surrealism art definition

a style of art and literature developed principally in the 20th century, stressing the subconscious
or nonrational significance of imagery arrived at by automatism or the exploitation of chance
effects, unexpected juxtapositions, etc.
Although some may think Surrealism is just another art form, it's actually a cultural movement
that was expressed through art, literature, and even politics. WWI had a profound effect on
Europe, and many people believed that the conflict was a result of excessive rational thought and
the materialistic values of the middle and upper classes. Artists of this belief were known as
Dadaists, and they embraced chaos and the irrational. Surrealism developed out of this thought
process in Europe in the 1920s. Surrealism also embraced the psychoanalytical idea of
unconscious desires, or things we want that we don't know we want. The Surrealism movement
focused on these ideas of chaos and unconscious desires in an effort to dig deep into the
unconscious mind to find inspiration for political and artistic creativity. They believed this
rejection of overly rational thought would lead to superior ideas and expressions. Sound
interesting? Let's take a closer look.

Definition of Abstract Art:

Abstract art can be a painting or sculpture (including assemblage) that does not depict a person,
place or thing in the natural world. Note that works of art that represent the world in exaggerated
or distorted ways (such as the Cubist paintings of Paul Paul Czanne and Pablo Picasso) are not
abstract, for they present a type of conceptual realism. With abstract art, the subject of the work
is based on what you see: color, shapes, brushstrokes, size, scale and, in some cases, the process
(see action painting).
Why can Picasso/ Braque be described as a cubist painter?
Braque's paintings of 19081913 reflected his new interest in geometry and simultaneous
perspective. He conducted an intense study of the effects of light and perspective and the
technical means that painters use to represent these effects, seeming to question the most
standard of artistic conventions. In his village scenes, for example, Braque frequently reduced an
architectural structure to a geometric form approximating a cube, yet rendered its shading so that
it looked both flat and three-dimensional by fragmenting the image. He showed this in the
painting Houses at l'Estaque.
Beginning in 1909, Braque began to work closely with Pablo Picasso who had been developing a
similar proto-Cubist style of painting. At the time, Pablo Picasso was influenced by Gauguin,
Czanne, African masks and Iberian sculpture while Braque was interested mainly in developing
Czanne's ideas of multiple perspectives. A comparison of the works of Picasso and Braque
during 1908 reveals that the effect of his encounter with Picasso was more to accelerate and
intensify Braques exploration of Czannes ideas, rather than to divert his thinking in any
essential way.[3] Braques essential subject is the ordinary objects he has known practically

forever. Picasso celebrates animation, while Braque celebrates contemplation.[4] Thus, the
invention of Cubism was a joint effort between Picasso and Braque, then residents of
Montmartre, Paris. These artists were the style's main innovators. After meeting in October or
November 1907,[5] Braque and Picasso, in particular, began working on the development of
Cubism in 1908. Both artists produced paintings of monochromatic color and complex patterns
of faceted form, now termed Analytic Cubism.
A decisive time of its development occurred during the summer of 1911,[6] when Georges Braque
and Pablo Picasso painted side by side in Cret in the French Pyrenees, each artist producing
paintings that are difficultsometimes virtually impossibleto distinguish from those of the
other. In 1912, they began to experiment with collage and Braque invented the papier coll
technique.[7]
French art critic Louis Vauxcelles used the terms "bizarre cubiques" in 1908 after seeing a
picture by Braque. He described it as 'full of little cubes'. The term 'Cubism', first pronounced in
1911 with reference to artists exhibiting at the Salon des Indpendants, quickly gained wide use
but Picasso and Braque did not adopt it initially. Art historian Ernst Gombrich described Cubism
as "the most radical attempt to stamp out ambiguity and to enforce one reading of the picture
that of a man-made construction, a colored canvas."[8] The Cubist style spread quickly throughout
Paris and then Europe.
The two artists' productive collaboration continued and they worked closely together until the
beginning of World War I in 1914, when Braque enlisted with the French Army. In May 1915,
Braque received a severe head injury in battle at Carency and suffered temporary blindness.[9] He
was trepanned, and required a long period of recuperation.
Describe some of the typical characteristics of Impressionist paintings.??
Impressionist artists experimented with several new techniques and materials that became
defining characteristics of Impressionism. First off, they deliberately left their paintings looking
unfinished, at least by current artistic standards. Instead of painting detailed scenes with sharp
edges and defined shapes, they tried to express their visions of particular moments in time,
moments that were always fleeting and subject to the artists' changing perceptions. Impressionist
paintings sometimes seem a bit fuzzy and undefined, like a photograph that captures the subject
in motion. Impressionists achieved this look through various brush techniques. They used short,
quick brushstrokes that touched colors to the canvas in little comma-like shapes one after
another. Sometimes, they didn't bother to use a brush at all, applying paint to the canvas directly
from the tube.
Color became another major focus for Impressionist artists. They tended toward bright, pure
colors that seemed to jump off the canvas in their boldness and strike the viewer with their
intensity. Vividness was key, and Impressionists loved to use vibrant blues, greens, and yellows.
In fact, they even enjoyed playing with new synthetic pigments, like ultramarine and cerulean

blue, and they rarely mixed paints together, which tended to diminish the intensity of the colors.
They preferred to allow colors to blend in the eye of the viewer instead.
Finally, Impressionists were nearly obsessed with capturing the effects of light. They hauled their
easels, canvases, and paints outdoors to work en plein air and directly observe natural light and
shadows, which they then attempted to render in their paintings. Impressionists also paid close
attention to phenomena, like reflections of the sun on the water, moving clouds, and swirling fog,
which they incorporated into their works in creative and fascinating ways.