André Breton

the other Surrealists. On 5 February 1932, he was summoned before a Surrealist tribunal headed by Andre Breton, the founder of Surrealism. Dali turned up wrapped in warm clothing, claiming that he had a cold. He stuffed a thermometer in his mouth which stifled his replies. He distracted his accusers by constantly taking off and putting on his warm clothing. He also threatened to humiliate Andre Breton who had a horror of homosexuality. Thanks to his theatrics and rhetoric, no action was taken…

well reputed, thoroughly studied, and widely influential artists today, has been comprehensively misunderstood and exploited since before she had achieved international notoriety. Kahlo’s relationship with the surrealist movement is complicated; André Breton and his fellow surrealists considered Kahlo’s paintings to be archetypal surrealist works due to their outlandish imagery and fantastic themes, yet Kahlo herself rejected the title and even disdained certain fundamental aspects of the…

Surrealism Surrealism began in the early 1920s, following the end of World War One and the Dada movement. Artists who participated in this movement focused on the potential of the unconscious mind and studied psychology in order to create their art. Salvador Dali is one of the most well-known surrealist artists. His most famous work was ‘The Persistence of Memory’, a painting created in 1931. Another influential surrealist artist was Man Ray, one of his most famous works was ‘Gift’, a…

I have chosen collection of Andre Breton’s poetry to suggest some examples. All the first hand irrational and illogical ideas come from an unconscious mind. According to Jung “Dreams are the soil from which more symbols originally grow. The reason for this is that anything we heard…

of WWI. The Dada encouraged artists and writers to go against nationalist and bourgeois conventions, it mocked nationalism and materialism which many believed had led to the war. Surrealism was also influenced by the Dada movement. Its founder, André Breton who experienced working with shell-shocked war patients as a medical student, abandoned medicine…

Luis Bunuel pioneered surrealist cinema. Many of his films revolve around three themes he was fanatic about. These being, religion, class and sexual desire. These topics can be linked to Bunuel’s early years. He was born on February 22nd, 1900 in Calanda, Spain. His birthplace was of highly religious mindset as many places were in Spain. In Bunuel’s semi autobiography My Last Breath he says, “The middle ages lasted until World War I” (8). The “Miracle of Calanda” (13) was a tale in which an…

Frida Kahlo, a Mexican artist born in 1907 is best known and remembered for her self-portraits that were brilliantly vibrant coloured and bold, along with her passion and pain. Kahlo started painting mostly self-portraits after she was severely injured in a bus accident, as she was slowly recovering in a body cast. During this time, she taught herself to read and paint often, while studying the art of the Old Masters. Common themes that were in Kahlo’s approx. 200 paintings, sketches and…

Introduction In this essay document I will discuss the use of vernacular imagery and their particular contexts, function, relevance and the artistic intent that gave birth to these examples. According to merriam-webster.com dictionary, the word ‘vernacular’ means to relate to the shared style of a specific time, place, or group (Merriam-webster.com, 2014). 1. Dada Dada was an Artistic and literary movement that started in Zurich in 1916. The Dadaists guided their…

Could you imagine not being able to listen to your favorite songs on the radio? Had the radio not been invented in the 1920s that would be the case. “The first commercial radio station in the U.S., Pittsburgh’s KDKA, hit the airwaves in 1920... By the end of the 1920s, there were radios in more than 12 million households” (“The Roaring Twenties”). In addition to the radios there was much more going on in the 20s. During the 1920s there was several things taking place such as Prohibition,…

Surrealism and Art in the 20th century: An Exploration of its effects on the art Since the 20th century was mostly dominated by enormous wars, such as the most popular First World War and Second World War and the outbreak of several civils wars, it is nothing but a normal aspect of the effects of war to have major reformations in several aspects of society. Influenced by the powerful Sigmund Freud, several artists and scholars at the time began to use their unconsciousness and imagination to…