In
1924 Andre Breton, the “father” of Surrealism, defined the new movement as
something “[d]ictated by thought, in the absence of
any control exercised by reason [and] exempt from any aesthetic or moral
concern.”
For
the Surrealists, truth was not the thing that was in front of us but was hidden
and buried from view. It was masked by culture itself. Influenced by Freud’s
theories, the Surrealists saw reality as something that manifested itself in
the unconscious mind. The real world could be seen in dreams, slips in speech,
or moments of reverie.
But
how could a person represent this other version of reality with techniques that
had been corrupted by a myopic approach? The answer came from writing
techniques that attempted to bypass the conscious world through the use of
automatism and something called the “exquisite corpse.”
A
variation and updated version of the latter is the focus of a current
exhibition at MCC’s Mercer Gallery.
Once
upon a time, there existed a game without a board and without a screen, an old
parlor game called Consequences. To play, each person had to think of a word to
answer a series of questions. Each person would write down their word, then
fold the paper over and hand it to the next person who in turn would write
their word and so on. In the end a narrative was unveiled. (Often this would
include some kissing.)
The
Surrealists used this format to subvert logic. They expanded the process to
incorporate anything that popped into one’s head while still using a
predetermined sentence structure. Rumor has it that the first sentence to be
thus produced by a group of Surrealists was, “The exquisite corpse drinks the
new wine.”
What
awaits us on the Mercer Gallery walls is the latest manifestation of this
technique — in drawings.
As
per the stated “rules” of production, both of the Surrealists and of the Mercer
exhibition, it takes three to make a group to make a drawing. One draws the
“head” and then folds the paper to conceal the drawing, the second draws the
midsection, and the last draws the lower extremities.
In the end, we have a fantastic image that is the
serendipitous result of the collaboration and one that is only limited by the
imagination of the individuals involved.
Of
course, the work on view is not done by the Surrealists but instead began as a
mail art exhibition. No one is or was turned away. Hundreds of works fill a
grid-like presentation. Depictions of human, animal, cybernetic hybrids abound.
These pictures of participation are an incredible convergence of “corpses” that
often amuse and at times stretch the imagination.
Often
the imagination is limited to the confines of the assignment — a Surrealist
and therefore fantastic image. If there is something to criticize in this
exhibit it is the lack of some kind of banality. We never in the end see that
human or animal form constructed, even serendipitously, as a natural or
everyday form. But what we get to see is work on all sorts of technical levels:
a democratic vision.
In
a nod to the Surrealists’ desire to tap into a personal and collective
unconscious, the Mercer Gallery has produced both art and a game at the same
time. Now that’s a schizophrenic moment that Breton would be proud of.
You should go if you want to see the collective
unconscious at work.
Mail
Art Exhibition: Exquisite Corpse through December 23 | Mercer Gallery, MonroeCommunity College, 1000 East Henrietta Road | Gallery hours are Monday through
Thursday 10
a.m. to 7 p.m.,
Friday 10
a.m. to 5 p.m.
292-2021, www.monroecc.edu/go/mercer
This article appears in Dec 14-20, 2005.
