History of Design II – C/HG-325

Semester VI - Credit Hour 02

COMMUNICATION DESIGN DEPARTMENT, SADA, UNIVERSITY OF GUJRAT

Lecture: 5

The Influence of Modern Art on Graphic Design

Surrealism

With roots in Dada and in a group of young French writers and poets associated with the journal Littérature,
surrealism entered the Paris scene in 1924, searching for the “more real than real world behind the real”—the
world of intuition, dreams, and the unconscious realm explored by Freud. Apollinaire had used the expression
“surreal drama” in reviewing a play in 1917. The poet André Breton, the founder of surrealism, imbued the word
with all the magic of dreams, the spirit of rebellion, and the mysteries of the subconscious in his 1924 Manifesto du
Surréalisme: “Surrealism, noun, masc. pure psychic automatism by which it is intended to express, either verbally
or in writing, the true function of thought. Thought dictated in the absence of all control exerted by reason, all
aesthetic or moral preoccupations.”

Tristan Tzara came from Zurich to join Breton, Louis Aragon (1897–1982), and Paul Éluard (1895–1952). He stirred
the group on toward scandal and rebellion. These young poets rejected the rationalism and formal conventions
dominating postwar creative activities in Paris. They sought ways to make new truths, to reveal the language of the
soul. Surrealism (or “super reality”) was not a style o`r a matter of aesthetics; rather, it was a way of thinking and
knowing, a way of feeling, and a way of life. Where Dada had been negative, destructive, and perpetually
exhibitionist, surrealism professed a poetic faith in man and his spirit. Humanity could be liberated from social and
moral conventions. Intuition and feeling could be freed. The writers experimented with stream-of-
consciousness writing, or automatism, to seek an uninhibited truth.

The impact of the surrealist poets and writers has been limited to French literary and scholarly circles; it
was through the movement’s painters that surrealism affected society and visual communications.
While surrealists often created works so personal that communication became impossible, they also
produced images whose emotional content, symbolism, or fantasy triggered a collective, universal
response in large numbers of people. Breton and his friends speculated about the possibility of surreal
painting. They discovered the work of Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978) and declared him the first
surrealist painter. A member of the short-lived Italian metaphysical school of painting, de Chirico
painted hauntingly empty spaces that
possess an intense melancholy (Fig. 13–
44). Vacant buildings, harsh shadows,
deeply tilted perspective, and enigmatic
images convey emotions far removed
from ordinary experience.

Of the large number of artists who

joined the surrealist movement, several
significantly influenced visual
communications, with a major impact on photography and illustration. Max Ernst (1891–1965), a
restless German Dadaist, used a number of techniques that have been adopted in graphic
communications. Fascinated by the wood engravings in nineteenth-century novels and catalogues, Ernst
reinvented them by using collage techniques to create strange juxtapositions (Fig. 13–45). These surreal
collages have had a strong influence on illustration. His frottage technique involved using rubbings to
compose directly on paper. As he looked at his rubbings, Ernst’s imagination invented images in them,
much as one sees images in cloud formations. Then he developed the rubbings into fantastic pictures.

Surrealism’s impact on graphic design has been diverse. It provided a poetic example of the liberation of
the human spirit. It pioneered new techniques and demonstrated how fantasy and intuition could be
expressed in visual terms. Unfortunately, the ideas and images of surrealism have been exploited and
trivialized frequently in the mass media.

Points to ponder:
What’s the difference between Dadaism and
Surrealism?

Keywords:
imbue, automatism, perpetual, intuition, melancholy,
enigmatic, frottage, juxtaposition, intuition,
exploite, trivialize

References:
Meggs' History of Graphic Design 5th Edition by Philip B.
Meggs & Alston W. Purvis