The Exposition Internationale du Surréalisme was an exhibition by surrealist artists that took place from January 17 to February 24, 1938, in the generously equipped Galérie Beaux-Arts, run by Georges Wildenstein, at 140, Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré in Paris. It was organised by the French writer André Breton, the surrealists' brain and theorist, and Paul Éluard, the best known poet of the movement. The catalogue listed, along with the above, Marcel Duchamp as generator and arbitrator (to appease the partly fierce conflicts mainly between Breton and Éluard), Salvador Dalí and Max Ernst as technical advisers, Man Ray as head lighting technician and Wolfgang Paalen as responsible for the design of the entrance and main hall with "water and foliage".Uwe M. Schneede: Exposition internationale du Surréalisme, Paris 1938. In: Bernd Klüser, Katharina Hegewisch (Hrsg.): Die Kunst der Ausstellung. Eine Dokumentation dreißig exemplarischer Kunstausstellungen dieses Jahrhunderts, p. 94 The exhibition was staged in three sections, showing paintings and objects as well as unusually decorated rooms and mannequins which had been redesigned in various ways. With this holistic presentation of surrealist art work the movement wrote exhibition history.Uwe M. Schneede: Die Geschichte der Kunst im 20. Jahrhundert, p. 104
Before their first group exhibition in November 1925, which took place in Pierre Loeb's gallery "Pierre" in Paris, the surrealist artists had previously shown their works at solo exhibitions. The group exhibition showed works of Giorgio de Chirico, Hans Arp, Max Ernst, Paul Klee, Man Ray, André Masson, Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso and Pierre Roy.L'Art surréaliste. centrepompidou.fr , retrieved 6 Jan 2012. Another joint exhibition followed in 1928 in the Parisian gallery "Au Sacre du Printemps" with the title "Le Surréalisme, existe-t-il?" (Does Surrealism really exist?) Among the participants were Max Ernst, André Masson, Joan Miró, Francis Picabia und Yves Tanguy. Further group exhibitions followed. In 1931 the first surrealist exhibition in the US took place in the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut, and in May 1936 the "Exposition surréaliste d'objets" was held in the Parisian gallery Charles Ratton, which particularly valued object art and also referred to Primitivism, sexual fetishes and mathematical models.An example of one of the mathematical-geometric models by Naum Garboat the exhibition: Construction in Space (Crystal), 1937–39, tate.org.uk, retrieved 6 Jan 2012
In June of the same year the International Surrealist Exhibition was launched in the New Burlington Galleries in London. In 1937, the title Exposition internationale du surréalisme was also used for a touring exhibition in Japan, Kaigai Chōgenjitsushugi Sakuhinten.... These exhibitions still made use of the usual form of representation, i.e. the White Room, which was designed at the "Sonderbund" exhibition in Cologne in 1912. In 1938 however, André Breton wanted to establish a framework for the surrealist art in the Beaux Arts Gallery, in which the presentation itself was surrealist art.Volker Zotz: Breton, Rowohlt, Reinbek 1990, p. 109 As a creative act it was to be a surreal experience, in which paintings and objects served as elements in a completely surrealist environment.Calvin Tomkins: Marcel Duchamp. Eine Biographie, p. 364
At the end of 1937, André Breton and Nusch Éluard asked Duchamp to contribute ideas to the surrealist exhibition they were planning. Duchamp had already presented his works at previous exhibitions, but he never became a member because of his principle never to be part of any group. Nevertheless, Duchamp accepted the invitation to help design the exhibition. This led to cooperation on further projects, such as the First Papers of Surrealism exhibition, which took place in New York City in 1942.Elena Filipovic: A museum that is not, www.e-flux.com, retrieved 6 Jan 2012 Various discreet meetings were held together with the inner circle of responsible curators and designers (Marcel Duchamp, Wolfgang Paalen, Man Ray, Max Ernst, Salvador Dalí) to discuss the general outlines and specific thematical questions.Andreas Neufert: Auf Liebe und Tod. Das Leben des Surrealisten Wolfgang Paalen, Berlin (Parthas) 2015, p. 342.
The catalogue and a reference book The eight-page catalogue, in which all the artists were listed in huge capital letters and so impossible to overlook, provided information about the people involved in the exhibition. André Breton and Paul Éluard acted as organisers, Marcel Duchamp was named as "Generateur-arbitre", Salvador Dalí and Max Ernst were listed as technical directors, Man Ray was chief lighting technician and Wolfgang Paalen responsible for "water and foliage".
Accompanying the exhibition, the gallery of Beaux-Arts published in addition to the catalogue a 76-page Dictionnaire abrégé du surréalisme under the direction of Breton and Éluard. It was a dictionary of Surrealism with an introduction by the French art critic and artistic director of the gallery, Raymond Congniat, along with cover artwork by Yves Tanguy and an illustrated section which was quite extensive for the time and which summed up the proof of origin of the complete surrealistic artwork. Here, all artists' names, "all keywords, all obsessional concepts and motives, the new inspirational image techniques and the ancestors"Uwe M. Schneede: Exposition internationale du Surréalisme, Paris 1938. In: Bernd Klüser, Katharina Hegewisch (Hrsg.), p. 100 were unified.Brief description and cover illustration of the Dictionnaire abrégé du surréalisme, tanguyves.free.fr, retrieved 6 Jan 2012 The names and terms from "Absurde" to "Zen" and "Zibou", organized in alphabetical order, were mostly explained by quotations from publications written by representative members of the surrealist movement.
The exhibition The exhibition was divided into three parts: a "lobby" with the taxi pluvieux (rain cab) by Salvador Dalí and two main sections; the first the Plus belles rues de Paris ("The most beautiful streets of Paris") with surrealistically fitted mannequins rented from a French manufacturer, and a central room arranged by Marcel Duchamp and Wolfgang Paalen with lighting by Man Ray. Paintings, collages, photographs and graphics hung - poorly lit - on the walls and on Duchamp's two revolving doors. Wolfgang Paalen created an artificial pond with real waterlillies and reed, covered the whole floor of the exhibition (including the entrance pathway with wet leaves and mud from the Monparnasse cemetery, and installed his objects "Chaise envahie de lierre" and Nuage articulé.Andreas Neufert: Auf Liebe und Tod. Das Leben des Surrealisten Wolfgang Paalen, Berlin (Parthas) 2015, p. 336 ff. Further objects were placed on different kinds of pedestals. Using objects and items from nature and civilization, the room itself was "transformed into a gloomy-absurd ambience: less exhibition room than cave and womb."Uwe M. Schneede, in: Bernd Klüser, Katharina Hegewisch (Hrsg.), p. 95
The opening
The exhibition was opened late on the first night, at 10 pm. Evening dress was required and all manner of highlights had been promised: hysteria, a sky full of flying dogs and the presence of Enigmarelle, an humanoid automaton, a descendant of Frankenstein. Marcel Duchamp could not attend the exhibition, because he and his partner Mary Reynolds had gone to London in order to select and hang paintings and drawings by Jean Cocteau for Peggy Guggenheim's Gallery Guggenheim Jeune. The gallery was opened on January 24, 1938, with a Jean Cocteau exhibition.Calvin Tomkins: Marcel Duchamp. Eine Biographie, p. 365 ff. Also not present were Joan Miró and Yves Tanguy, who did not usually attend collaborative events, as well as René Magritte, who lived in Brussels. At Ernst, Dalí and Paalen had trained the actress Hélène Vanel to do a performance. She jumped out of pillows lying on the floor with chains wrapped around her naked body. After splashing wildly in Wolfgang Paalen´s puddle she reappeared dressed in a tattered evening dress a short time later "and gave a very realistic performance of a hysterical attack" in one of the beds in the main hall.B.: Ein Kunstsalon als Tollhaus, Münchner Abendblatt, Nr. 19, 24. Januar 1938, p. 2, from Uwe M. Schneede, in: Bernd Klüser, Katharina Hegewisch (Hrsg.), p. 97
The artists The event showed 229 works by 60 exhibitors from 14 countriesTorsten Otte: Salvador Dalì: eine Biographie mit Selbstzeugnissen Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2005, , p. 73 and contained paintings, art objects, collages, photographs and installations. Artists and writers like Hans Bellmer, Leonora Carrington, Joseph Cornell and Óscar Domínguez participated. Salvador Dalí was represented with six paintings, among which was "The Great Masturbator" from 1929. Wolfgang Paalen showed his painting "Paysage totémique de mon enfance" among others, as well as his objects "Le moi et le soi", "Potènce avec paratonnerre" (a life-sized gibbet with a lightning rod dedicated to the German philosopher Georg Christoph Lichtenberg. Paalen's umbrella made with sponges Nuage articulé was hanging from the ceiling.Andreas Neufert: Auf Liebe und Tod. Das Leben des Surrealisten Wolfgang Paalen, Berlin (Parthas) 2015, p. 346 ff. The "Ultra-furniture", 1937, by Kurt Seligmann, sculptures by Alberto Giacometti, and objects by Meret Oppenheim, including "Breakfast in Fur" from 1936, were presented along with five other works, such as "La Baguerre d'Austerlitz" and a replica of the Ready-mades "Bottle Dryer" by Marcel Duchamp. Furthermore, there were 14 pictures by Max Ernst, such as "The Rendezvous of Friends" from 1922 and "The Triumph of Surrealism" from 1937; works by Stanley William Hayter, Georges Hugnet, Humphrey Jennings, and Léo Malet; "The Expectation", 1936, by Richard Oelze; and two surrealistic pictures by Pablo Picasso. Man Ray presented, among other works, "A l'heure de l'observatoire – les amoureux", 1932–34, as well as "Irrlichter" from 1932 to 1937. There were nine works by René Magritte, for example "The Key to the Fields" from 1936 and "The Therapist II" from 1937; eight early pictures by Giorgio de Chirico; works by André Masson and Roberto Matta; and several works by Joan Miró, including "Dutch Interior I" from 1928. Other artists represented included Roland Penrose; Jindřich Štyrský; Yves Tanguy with nine pictures, among which was "From the Other Side of the Bridge" from 1936; Toyen; Raoul Ubac; and Remedios Varo.Uwe M. Schneede, in: Bernd Klüser, Katharina Hegewisch (Eds.), p. 99 And the Danish painter Rita Kernn-Larsen with her self-portrait " Know Thyself."
The Forecourt Dalí's Rain Taxi, a former taxi, welcomed the visitors in the forecourt. The old automobile was covered with ivy inside and out, and a female dummy with dishevelled hair and dressed in an evening gown sat between some heads of lettuce and chicory in the back of the car. Next to her was a sewing machine. The driver was a doll, whose head was framed by the mouth of a shark and whose eyes were covered by a pair of dark glasses. The interior was constantly sprayed with water so that the clothes of the lady were drenched and the blond wig dissolved into felted strands, while some edible snails, visible on the lady's neck, left their slimy traces.Niels Werber, Ruhr-Universität Bochum (Hrsg.): Ringvorlesung Avantgarden der Kunst und Literatur: Surrealismus, Kunstkörper, Fotografie 1 December 1999, retrieved 6 Jan 2012
In 1974, Dalí exhibited his Rain Taxi in his birthplace of Figueres in Catalonia, in the inner courtyard of the museum for the opening of the Theatre-Museu Dalí. The roof of the taxi was decorated with the large sculpture Esther by Ernst Fuchs.Dali's Biography Europäische Kulturstiftung, retrieved 6 Jan 2012
The most beautiful streets in Paris