What is surrealism and its relationship to photography?
We often hear this. “This is so surreal”, “What a surreal feeling.”. But what exactly is surreal? The dictionary says “Surrealism is an avant-garde art form that sought to release the creativity of the subconscious mind.” It is those weird dreams where you discover you can fly, where you fought off a giant spider and then end up underwater wearing your school uniform.
In a nutshell, bizarre and weird.
Before photography, artists were limited to the canvas and brush. What photography introduced was its ability to accurately capture reality relatively easily. Instead of taking weeks and months to paint or carve a sculpture, photographers can capture images in a matter of hours.
This convenience allowed artists to create work that couldn't be done in the past. Very often, surrealism works only when it is close to reality. If it is too abstract, the meaning often gets lost in translation.
Photography allows accurate images to be captured and manipulated. Photographers such as Martina Lopez utilise images and combine them in interesting manners way before Photoshop came about.
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