Surrealist Manifesto

Salvador Dalí’s Lobster Telephone (1936) is, perhaps, one of the most influential and distinguishable surrealist objects from the 20th century. Commissioned by the English poet and great patron of surrealism, Edward James, the work is a humorous fusion of life and technology. It is comprised of an artificial lobster mounted upon the handset of a functional rotary dial telephone (Figure 1). This comical arrangement was duplicated by Dalí into several off-white versions and the symbolism of the…

doubt, one of the greatest, most controversial, and influential visual artist of the 20th century. During the several significant stylistic shifts Picasso went through—most notably the Blue Period, Rose Period, Cubist Period, African Period, and Surrealist Period—Picasso explored the emotionally provocative power of different colors, went beyond the boundaries of artistic conventions by creating entirely new forms of expression, and earnestly employed stylistic innovations in his contemporary…

Figure 4: Watts, J. (n.d.). Mae West from the cover of Mae West: An Icon in Black and White. [image] Available at: http://www.jahsonic.com/MaeWest.jpg 2.2 Similarities and differences between the Surrealist Movement and Pop Art Surrealism started in the early 1920’s and Pop Art started in the 1950’s. Surrealist communicated the emotional component of the artist’s perspective and Pop art is generally shown through items of current interest of the time, taking objects/headshots/comic books and…

life, which was illustrated as art. The combination of the two eras led to the creation of an art form that was unknown and out of the art world. Surrealists used their subconscious mind and creativity to turn the reality into a dream, which made outstanding pieces of art. The artist Andre Breton was the founder of this movement. His belief, “true surrealists had no real talent; they just spoke…

The Surrealist Movement was a creative effort to established a new style. Prominent figures and influencers during this twentieth-century movement were Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, André Breton, and Max Ernest (Dickerson 213). As a way to diverge from previous writing and artistic norms, artists began to use the idea of the unconscious mind as a way to better exemplify one's own imagination and mind. In the works "The Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe, and The Persistence of Memory by Salvador…

In 1929 during the Surrealist movement, Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí created Un Chien Andalou. The film leaves a lasting impression on all its viewers and leaves them wondering what the purpose of the film was. It has no plot; it is a series of shots that do not link together. Title cards separate the shots and notify changes in time that do not match up with what is happening in the shots. The film pushed boundaries with its content and caused uproar among viewers. The purpose of the film Un…

constantly being challenged to be unique, different, inspired etc. in our field of work. In this essay I will be discussing one of Adam Martinakas’ works, namely, The Divisions of Pleasure, 2012(Figure 1). I will be discussing its relevance to the Surrealist movement in its style by using two examples of Rene Magritte i.e. The Lover II, 1928(Figure 2) and The Wonders of Nature, 1983(Figure 3). I will be using both formal and contextual analysis to…

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…

by the Spanish artist Salvador Dali (1904-1989). This Metamorphosis of Narcissus’ genre is a figure within a landscape. This picture is an open composition. What is surrealism? Surrealism is an artistic movement that started in 1924 when the Surrealist Manifesto was published. A French poet named Andre Breton (1924 through World War 2) led surrealism. Surrealism started in Paris and then spread internationally. Salvador Dali Quoted “Surrealism is destructive, but it destroys only what it…

There has been great debate over the difference between the surrealist and the avant-garde, and whether or not they are simply different branches of the same movement, that surrealism is just a romanticised extension of the avant-garde. André Breton, the movement’s considered leader, regarded surrealism as a belief in superior forms of reality in his 1924 Surrealist Manifesto, and irrespective of more contemporary arguments over the exact definition or difference, was above all explicit in his…