Monsters & myths : surrealism and war in the 1930s and 1940s / edited by Oliver Shell and Oliver Tostmann ; essays by Robin Adèle Greeley, Samantha Kavky, Oliver Shell, and Oliver Tostmann

Object Details

Notes: "This book is published in conjunction with the exhibition Monsters & Myths: Surrealism and War in the 1930s and 1940s, organized by the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, on view at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, CT, October 20, 2018--January 13, 2019; The Baltimore Museum of Art, February 24--May 26, 2019; and the Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN, June 23--September 22, 2019."; "Monsters & Myths: Surrealism and War in the 1930s and 1940s" : October 20, 2018-January 13, 2019, the Wadsworth Museum of Art, Hartford, Connecticut, United States.; "Monsters & Myths: Surrealism and War in the 1930s and 1940s" : February 24-May 26, 2019, the Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, Maryland, United States.; "Monsters & Myths: Surrealism and War in the 1930s and 1940s" : June 23-September 22, 2019, the Frist Art Museum, Nashville, Tennessee, United States.
Contents: The Surrealists and their monsters in a "time of distress" / Oliver Tostmann -- André Masson's monsters : Making art in a minotaurian era / Oliver Shell -- Max Ernst and the Second World War: witches, chimeras, and totems / Samantha Kavky -- The Minotaur in its labyrinth: art and politics in the Surrealists' world / Robin Adèle Greeley -- Catalogue: Premonition of war; The Spanish Civil War, World War II; Surrealism in the Americas
Summary: "During the pivotal decades leading up to World War II and throughout the war, important Surrealist artists such as Salvador Dalí, Max Ernst, André Masson, Joan Miró, Wolfgang Paalen, and Yves Tanguy--some of whom had served as soldiers in World War I--responded through their works to the repression and violence attending the rise of Hitler and the spread of Fascism in Europe. In this engrossing volume, essays by experts in the field and more than 130 color images showcase the experimental and international extent of Surrealist art during these years. Three of the book's featured artists, Dalí, Miró, and Pablo Picasso, were from Spain, where tensions between right and left after the formation of the republic in 1931 led, five years later, to full-blown civil war. The victory of General Francisco Franco's Nationalist forces over the Republicans in April 1939 was a blow to anti-Fascist hopes throughout the West. Picasso's 'Guernica', painted in response to the bombing of a Basque village in April 1937, was exhibited in Paris at the Exposition Internationale and made a strong case for the relevance of visual art in political discourse. With the onset of World War II in September 1939, brutal hostilities engulfed the whole continent and then the world. Unlike Picasso, who remained in Paris throughout the war, many artists became refugees, and some fled to safety in the Americas. Despite (or because of) the political and personal turmoil, this was a period of surprising brilliance and fertility: avant-garde artists on both sides of the Atlantic pushed themselves to engage artistically with the psychological forces propelling contemporary history. Tapping into classical mythology, folklore, and witchcraft iconography, artists found ways to communicate their feelings and fears in this 'time of distress,' implementing a wide spectrum of new techniques. In the 1930s and 1940s, monstrosities in the real world bred monsters on canvas, in sculpture, on film, and in the pages of journals and artists' books. 'Monsters & Myths' brings together the most vivid and potent of these creations, showing us war through the eyes of some of the twentieth century's most celebrated artists." --publisher's description, dust jacket.; As Europe lurched toward fascism and America fought in the Second World War, no other artists produced images more powerfully disturbing than the Surrealists. Monsters & Myths: Surrealism and War in the 1930s and 1940s will be the first major exhibition to focus on the interrelationship between Surrealism and war in both Europe and America during this period. Surrealism--one of the most impactful and avant-garde movements of the 20th century--resulted from profound geopolitical shifts and pushed aesthetic boundaries to new places. Monsters and myths became some of the Surrealists' most favorite subjects, as they often took recourse in mythological themes to depict the horrors of war and capture dark premonitions. This exhibition will examine key works in a variety of media by Salvador Dalí, Joan Miró, and Max Ernst, juxtaposing them with works by lesser known artists such as André Masson, Wolfgang Paalen, and Wifredo Lam.--Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art website.

Data Source: Smithsonian Libraries

Date: 2018; 20th century

author: Greeley, Robin Adèle 1958-; Kavky, Samantha; Shell, Oliver; Tostmann, Oliver
host institution: Baltimore Museum of Art; Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art; Frist Art Museum (Nashville, Tenn.)

Type: Exhibitions; Art and the war; Expositions; Art; Exhibition catalogs; Essays; Illustrated works

Physical description: 256 pages : illustrations (chiefly color ; 1 folded) ; 29 cm

Place: Europe

Title: Monsters and myths : surrealism and war in the 1930s and 1940s

Topic: Surrealism; Surrealism--Themes, motives; Avant-garde (Aesthetics); War in art; World War, 1939-1945; Art--Political aspects; Art, European; Surréalisme; Guerre dans l'art; Guerre mondiale, 1939-1945--Art et guerre; ART / General

Record ID: siris_sil_1117093

Usage: CC0