Reverie: The Art of Surrealism

reverie: The Art of Surrealism

What Is Surrealism?
Surrealism is a form of art that diverts it focus to the visualization of extreme elements. Surrealism is Inspired by the philosophy of psychoanalysis and all that Sigmund Freud psychology, Surrealism plays with the functions of ordinary subjects and turns them into extraordinary matters.

Reverse Mermaid, Rene Magritte, 1940

African Sonata, Vladimir Kush

Elephants Reflecting Swans, Salvador Dali, 1937

The Elephants, Salvador Dali, 1948

The Elephants Celebes, Max Ernst, 1920

Location: 

Basing of popularity, essentially the exhibition would be located in the main hall (across the library), of the E-Building. I find this location to be the heart of LaGuardia Community College. Ideally this is where events are held and where hundreds of people cross paths on the way to class in a daily basis, not to mention countless of artworks are honorably displayed behind the glass here each semester, therefore the variety of audience will have it's benefits on the exposure. Generally, there is no main target of audience for this exhibition. Audiences of all kinds are welcome, because there is no need to set a limitation on art. College students however make a great audience for art displays, especially during a day of stress and weariness, this exhibition will be a great to accompany one in their agony of boredom! 

Surrealism Art is fascinating in every possible way, aside from the mind blowing appearance, Surrealism vitally captures and psychologically bends a variety of themes. Overall, my demonstration of "reverie: The Art of Surrealism"  will be portraying the surrealist version nature with a bizarre twist. The exhibition provides a broad outlook on Surrealism, however they relate in a sense. My main goal is for audiences to figure out the concept of the paintings, so literal thinking isn't gonna do the deed here! With a theme like Surrealism, there is so much to understand and analyze. It's very rare for one to not develop a personal subjective thought to it's depiction. Surrealism is one form of art that is unbelievably unusual that one would have to pay more than an instant glance. Practically I would prefer the audience to indulge the visuals that are projected using senses beyond the eyes. I want to capture the attention of each individual for at least five minutes per artwork. Sure these piece are remarkably appealing, but what kind of exhibition would it be if one did not stop to sink in the elements of artwork. It may sound clique, but this method of approach would generally allow the audience to appreciate the purpose of the creativity of Surrealism.

As the curator of this show I picked these pieces because the oddity and strangeness each depict the interaction with animals and their environments. The first piece is "Reverse Mermaid" by Belgian Surrealist painter is quite vivid by the title. This equilibrium of ocean and sand shows the infused entity of woman and fish, hopelessly washed upon a shore. This piece is quite humorous to me because it twists the ideal image of a mermaid, which is usually depicted as beautiful women with a fish body. Rene takes this idea of a fantasy mermaid and reverses, making it less attractive but far more interesting and abstract. This minor idealization tells me that one shouldn't always have high hopes, things may come unexpected. As shown, you can see that I've purposely chose four pieces that involves the theme of elephants. The incorporation of elephants were unbelievably common in Surrealistic Art. One interesting statement is that elephants were believed to symbolize strength, power, and wisdom. In Thailand, it is said that the trunk of an elephant represented good luck. 
Introducing my collage of elephants, "African Sonata" by Vladimir Kush depicts three Elephants with trumpets as the head. The rule of odds are used and one would speculate that the artist is a fan of African themed music, therefore he mixed a national animal of Africa with trumpets. This painting has numerous implications of music, such as the harp on the antelope's head, the tuba grass, and the swans seems to resemble music notes. I chose this piece because of it's obvious strangeness, one wouldn't have to search for the surrealism in this painting because it is naked to the eye, also to show that themes are usually relate to the artist interest.
The third piece is "Elephants Reflecting Swans" by the amazing Salvador Dali, one of the most known and appreciated Surrealist painters. This painting shows a dry looking landscape. The swans are shown looking into the body of water however their reflections come out as elephants. Everything is heavily abstracted, such as the clouds, the tree branches except for the swans and the elephants, which appears to be the painted vividly. One can say that Salvador is trying to suggest that reflection of all animals are of one despite physical appearance, animals dwell on similar survival instincts.
It seems that Salvador Dali is in fact a fan of elephants at this point because the following is Dali's monochromatic piece, "The Elephants", which shows two thoughts of elephants, however they're heavily abstracted. The legs of these creatures of stretched out. I simply wanted to strive for variety and I saw this painting as an emptier piece because it dominantly projects a vacant warm orange background and the elephants are rather disheveled.
The final artwork is one of my favorite, Max Ernest "The Elephant Celebes". This picture shows a large figure, which appears to be the idea of an elephant, however distorted with horns, and a mechanical design to it. One can easily tell that this subject in the image is an elephants, but the way that the elephant is drawn allows one to think twice about what Ernest is trying to convey. 
Together these pieces seems to provide a sense of escape, an aspect that Surrealism essentially depicts, Nature is heavily portrayed in these painting and generally used as the setting to create the proper atmosphere for the artist message. As the curator, I would suppose that Surrealist Artist felt that Nature is so outstanding in numerous  ways and I wanted to propose the wild life, and the distinctive reality of their nature, and how it is such a phenomenal topic in Surrealism Art.