Luncheon In Fur Meret Essay

Like many artists Meret’s work was not originally recognized for what it was worth, infact it’s amazing how soon her work took off considering that she was a female artist of of the 20’s in a field that was so consistent of men. Born in Berlin-Charlottenburg, Germany on October 6th 1913 and died on November 15th of 1985 of a heart attack. She came from a family background of psychoanalysts, which gave her a different level than the other surrealists in how her work affected people and their mind. Oppenheim’s work is both dream and nightmare like, she once said that "It's the artists who do the dreaming for society." (Oppenheim), it was also beautiful and sometimes gory, which is why she was such a big staple in the surrealist movement. Even though in the beginning she had to work extremely hard to persuade the surrealists to let her in the group because it was almost strictly men before she became a part of it.
Meret Oppenheim is best known for her piece called Object or also known as Luncheon in Fur it is also the piece that she got the most recognition for. Normally
this would be considered an amazing thing but to her it was a horrible thing. This is because when you are only connected to one of your works it's almost like being haunted by that one work, there were also people that began assuming she only did art like that. To Meret that was almost insulting because she was more than just that one work, she did more than just that style of art, she did not just have one style of art in general in the art that she created. She manifests her work in all sorts of media, from live person installations/performances to paintings to poetry to sketches from her old school notebooks. Oppenheim used both real and fake materials but considered it all natural material because even man made things like plastic is natural.
Throughout her years as an artist she had many themes that she evoked through her art like food, sex, death, cannibalism,and bondage but with her own creative take.
Some of her works even include all of those themes like Spring Banquet/Cannibal Feast. These are the things that make her art stand out so much because during her time these kinds of things were not common and often looked down upon by those outside of the art world for its unusualness and provocative nature. The statements that she made with her art was also looked down upon. For example she confronted the conventional roles of what women need to be and needed to do which is why she is widely considered part of the feminist movement and Oppenheim never outright declined this but she was more concerned with just removing gender from art in whole. That it should not be considered more masculine than it is feminine for what it
is.
One of the biggest things to happen to her at a young age was the start of WWI even though that happened only a year after she was born it still had an impact on the way she grew up. Since her father was German and Jewish and her mother was Swiss they had to run away to Switzerland. But even after all that happened in her life, her parents and grandmother were always supporting her in her pursuit in art. Later in life she moved to Paris where she attended the Academie de la Grande Consumers for a short time. Being in Paris allowed her to connect to the art world in ways she couldn't before, she was able to meet and work with artists like Alberto Giacometti, Man Ray, and Andre Breton who helped her get her works in museums and used her as the muse for their own art.
I personally am mesmerized by Meret Oppenheim and her work, with all the different things that she makes it would be incredibly difficult to find a piece that someone wouldn't fall in love with or at least have a strong connection to. I also connect with her being a self-taught artist I like to try as many different kinds of media as I can to really get a grasp of what I can express with my work. Particularly the surrealist movement intrigues me because of its contradicting nature and very strong use of symbolism that is incomparable to any other art movement or period. I'm also moved by her goals and messages she tried to express with her work especially with removing gender from her art.