Robert Hubbard

April 8, 2010

Hammond

Surrealism: The Subconscious Mind

The oxford english dictionary defines surrealism as, "A movement in art and literature seeking to express the subconscious mind by any of a number of different techniques, including the irrational juxtaposition of realistic images, the creation of mysterious symbols, and automatism." This artistic movement began in the early 1920s and spread throughout paintings, films, and literature. The best example of a surrealist is Salvador Dali and his paintings like the one shown above. The style is odd and non-conventional. Known objects are seen and recognized but they are shown in a way that is distorted and out of place. Like the clocks in the picture, the objects portray an image that could be the representation of a dream.

In dreams your mind often takes objects seen throughout the day and puts them together in odd ways that make sense to you but are not in touch with reality. Trying to relate these strange visions to other people can be difficult and the more detail you can uncover about the dream the less sense it begins to make. LIkewise, Dali's paintings seem normal at first but as you look closely they begin to seem strange and unusual. The clocks are hanging off the table and on the tree limb like cloth or rubber. The tree is growing off the table and the horizon line is not even. These images represent something from the conscience mind of Dali but anyone who sees the image can have their own interpretation based off of their own personal experience.

When I look at "The Persistence Of Memory" I think of somebody lost in the desert. To me the drooping disfigured clocks represent how time is only an illusion. They are showing the relativity of time and is unimportance when you are all alone wandering the desert barely alive. The landscape reminds me of a desert and the horizon line looks like water on the horizon which could be a mirage caused by dehydration and hallucination. The dead tree looks like despair. The image as a whole brings me to a dream of wandering the desert with no hope of survival. There is no water to be found and I have lost track of time. To someone else this image might be representing something very different, but that is up the ones individual conscience.

Surrealism has also showed up in film. David Lynch is a famous director who has often used a surrealistic approach in his films. His films seem to be non linear and jump to parallel universes, He uses images that he creates on his own to draw an emotional response from the audience. In Lynch's film "Fire Walk With Me" he uses a little boy in a clay mask with a long nose to represent fear and a large gorilla to represent the face of death. Lynch's films are successful because people seem to share the meaning of these different symbols. If people had very different connotations for the strange characters he pulls from his mind then the film would only make sense to the director. But because there seems to be a basis for the way people perceive things, what Lynch dreams up can be shared by others as well.

I find this style of art very interesting because it offers a window into the stranger parts of an artists mind. Any piece of art can tell something about its creator but it often only tells about the sane parts. There is a little bit of insanity inside of everyone and someone who can capture that hidden nature and share its experience with others has found a whole new way of expression and experience. I enjoyed watching "Fire Walk With Me" and I was pleased that in the end many lose ends were tied up and the film did not remain non-linear. It is easy for a director to create a film where things are strange and appear to have no explanation but only a great director is able to that those events and explain them in a way that new and exciting.