mag seeks bizarre/unusual works
Smudge21
but nationally and internationally distributed publication, is always
looking for:
* Short fiction
* Artwork
* Photography
* Non-fiction (travel, interviews, etc.)
Email here or Impl...@gdi.net for complete guidlelines
Sphinx
Greetings.
Your publication sounds interesting, could you please send me
some details? I'm espeecially interested in submitting short
fiction.
Thanks!
Jumgolaya
agntshawn
dada
>
>me two.
>
>agntshawn
-- Come to:
Robert Dada
Anti-Art Productions WWW Site: http://www.sgi.net/dada/
"Each one of us, in his timidity, has a limit beyond which he is outraged. It
is inevitable that he who by concentrated application has extended this limit
for himself, should arouse the resentment of those who have accepted
conventions which, since accepted by all, require no initiative of application.
And this resentment generally takes the form of meaningless laughter or of
criticism, if not persecution. But this apparent violation is preferable to
the monstrous habits condoned by etiquette and estheticism." - Man Ray, Paris
1934
Sebastien Marchand (SIS)
Can anyone help me with this question :
Discuss the use of Inconcious as a liberating force in the
Surrealist manifesto by A. Breton ?
If you have any Idea please Do not Hesitate : mail me to this address :
thanks in advance
Sebastien
Keith Jenkins
100...@alpha3.iso.port.ac.uk>, "Sebastien Marchand (SIS)" <sis3543@alpha
3.iso.port.ac.uk> writes
I think I am right in assuming you mean -unconscious-, though if not it
amounts to the same thing. Given that you may (or not) find the
following of some little assistance.
The Surrealists can be seen in many respects as marking a turning point
in the rationalistic development and tradition in Western Culture and
thinking which was established as far back as the Renaissance. That, in
its turn, based much of its cultural and philosophical thinking on
ancient Greek ideas about logic, forms and so on.
The First World War was seen by many as a culmination of that
development and a result or even fault of that whole way of thinking.
The millions that died so pointlessly were seen as victims of a way of
going about the business of being human beings that was incorrect and
harmful. A mechanistic, cause and effect, empirical approach to the
world, the separation of science and human experience, the -rational-
planning of human relations and so forth were all suddenly seen as a
nonsense by many -intellectuals- and artists.
At the same time as the horror of the Great War was sinking in new ideas
about the way human beings really are were being discussed. In
particular Freud's ideas were taken notice of. Freud's notion of the -
unconscious- and the surrealists were closely related. They agreed that
the road to real freedom, happiness and human imagination was
straightjacketed by our insistence that the mundane rational world is
the only valid one. Freud described how the unconscious bits of our mind
are repressed -base- areas of early experience are hidden from us, by
ourselves. By suppressing these along with early and frightening
experiences of things like maternal rejection, anger towards her and so
on, we become -neurotic-. We develop patterns of thinking and behaviour
that help us to avoid those painful things. Freud said that there was no
true -mental health- (not his words) without sweeping away some of these
unhealthy patterns. He came up with a number of ways of examining these
areas and of dealing with the confusion and pain associated with them.
One of them was by examining and interpreting dreams. (along with -free
association- and hypnotism). His book -Interpretation of Dreams- is
still worth reading.
The surrealists, growing out of Dada took a similar, though slightly
more socially oriented view of this kind of -repression-. They felt that
society was screwed up by it. Dada, when its members did intellectualise
their activities, which was rare, expounded a sledge hammer approach.
The surrealists attempted a number of ways of working directly out of
their unconscious minds. They used -automatic- methods (a very similar
notion to Freud's -free association-) and attempted to, in effect, draw
illustrations of dreams. They also tried to create images that would
shock people out of their mundane -conscious- thinking and into a new
and supposedly -better- way of thinking about the world. Thus people
were encouraged to examine ideas about labels and art (This is not a
pipe, and so on) Breton was conscious of all this of course and was keen
to establish it at the core of surrealism. There were of course lots of
arguments and splinter groups and some people got really upset, as they
do. They are all dead now, so is it worth a hill of beans?
These are, necessarily generalisations because of time constraints and I
am conscious (!) that this little article could spark a bit of argument.
In fact I hope it does, I'll look forward to following it.
By the way, in my view as a practising therapist, much of what Freud
said has been dismissed as fanciful and misguided. My view is that he is
a great because he actually looked in detail for the first time really
at some fundamental issues. There does not seem to be much of that going
on nowadays.
Hope that helps.