Been thinking a lot about how Surrealism,originally this radical art and literary movement aimed at unlocking the unconscious mind,unexpectedly shaped some of the seemingly random,”whimsical” art we see today. It’s easy to dismiss certain modern aesthetics as just being quirky or deliberately weird, but so much of it has roots in Surrealism’s challenge to conventional forms and rational thought.
I mean, consider the dream logic often employed in contemporary illustration or animation. That non-sequitur feeling, where images and ideas collide without obvious connection, directly echoes the techniques used by Magritte or Dalí.Even the current trend of mixing unexpected textures or materials in design – is a sculptural object made from bottle caps, or a painting that incorporates found objects really that far removed from Duchamp’s “readymades” and the surrealist object?
It makes you wonder, are we actually surrounded by a diluted, more palatable form of Surrealism than we realize? Does understanding this historical context change how we perceive art that seems deliberately absurd or unconventional?