Final Rough Draft
Surrealism and Salvador Dali
Surrealism is defined as an art style developed in the
1920 's in Europe, characterized by using the subconscious
as a source of creativity to liberate pictural subjects and
ideas. Surrealist paintings often depict unexpected or
irrational objects in an atmosphere or fantasy , creating a
dreamlike scenario ( www.progressiveart.com 2004). The word
Surrealism was created in 1917 by the writer Guillaune
Apollinaire. He used it to describe two instances of
artistic innovation ( Bradley 6). In 1924, in the
Manifeste du Surrealisme which launched the surrealist
movement, the writer Andre Brenton and his friend Philippe
Soupault adopted the word,"baptised by the name of
Surrealism the new mode of expression which we had at our
disposal and which we wished to pass on to our friends."
Brenton adopted the word Surrealism to describe the
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literary and artistic practice of himself and his
"friends." Some examples of Surrealist art are; M.C.
Escher 's "Drawing Hands," Salvador Dali 's "The Persistence
of Memory," (1931) , and Salvador Dali 's "Remorse." (1931)
One of Dali 's more famous paintings, "The Persistence
of Memory," was first shown June 1931 at The Pierre Cole
Gallery in Paris. Essentially the soft watches demonstrate
that one aspect of the paranoiac critical method is it 's
capacity to link objects to qualities normally associated
with other, completely different , elements .Dali painted
the setting first, a deserted landscape at Port Lligat
where he and Gala had bought a fisherman 's hut the previous
summer. in the foreground the self-portrait motif reappears
in the form of a foetus abandoned on a beach. This refers
to Dali 's professed memories of intrauterine life and
suggests the trauma of birth. A watch sagging across the
foetus and another hanging from a
Bibliography: London, 1990. Danbury Connecticut, 1993 . Danbury Connecticut, 1993 . N.Y. , Da Capo Press, 1995. N.Y. , New Directions Publishing Corp. , 1988. United Kingdom, 1997. Spain, 1994. N.Y., 1990.