Arte fantástico

El Movimiento Arte Fantástico nace en el siglo 20. Originating in 1916 as a reaction to World War I and coming to a close before the end of World War II in 1940, Fantastic art stressed the growing interest in and preoccupation with an alternate way of living and thinking as a way to counter the destruction of war and the threat of the developing technology. Fantastic artists felt threatened by the Italian movement called Futurism that embraced the beauty of machines and celebrated speed, technology, and violence

Fantastic art can be distinguished by its two unique styles Dadaism and Surrealism. The Dada movement developed in 1916 and came to an end in 1923, leading to the birth of Surrealism in 1924. An important presence in the history of Fantastic art can also be claimed by the Independents, Fantastic artists who did not align themselves with either, Dadaism or Surrealism.

INDEPENDENTS

Their inspiration stemmed not only from their imagination, but also from private dreams, memories, and experiences. The artists examined pertinent issues in their lives without relying on a specific modern trend. 

Henri Rousseau

French artist Henry Rousseau's paintings were inspired by nature and his belief in ghosts which is reflected in his supernatural, haunting, and theatrical iconography.

Marc Chagall

His paintings were filled with poetic and nostalgic representations of his past where mysterious people and animals defied proportion and gravity. Although his subject matter was fantastic in its content, Chagall was influenced by the Expressionist and Cubist movements. Unlike the Surrealists, he refused to analyze the meaning of his images, and viewed them merely as representations of the self.

Georgio De Chirico

 His metaphysical paintings were filled with symbols of both ancient antiquity and modern invention, and preceded the Surrealist technique

THE DADA MOVEMENT

Dada was a cultural movement that originated around 1916 in Zurich, Switzerland. It occurred as a reaction to World War I, which provoked artists to deny the conventions of the world and promote absurdity, nihilism, and irrationality in painting, writing, poetry, theater, music, and other art forms.

Hannah Hoch

SURREALISM

Surrealism was the second movement within Fantastic art. It was born out of the Dada movement in 1924, between World War I and II when Dada was losing its creativity and potency. Surrealism was a visual and literary movement that explored the realm of the imaginary and unreal. In French, Surrealism translates to "beyond real. "

André Breton

Breton encouraged artists and poets to seek "pure automatism " in their work by embracing chance juxtapositions of ideas, forms, and meanings.

Automatism and Veristic Surrealism

Surrealist artists used the technique of automatism to explore fear, desire, fantasy, eroticism and symbolism. They often expressed and pondered images and ideas through writing and making art. Artists who employed automatism investigated the abstraction of their subconscious, and relied on various forms of chance art such as frottage, grottage, decalcomania, and exquisite corpse.

Members of the Surrealist movement such as Joan Miro, Max Ernst, and Salvador Dali depicted the relationship between the everyday world and ideas of an alternate reality.

Max Ernst

Joan Miro

Salvador Dali