Surrealism will usher you into death, which is a secret society. It will glove your hand, burying therein the profound M with which the word Memory begins.
Andre BretonRead
I maintain that anyone who still refuses to see, for instance, a horse galloping on a tomato, must be an idiot. A tomato is also a child's balloon - Surrealism, again, having suppressed the word "like."
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the absurdity and creativity in surrealism, challenging conventional perceptions.
Andre Breton's quote highlights the unique perspective of surrealism, which aims to break free from traditional representations of reality. By presenting seemingly absurd imagery, such as a horse galloping on a tomato, he encourages a more imaginative and unrestricted interpretation of art that transcends ordinary logic.
Themes
SurrealismCreativityImaginationArtAbsurdity
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in an art discussion to highlight surrealist techniques.
More from Andre Breton
All quotes βThe mind, placed before any kind of difficulty, can find an ideal outlet in the absurd. Accommodation to the absurd readmits adults to the mysterious realm inhabited by children.
Andre BretonRead
Beauty is like a train that ceaselessly roars out of the Gare de Lyon and which I know will never leave, which has not left. It consists of jolts and shocks, many of which do not have much importance, but which we know are destined to produce one Shock, which does...The human heart, beautiful as a seismograph...Beauty will be CONVULSIVE or will not be at all.
Andre BretonRead
There is no use being alive if one must work. The event from which each of us is entitled to expect the revelation of his own lifeβs meaning - that event which I may not yet have found, but on whose path I seek myself - is not earned by work.
Andre BretonRead
Let us not mince words: the marvelous is always beautiful, anything marvelous is beautiful, in fact only the marvelous is beautiful.
Andre BretonRead
The simplest act of surrealism is to walk out into the street, gun in hand, and shoot at random.
Andre BretonRead
Similar quotes
Making art was really about the problem of the soul, of losing it. It was a technique for inhabiting the world. For not dissolving into it.
Rachel KushnerRead
In some ways I believe music is the more convincing communicator of ideas than words. For instance, we can hear of Kordaly and Bartok and recognise them as Hungarian, but very few of us speak Hungarian, but the music itself speaks to more people.
Leonard SlatkinRead
When the first baby laughed for the first time, the laugh broke into a thousand pieces and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies.
James M. BarrieRead
The truth is, the difference between a studio photographer and a photojournalist is the same as the difference between a political cartoonist and an abstract painter; the only thing the two have in common is the blank page. The jobs entail different talents and different desires.
Lynsey AddarioRead
We will, of course, without hesitation use art to parody, ridicule, debunk, or criticize ideologies.
David Foster WallaceRead
The most watched programme on the BBC, after the news, is probably 'Doctor Who.' What has happened is that science fiction has been subsumed into modern literature. There are grandparents out there who speak Klingon, who are quite capable of holding down a job. No one would think twice now about a parallel universe.
Terry PratchettRead