Surrealist creative techniques (Part II)

Juxtapositions

An equally important and relevant component of Surrealism is juxtaposition. Salvador Dali, the pioneer of surrealist cinema, aimed to create a new vision for the viewer, and the most famous example of his surrealist work in cinema is the knife slashing through the eye in An Andalusian Dog (Fig. 3). This image speaks to the subconscious and leads us to believe that the eye is being cut open, even though the eye is not shown on screen (87).

Fig. 3 A poster for the film An Andalusian Dog, showing an eye transection.

This juxtaposition can still be called the most famous surrealist juxtaposition and is often repeated in different contexts. For example, a few years ago, in the video "Liūdnos akys" (Sad Eyes) by the Lithuanian indie music band Garbanotas bosistas, we can see this very motif of the eye splitting88. Artists such as Andre Breton, Man Ray and Salvador Dalí have used surrealist techniques to become titans in their fields, and today, their artistic paths suggest that surrealism is a way of thinking rather than a style. So in order to create a work on a surrealist basis, the goal must be unknowable and unthinkable until the moment it appears. So one would like to think that the creative process is more important than the result.

Uncanny aesthetics and expression

It is not only automatism or the other aforementioned components that are characteristic of surrealism. In the surrealism of the last decades, we can see more and more pervasively the uncanny aesthetic, which means - a strange, mysterious, especially disturbing image or emotion. Surrealist filmmakers often use uncanny mystique. Freud described the term uncanny as a frightening class that leads us to something long known, very familiar. The psychoanalyst argued that the things that seem familiar to us, but ultimately are not, are the most frightening. Freud used the example of a mannequin and a wax doll. He said that mannequins are frightening because they look human but are not (89). It is no coincidence that the slit eye in Dali's An Andalusian Dog retains such power. Although the image looks terrifying, it is not, it is uncanny - so familiar and slightly mystical, and this is what makes it scary. However, while it is not difficult to understand uncanny theoretically, in order to see exactly how this aesthetic works in set design, it is worth taking a look at the uncanny techniques that film directors such as David Lynch and Yorgos Lanthimos have incorporated into their work (read more). Such a close examination of this aesthetic in one of the most influential art forms of surrealism, cinema, can be useful for creating a convincing uncanny design.

87 An Andalusian Dog. Salvador Dali. [Žiūrėta: 2021 m. lapkričio 2 d.]. Prieiga per internetą: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB7gd_t6WMQ

88 Liūdnos akys. Garbanotas. [Žiūrėta 2021 m. lapkričio 2 d.]. Prieiga per internetą: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYKCDvytEyM

89 FREUD, Sigmund. The Uncanny. Penguin Classics. 2003. p. 240. ISBN 9780142437476