What Is Surrealism?: Selected Writings

Rosemont, the editor, provides an excellent (and impassioned) introduction which places surrealism in a clear political and historical context, necessary for truly understanding the movement. He seems to be a dedicated surrealist himself- and who better to explain a movement than one of its members? Though his writing is certainly not unbiased; he places surrealism and Breton on the highest pedestal possible. However, this level of passionate writing and dedication rings true to the movement as a whole. Breton's work, of course, is excellent. This translation holds true to the meanings and passions of the work.

This book is about the intersection between art and revolutionary politics.In the 1930s the leading figures of the surrealist movement and a few other artists and writers tried to cut out some political space for artists who supported a revolutionary overturn of the system that birthed fascism and world war - capitalism .The same "globalized" capitalism that exists today, and which is marching toward fascism and world war all over again. In the 1930s, there was another challenge for would-be revolutionary artists : the obstacle of the mass"Communist" parties which betrayed them and workers and farmers around the world in the interests of the "Soviet" bureaucrats headed by Stalin, which same bureaucracy stifled and suffocated all art and creativity inside the USSR.The struggle of those artists, led by Andre Breton and Diego Rivera, and their direct collaboration with the Russian revolutionary leader in exile Leon Trotsky, has rich lessons for those artists of all kinds who are already beginning to reject and revolt against the "globalized" capitalism of today. As well as those who will do so tommorow.

Well, what a shock. A totally human, big, fat tome on an art form that I've never enjoyed. Makes understandable and useful for one's own life the surrealists' aim of dissolving the alienating barriers between thought and action, dream and consciousness, art and life. Their appreciation of Freud; their collaboration with communists, with Leon Trotsky; their rejection of fatherland, religion, family - all flowing from their determination to be part of the birth of a new world in which there would be no poets because all would make poetry. Fascinating section of documents including a brief homage to Hopi art, denunciation of Salvador Dali for being pro-fascist, support to the Algerian independence fight. Still don't enjoy the surrealists' work. But do enjoy them now.

This book will give you a good understanding of the surrealist movement. You will read the artists' writings not only on this subject, but also their views on the important political questions of the day which they understood were tied to cultural questions. A photo display in the book gives you a sampling of surrealist works. There is also an excellent glossary of names that reveals the evolution of the surrealists in later years. You gain an appreciation for the international breadth of the movement. 'What is Surrealism?' is not just for art history students. Anyone wishing to gain a deeper understanding of the relationship between art and politics will be fascinated by collection of articles in this book.

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