The Surreal House explores the power and mystery of the house in our collective imagination. Bringing together over 150 works, the exhibition reveals the profound influence surrealism has had on a host of contemporary artists, filmmakers and architects. With an ambitious installation by acclaimed architects Carmody Groarke, the exhibition is designed to be experienced as an extraordinary surreal house in its own right.
For the Surrealists, the house was more than ‘a machine for living’, as identified by Modernist heavyweight Le Corbusier. Instead it was a ‘stage for living’, a convulsive theatre of the domestic; a real space, inhabited, if not by people, then by their ghosts. In The Surreal House all the exhibits show the significance of the unconscious world of dreams and desires, presenting extraordinary dwellings that reflect everything that the rational, sanitized house sacred to Modernism is not.
The Surreal House brings together first generation Surrealists, precursors and close associates, with contemporary artists and architects. Iconic works by Salvador Dalí, Marcel Duchamp, Alberto Giacometti, and René Magritte are set alongside works by Giorgio de Chirico, Le Facteur Cheval and Edward Hopper as well as contemporary works by artists such as Louise Bourgeois and Sarah Lucas. Filmmakers include Maya Deren, Jean Cocteau, Andrei Tarkovsky and Jan Švankmajer , whilst modern and con temporary architecture is represented by John Hejduk, Coop Himmelb(l)au, Rem Koolhaas , Bernard Tschumi and Diller & Scofidio.
This richly illustrated account brings together a host of commentators and historians, and accompanies the major exhibition at the Barbican Art Gallery (10 June - 12 September 10)
£39.95 ISBN 9780300165760 Published 30 Jun 2010 Hardback 300 colour illustrations 336 pages
Available from the online shop or buy in store at the Barbican Art Gallery to get the book at a special exhibition price for a limited time while stocks last.
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