Salvador_Dali_&_Surrealism

Art Speech Transcript by Tom Bottrill Salvador Dali & Surrealism Surrealism The dominant motivation of surrealist painting and construction is to bring together, into a single composition, aspects of outer and inner reality in much the same way seemingly unrelated fragments of life combine in the vivid world of dreams. In the “Manifesto of Surrealism” Andre Breton defined surrealism as, “pure psychic automatism by which is intended to express…the true function of thought. Thought dictated in the absence of all control exerted by reason and outside all aesthetic or moral preoccupations…Surrealism is based on the belief in the superior reality of certain forms of association heretofore neglected, in the omnipotence of the dream”. Beginning in the early 1920’s Surrealism directly preceded and was developed out of, the Dada activities of World War I. From the 1920’s onwards, the movement spread around the globe, eventually affecting the visual arts, literature, film and the music and languages of many countries, as well as political thought and practice, philosophy and social theory. Surrealist leader and theorist André Breton, was explicit in his assertion that Surrealism was above all, a revolutionary movement and one of the most influential and significant artists of that movement was Salvador Dali. Dali (Brief Bio)/Artist Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquis of Púbol, was an extremely prominent Catalan surrealist artist. Born on 11th May 1904 in the Spanish town of Figueres, Catalonia, he died on 23rd January 1989. Whether it was Dali’s eccentric attitude, his bizarre moustache or his amazing surrealist art, he became one of the world’s most famous and internationally recognized artists. He was prolific, producing over 1500 paintings alone. In 1922 Dali moved to Madrid, to pursue painting at the Academy of Arts. Within the Academy, he experimented with both cubism and Dadaism. He later moved to Paris, where he mixed with other progressive artists such as Pablo Picasso. Here, Dali produced some of his most famous works including, “The Great Masturbator” and “The Persistence of Memory”, both of which have come to represent the very essence of Surrealism. In 1934 Dali married Helena Diakonova, who came to be known as “Gala”. The couple moved to the United States, where Dali found great success and celebrity. In 1982 Gala passed away and in 1984 Dali moved back to his home town of Figueres, where he died 5 years later. Dali had a rich and fulfilling life in which he devoured many influences from different artistic styles, artists, objects and those around him. World/Influences As a child, Dali spent a holiday visiting the Picot family of artists, where he was encouraged and advised to pursue art. At a later time, during his enrolment at the Academy of Arts, he met a surrealist filmmaker, Luis Buñuel. Dali was extremely fond of his work and at a time when Dali had not yet settled on a particular style, Buñuel’s work in Surrealism peaked Dali’s interest and is likely the reason Dali decided to explore the style. Throughout his life, Dali was heavily influenced by his world. Garcia Lorca, a good friend, Paul Edward of the surrealist movement and Gala his wife were among some of the most significant figures in his life. Additionally, Dali’s works were influenced by more trivial things such as money, the telephone and even “the shape of Hitler’s back”. Many believed his desire for money caused him to sacrifice artistic integrity; the telephone was a recurring theme and he was fascinated with the shape of Hitler’s back, causing much controversy and one of the factors in his expulsion from the surrealists. Despite Dali’s many influences, it is argued Sigmund Freud had, above all, the most profound effect on his life. Reacting to Freud’s theories on dreams and the unconscious, many of Dali’s concepts and understandings were developed. Audience Like most artists, Dali created art for himself. He wanted to translate his bizarre dreamscapes and haunting ideas into a physical existence on canvas. He encouraged his unconscious thoughts and fuelled his ego, by deliberately realising his imagination. The surrealists of the time believed the only way to truly tap into one’s unconscious, was through automatism (The writing or drawing without conscious control in order to free one’s self from reason). Dali challenged his fellow surrealists by employing his own version of automatism, where he consciously and deliberately projected his unconscious thoughts onto canvas. Despite Dali’s deliberation, the imaginative power of his imagery was so great he overshadowed his fellow surrealists. The so-called, “pope of surrealism”, Andre Breton, admitted that, ‘It is perhaps with Dali that for the first time the windows of the mind are fully opened’. While Dali painted for himself, he also had an enormous public following. Over the years he skilfully manipulated the media, resulting in fame and skyrocketing success. He created a public persona, bringing him attention and an audience. Charles Stuckie, author and expert on 20th Century art, claims, “Dali was never given credit for his character”. At the time, the public did not appreciate his confronting honesty and general crassness. Instead, people praised Dali for his bizarre content, technical skill and imagery. The public was shocked by the bizarre nature of his works, often feeling something vague and disturbed; a realisation that there may be more than they could grasp. With growing popularity and recognition, people began to expect a Dali work would include disturbing images or suggestions of death, violence, cannibalism or bizarre sexual practices. Dali knew that everyone would view his works differently, with every individual’s unconscious mind and differing qualities allowing them to see the same work from a unique perspective. Material Practice and Conceptual Practice Dali’s oil painting technique was traditionally based but combined materials and methods in a manner unique to him. His signature style began with his connection to the Metaphysical as a hyper- realist artist. Metaphysical art sprang from the urge to explore the imagined inner life of familiar objects, when represented out of their explanatory contexts and the secret dialogue that may take place between them. Realist art, as the name implies, is an artistic style where an object/subject is represented in a convincing way, accurate to the human eye, or in other words, is "in accordance with secular empirical rules,”. Realist and Metaphysical art were not pioneered by Dali, already existing as established styles, however, Dali was unique in the way he combined them. Using a realist style, he painted dream-like views. His amazing dreamscapes were completed in a way which made them seem real, so that impossible events within his works, appeared possible. Dali further developed his illusionistic style with his use of the Paranoiac-critical Method. This is a surrealist technique he himself developed in the early 1930’s and he employed this technique in many of his paintings and other artworks, especially those involving optical illusions and other multiple images. The development of this technique came from Dali’s interest in paranoia. He was fascinated and inspired by the aspect of paranoia that allowed one’s mind the ability to perceive links between things that are rationally not linked. He described the paranoiac-critical method as a, "spontaneous method of irrational knowledge based on the critical and systematic objectivity of the associations and interpretations of delirious phenomena." This method involved an active process of the mind to visualize multiple images within a work. The result is an ambiguous image which can be interpreted in different ways. André Breton hailed the method, saying that Dali’s paranoiac-critical method was an, "instrument of primary importance" and that it, "has immediately shown itself capable of being applied equally to painting, poetry, the cinema, the construction of typical Surrealist objects, fashion, sculpture, the history of art, and even, if necessary, all manner of exegesis." Dali’s art represented a visionary world which engaged most immediately with the unconscious mind, beyond physical reality, where nothing is bound by rules or impossibilities. Through his artistic character and his experiments within different styles and media, Dali’s single most important, overarching objective in art was, "to materialize the images of concrete irrationality with the most imperialistic fury of precision", that is, to make the unreal seem more real than true reality. Dali built his art on this premise of a paradox; reality combined with unreality, and lived his life this same way. He was irrational in his behaviour, but rational in the way in which he promoted himself and his art to worldwide fame. His life was, in many ways, a parallel of the concepts presented within his art and he managed to synchronize his life with his art. For Dali, this dream-like paradox of real vs. unreal was surrealism. Structural + Subjective frame/artwork Dali works from the structural frame with his use of multiple symbols of multiple symbolic meaning, to suggest evocations from his subconscious- unconscious. Within Dali’s most famous work,” The Persistence Of Memory”, his use of the structural frame is extremely evident due to the abundance of signs and symbols within the painting. Scattered within the picture, are melted watches, an amorphous creature lying flat with an eye closed and a tree growing out of a non-descript block of static matter. The atmosphere is calm, masking the friction between the incongruous images. Many art historians have said that the ‘monster’ within the centre of the painting, actually represents Dali himself and that “its long eyelashes seem disturbingly sexual” , symbolic of Dali’s many bizarre and disturbing sexual fantasies. Perhaps this is also symbolic of how he pictured himself; somewhat peaceful and yet lost with no concept of time to keep him going forward. Many also consider the melting watches symbolize the irrelevance of time and Einstein's theory that time is relative and not fixed. Art historians also suggest that the ants present within the painting represent both death and female genitalia. Although no final conclusion can be made about the painting, many academics have suggested the juxtaposition between hard and soft, the melting clocks and the sense of timelessness, the symbolic ants (death/femininity) and the strange creature (Dali) are symbols that together represent the trauma of birth and, more specifically, the trauma of leaving the safe and timeless nature of the womb. However, this is just speculation. Dali’s works are always surrounded with uncertainty because he works through the subjective frame. At the very core of his practice, he tries to realize the bizarre and impossible images, present within his conscious mind. His works have a personal connection with his audience, each viewer seeing things differently. The images originate from the unconscious mind, making the imagery connect to the individual on a psychological level about which the viewer is unaware. All aspects of the subjective frame directly link with Dali and his practice, from the deeply felt and sensory experience, to imagination, intuition, originality, creative expression, human consciousness and the aesthetic response. Much of the same can also be said for the surrealist movement itself but Dali truly embodies the frame. Conclusion Dali was a truly amazing person. Whether he is remembered for his strange eccentricities, his obsession with money and the media or his revolutionary art, it is undeniable that he greatly influenced the artistic landscape and changed the art world as we know it. In the words of Charles Stuckie, Curator of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, “ Dali has to rate in my mind as one of the top five artists of the 20th Century”.