Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Roots of Surrealism

These are few examples I selected/extracted/scanned from old books (in a Dadaesque process maybe)  that show ancient imagery. 
These images and subsequent ones (mostly by Hieronymus Bosch ) eventually fed the surrealist aesthetic*. I think this movement was not a total rupture from western art but the highest expression of an ever present, yet subjacent, way to see the world. Just beautifully mad. 

Surrealism is based on the belief in the superior reality of certain forms of previously neglected associations, in the omnipotence of dream, in the disinterested play of thought. It tends to ruin once and for all other psychic mechanisms and to substitute itself for them in solving all the principal problems of life.



















  

2 comments:

chasingtales2 said...

I've always particularly loved all the "danse macabre" style imagery. Was the intention to somehow make death less fearful to the common folk? Otherwise, what were the good monks smoking?

magnifik said...

Fantastic stuff man! Love 'em! Such great found!

You got a nice blog here.

P.S. Junebug finally told me who you are! In the beginning at flickr I had no idea. Great knowing ya!