by Malcolm WImrie fringe STERIES revolutionary' the I's ironic, but not surprising, thai most passes surrealism today in Britain would been violently: atlacked Themselves. Certainly true of the current jamboree in London, wiuch Revisited' exhibition at the Hayward Gallery supplement reminiscences and lectures that surrealism has boen reduced to a colourfel and slighly scandalous period "history" of European Art, Helped in this by the fame of Salvador Dali and the mistaken notion that he typities surrealism On tact he was expelled from the group for his sympathy with fascism and re-christened Avida Dollars). surrealism is left with an image which in only in the •SENSE THE powder ads give the word.
To transform the world, to change life, ard to remake human understanding from scratch (Andre Breton) is probably as good a sumerary as any of the aims of surrealism. "Transform the world' comes from Marx; "change life' is taken from Rimbaud, the poet who thed to 'seer' throuch disordering of all the senses". The surrealists wanted to change not just the economic conditions of life, but every aspect of how we live in the world, how we perceive it/ourselves, how we communicate Particuluriy, all that схоса пол "poor everyday life, needed to be released. So they were concerned, from the start, with dreams and with the unconscious, as a soarce of new which had, in some way. to be merged with "conscious life. They great hopes on that potential wity. Anyrhing which could break chrough the barrier of institutions channeled and sustained it (ideologies, though usually talked of Automatic writing. [produced in various forms trance). chance events meetings, the bringing together of unlikely objects/ideas, verbal and physical attacks on religion, putriotism, the family, The paintings and poems are records o1 this exploration.
Psol lizards. are hidden under every stone, wrote Bretoo.
Benjamin Peret, one of the most consistently nctive surrealists (later, till 1948, a member of the Fourth Internationali said, today has no orber choice than to revalutionist or not to be a poet. One of the many questions begged by that was what kind ol relationship they were to have to "the social revolution', They agreed, in 1925, 'we are not utopianists, we can conceive of revolution only In ES SOCIal FOR Even it overthrowing only a starting , there was still the probiem o carly 30e, the surrealists debared that question. reach that point. From 1925 to the For some of them, even vague support for the revolution was too much. Louis Arugon called it a mere 'ministerial crisis" (be changed rapidly - ditching surrealism and cobracing Stalinism in 1932, just us many inchiding Breton, expelled from the French Connuant Part their continuing attacks degeneration of the LiSSR), For others, faced with the fact that their own governmicot was engaged in an imperialist war in Morocco, and that there was a Left Opposition, under threat, within the Third Incorational, it was time to take sides more specifically.
Pierre Naville, a member of the original sancalet group, tried to force the issue. the abolition otthe nonreenis condilions DI marena. life a nocessary condition of the Siberation? alroady collaborating in producing Clarie, a journal of oppositionists within the PCE. Hos much famher would they go? Breton replied TENTS NUIS by the that's in the eternal become an revolution he Paris Dada groa to caplain the esample systematising. is true that repetitions, PANELILLY confined indication at least ot differences was the d complete reality of pinned that "moralities') was drawing.
Who wete the surrealists? Surrealison was to International movenient, groups active in most European countries, ID Latin Anterica, North Africa, the Middle East and Japan. It began in Paris, in 1921-3, w10 a small croup of intellectuals, mostly in their World War ash witse the holster witnessed Bolshevik • Some of them had formed part of There are lots of glib formulas which preter spill between surrealism Dada: Dada as destructive or negative surrealism as constructive ar conversely. surrealism Dada random because within the arena the surrcalises, of the work of Freud and Marx. history of revolationary available in predecessors of the movement.
IT 1 ASTRATIONS, (Top) Andre Breton The nam philet But there's another sue to this new anterest published by Pluto, one an introduction by someone who is still a "surrealist activist' in the other, a vast anchology of material by Andre Breton, who was the domicant Seareda l movement, Taken together, they can remind us that surrealism sc an important part of the Jong-overiue reminder, The Breton anthologs includes examples of nost kinds of written products of surrealem — from manifestoes to experiments in reproducing states of ment disorder" — few of which have previously beer translation. •Pen Ruin have followed suit with a collection of English anc American surrealist poetry and a clicap edition of the Songr of Muldoror, a vision of what on: surrealist called the everyday monster. iron man forged by capitalist society" by
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condemning Ardeon's role during the trial of the Russian writers Darticl and Siniavsky, 1966, It's tbe cover of a surrealist
What is Surrealism. Selected Writings of Andre Enter sion by Muld rodo Sure let _ Franklin Resemont: Pluto El.HO Andre Brefon and the Find Principles Breton: Pluto 25.00 Penguin.