Page 49 - Studio International - December1996

attitude towards the money-grubbers and social climbers `ENCYCL. Philos. Surrealism is based on the belief in
caused him from time to time to excommunicate tem- the superior reality of certain forms of association here-
porarily some of the most brilliant and untainted mem- tofore neglected, in the omnipotence of the dream, and in
bers of the group, but it was the political question which the disinterested play of thought. It leads to the perma-
caused the deepest rifts. Breton's sympathy lay with the nent destruction of all other psychic mechanisms and to
theory of perpetual and universal revolution which caused its substitution for them in the solution of the principal
him to abhor developments in Russian Communism after problems of life.'
Trotzky was expelled, and it was finally on these grounds Breton's belief in the imagination led him to declare that
that he parted company with his closest and most able `hallucinations, illusions, are not a negligible source of
friend Paul Eluard at the beginning of the last war. pleasure. . . . The confidences of madmen : I would
Later, as the clear-cut distinction between fascism and spend my life in provoking them.' This led him into a
democracy became increasingly blurred, Breton became very daring free-for-all which could have become as
less active in the political sphere. This was encouraged by chaotic as it is romantic, but being linked with his intense,
his exile in the United States during the war. With his almost puritanical desire to transform the world, it
unfaltering belief in his own culture and his distaste for developed into a systematic endeavour to discover a new
speaking English it is surprising how much he and other logic which would supersede what we know as common
Surrealists who had taken the same path to America sense and a form of art which would annihilate the trivial
managed to influence the painters and poets they met and the insincere.
during those years. Few of us now appreciate that it was Although Breton enjoyed the writing of manifestos
Breton's theories of automatic expression brought about which at this period was a favourite method of tilting
by a freeing of the subconscious and the deliberate use of with one's adversaries, he also used his theories to produce
fortuitous happenings that was largely responsible for experimental novels such as Nadja and critical works such
Jackson Pollock and the abstract expressionist movement as Le Surréalisme et la Peinture. He was also a poet of dis-
in New York. In this way and many others Surrealism tinction. But apart from his gift of animating a movement
entered into a new phase in which the group which had as turbulent and productive as Surrealism, it was his deep
distinguished itself with such brilliance in the twenties appreciation of painting and the fortunate situation in
and thirties disintegrated but the ideas on which it was which he found himself surrounded by artists of rare and
founded continued to influence contemporary thought. varied talent that gave him a key position in the period
On his return to Paris Breton found himself surrounded between the wars. He wrote with great understanding not
by an enthusiastic but much less talented group of young only about the painting of Picasso but about Picasso the
artists, and nothing fundamental was added to his poet. He collaborated with Max Ernst in books such as
theories. However, it would be wrong to suppose that Le Chdteau Etoilé, and in those numbers of Le Minotaure
Surrealism ended with the war. To understand the full which appeared during the thirties he contributed many
impact of Breton's attitude and writings it is necessary to brilliant articles on Duchamp, Masson, Tanguy, Dali and
turn to the manifestos which he brought out twenty many other painters who were in their prime.
years before. The first one dating from 1924 was an As far as we were concerned in London, it was the
authoritative statement of the meaning of Surrealism: INTERNATIONAL SURREALIST exhibition of 1936 that gave
`We are still living under the reign of logic, but the logical us a sense of his authority and good judgement—a judge-
processes of our time apply only to the solution of prob- ment which was never conventional or 'aesthetic' but
lems of secondary interest. The absolute rationalism combined in it his knowledge of the arts of all time,
which remains in fashion allows for the consideration of primitive and spontaneous, and the close responsibility of
only those facts narrowly relevant to our experience. the artist to the moral, social and political situation. I
Logical conclusions, on the other hand, escape us.' He shall never forget the rapidity with which a painting by
then goes on to point out, giving credit to Freud, that: Chirico of the twenties that had strayed into the exhibi-
`If the depths of our minds conceal strange forces capable tion among other earlier Chiricos was thrown out when
of augmenting or conquering those on the surface, it is in Breton saw that it contained an Italian (then fascist) flag.
our greatest interest to capture them.' The dream, he If we forget the controversies, the exaggerations, and the
points out, is at the disposal of us all, while other more enemies for which Breton was responsible, we should be
unusual states of mind, such as the trance and even doing him a grave injustice. It is impossible to live with
hysteria, can be the key to the deeper realms of the ideas that are demanding expression, to be one of those
imagination, and stressing the poet's research into the marked by l'étoile au front, without reaping the conse-
mysteries that we can call sur-reality, he finds that there is quences. When we make our reckoning, Breton emerges
one thing above all that is worthy of our attention, the as one who has sown ideas that are not to be reaped
marvellous. 'The marvellous,' he says, 'is always beau- hastily. They remain for us in his writings and also in a
tiful, everything marvellous is beautiful. Nothing but the way of thought and action which has far-reaching conse-
marvellous is beautiful.' The manifesto finishes with a quences and which has yet to be fully appreciated. The
definition of Surrealism: urge to explore beyond painting and beyond our feeble
`SURREALISM, noun, masc. Pure psychic auto- perception of reality has been given a formidable and
matism by which it is intended to express, either verbally lasting impetus by Andre Breton.
or in writing, the true function of thought. Thought dic-
tated in the absence of all control exerted by reason, and (Quotations from Breton's writings taken from Surrealism
outside all aesthetic or moral preoccupations. by Patrick Waldberg, Thames & Hudson, 1965.)