Those Are Pearls That Were His Eyes

Rene Magritte publishes "I Do Not See the Woman Hidden in the Forest"

In the December 1929 issue of the surrealist review La Révolution surréaliste, leading member of the movement Rene Magritte published a piece critiquing the attitudes of his fellow male surrealists towards women. Magritte depicts a painting of a woman with the text “I do not see the woman hidden in the forest” [translated from French], surrounded by photographs of leading male surrealists with their eyes closed (Ades 41). Surrealism as a movement sought inspiration in the unconscious, psychic realm within the human mind, and one of their primary “guides” or muses to the unconscious realm was the idea of the woman. Notably, Magritte here seems to critique the shortfalls of this approach. The woman in the center, as opposed to the men around her, is an artistic representation of an ideal woman rather than a photographed human being—and even then, the surrealists do not truly see her. Women, to the surrealists, were tools and not human beings. Their individuality was irrelevant in their role as a guide to the subconscious. As Dawn Ades notes in the Oxford Art Journal notes, “All specific reference is eliminated, and the woman, ‘the collective person of the woman”, as Breton described her in Les vases communicants, is now presented as the guide to the unconscious, the incarnation of the marvelous, symbol of the psychic life,” (Ades 41).

Ades, Dawn. “Notes on Two Women Surrealist Painters: Eileen Agar and Ithell Colquhoun.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 3, no. 1, 1980, pp. 36–42. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1360177. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Magritte, Rene. I Do Not See the [Woman] Hidden in the Forest. La Révolution surréaliste, 15 Dec. 1929, p. 73.

MoMA holds "Fantastic Art, Dada and Surrealism"

            In 1936, the Museum of Modern Art in New York held an exhibition titled Fantastic Art, Dada, and Surrealism. Importantly, this exhibition hosted older works from the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century artists Arcimboldo and Joost de Momper. The style of these Renaissance-era European artists later influenced the art styles of the surrealists, especially in their representations of faces and figures transforming into non-human objects (Ades 40). Arcimboldo, for instance, created paintings of fruits, vegetables, and other objects arranged in such a way to closely resemble a human face. Joost de Momper similarly made landscapes that came together to form a face, which Dawn Ades refers to as “figure-landscapes,” (40). Importantly, the works of these artists are painted in a realistic, representational form similar to the later style of surrealism found in the works of Dali, Magritte, and many other surrealists. It is this dream-like impression of a human face within completely separate objects that resonated strongly with the surrealists. A particular consequence of Arcimboldo’s and de Momper’s styles is the dehumanization of their subjects. Their subjects are not quite human nor entirely non-human but exist in a strange limbo between. When combined with male surrealists’ tendency to use female subjects, the dehumanization of women within their work leads to a latent misogyny present throughout much of the movement.

Ades, Dawn. “Notes on Two Women Surrealist Painters: Eileen Agar and Ithell Colquhoun.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 3, no. 1, 1980, pp. 36–42. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1360177. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Arcimboldo, Giuseppe. The Cook. Nationalmuseum, Stockholm. 1570. https://www.wikiart.org/en/giuseppe-arcimboldo/the-cook. Accessed 30 Mar. 2023.

The International Surrealist Exhibition is held in London

In June 1936, the International Surrealist Exhibition was held in London, introducing the British art world to the movement that had primarily flourished in continental Europe. Andre Breton’s influential Surrealist Manifesto had been published in France over a decade prior, and, though many British artists were familiar with the general premise of the movement, few had been exposed to the breadth of artwork like that hosted at the Exhibition (Ades 36). The varying styles of surrealist works hosted in London represented the eclectic methodologies of individual artists in the movement, as well as their shared inspiration in the workings of the unconscious mind (“International Surrealism”). While the exhibition featured a wide range of surrealists, only a single professional woman painter, Eileen Agar, had works at the event (Ades 36). Agar’s work is somewhat indicative of the eclectic stylings of the surrealists. Unlike Dali or Colquhoun’s representational, realistic style, Agar employs a much more abstract style influenced in part by cubists like her friend Louis Marcoussis (Ades 37). The works of Agar and other surrealists familiarized British artists with the styles and subjects of surrealism and was the catalyst of later British surrealist movements, including Ithell Colquhoun. The lack of female artists shown at the Exhibition also demonstrates the male-dominated nature of the surrealist movement during the 1930s.

Ades, Dawn. “Notes on Two Women Surrealist Painters: Eileen Agar and Ithell Colquhoun.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 3, no. 1, 1980, pp. 36–42. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1360177. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Agar, Eileen. The Autobiography of an Embryo. Tate Modern. 1933-1934. https://www.wikiart.org/en/eileen-agar/the-autobiography-of-an-embryo-1934. Accessed 30 Mar. 2023.

“International Surrealism.” Tate, https://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-modern/display/inthestudio/internati…. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Ithell Colquhoun attends Dali lecture in London

During the International Surrealist Exhibition in July 1936, Ithell Colquhoun attended a lecture in London given by leading surrealist Salvador Dali (Ades 39). The lecture, called “Fantomes paranoiaques authentiques,” was given as Dali wore a deep-sea diving suit and held a billiard cue and the leash of a pair of wolfhounds (Auld). Dali’s speech and his eccentric attire—intended to represent a sort of “diving into the unconscious”—inspired numerous British surrealists in the audience, including Ithell Colquhoun (Auld). According to Colquhoun, “’It seemed that he did actually invoke phantasmic presences which generated a tense atmosphere,’” (Ades 39-40). Along with the generally introducing surrealism to the British, the International Surrealist Exhibition more specifically familiarized artists with the specific styles of leading surrealists like Dali. Surrealism, importantly, was more defined by a focus on the unconscious and dream-like subject matter than any particular style. Some artists—like Eileen Agar, pictured above—employed a distinctly non-representational style, while Dali and Magritte championed a style which depicted realistic people and objects in dream-like scenarios. It was this latter style that became especially dominant throughout the surrealist movement of the 30s, partially furthered by Dali’s prominence within the genre and this unforgettable speech (he nearly suffocated in the suit) at the birth of British surrealism (Ades 36).

Ades, Dawn. “Notes on Two Women Surrealist Painters: Eileen Agar and Ithell Colquhoun.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 3, no. 1, 1980, pp. 36–42. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1360177. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Auld, Sarah. “Globe trotter: The journey of an artwork.” Tate, 1 Sept. 2010, https://www.tate.org.uk/tate-etc/issue-20-autumn-2010/globe-trotter. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Photograph of Salvador Dali in a diving suit at the International Surrealist Exhibition of 1936. “Dalí in a diving helmet: how the Spaniard almost suffocated bringing surrealism to Britain,” by Joanna Moorhead, 1 Jun. 2016. The Guardian.

Surrealists use female body as subject

In the late-1930s, numerous male surrealists created works using the female body as a subject, either blending it into landscapes or juxtaposing it with other objects from within their psyches. André Masson, for instance, drew the forms of women represented by the trees and hills of a landscape during this period (Ades 40). Man Ray, likewise, juxtaposes a nude woman and a mackerel in his 1938 Pisces, evoking the eponymous astrological symbol by replacing one of the fish with the figure of a woman (Towler). Dawn Ades suggests that these pieces and other similar works of the time represent the surrealist trend of incorporating the female body into paintings depicting transformation and other dream-like processes, using women as a guide to the unconscious and, in the process, dehumanizing them (Ades 40). In Man Ray’s Pisces, for instance, the replacement of one of the twin fish of the astrological sign with a nude woman evokes a comparison of a human figure with a non-human concept—a dehumanizing juxtaposition common within the landscapes of surrealists during the 30s. Dawn Ades also notes that surrealism contained an “ideology of eroticism,” using the female body as a vessel to evoke the feeling of the erotic in a way that sexualizes women while furthering their dehumanization (40).

            These prior events explain the cultural climate within the British surrealist movement and Ithell Colquhoun’s stylistic influences which led to the creation of Gouffres Amers. It was at the International Surrealist Exhibition that Colquhoun attended Salvador Dali’s lecture, resulting in Dali becoming Colquhoun’s dominant influence as she entered the surrealist movement (Ades 39). While other artists like Eileen Agar were more abstract and cubism-inspired, Colquhoun referred to her style as “magic realism” and derived it from Dali’s own methods, which typically depicted strange scenes with disparate elements in a realistic, concrete representational style. It was in this style that blended dream-like imagery with techniques of realism that Colquhoun painted Scylla in 1938 and Gouffres Amers the year later (Ades 40). The latter painting was also seemingly inspired by the works of Arcimboldo and de Momper, as Gouffres Amers depicts a male figure composed of the disparate elements of a seascape.

            Colquhoun’s choice of a male subject is also explained by the aforementioned events. Surrealism was pervaded with a culture of eroticism and the dehumanization of female subjects—as depicted in the works of Man Ray and as is responded to by Magritte. Colquhoun reverses this treatment of women by placing a nude male figure at the center of a transformation in Gouffres Amers. Rather than evoking the erotic, Colquhoun seemingly emphasizes the unsettling nature of this treatment. The sea-life making up the man is disturbingly skeletal, and the center of his sexuality—his penis—is flayed into an unidentifiable sea-thing. These aspects form, as Ades suggests, “an almost mocking response to the prevailing imagery of eroticism within Surrealism,” (40).

Ades, Dawn. “Notes on Two Women Surrealist Painters: Eileen Agar and Ithell Colquhoun.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 3, no. 1, 1980, pp. 36–42. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1360177. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Colquhoun, Ithell. Gouffres Amers. Hunterian Art Gallery, Glasgow. 1939. https://en.wahooart.com/@@/AQSREH-Ithell-Colquhoun-Gouffres-amers. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.

Ray, Man. Pisces. Tate. 1938. https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/man-ray-pisces-t00324. Accessed 30 Mar. 2023.

Towler, Lucinda. “Man Ray: Pisces.” Tate, Dec. 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/manray-pisces-t00324. Accessed 19 Mar. 2023.