| Artist: | Redon, Odilon |
|
|---|---|---|
| Title of Work: | The Dream is Consumated in Death | |
| Date of Work: | 1887 | |
| Nationality: | French | |
| Context: | The Turn of the Century | |
| Movement: | Symbolism | |
| Medium: | Lithograph | |
| Proto Surrealism Symbolism: "putting the logic of the visible at the service of the invisible . . ." Subject: a coupling of dreams and death, a descent into one's unconscious; the path to the interior; focus is on vision, not of the outer eye so much as the inner eye Style: lithographic twilight zone; a shadowy world, deliberately vague and mysterious rather than defined. This is not done from nature but from the imagination. Working chiaroscuro rather than color. Context: Symbolism is a movement that is dedicated to going beyond the mere imitation of nature; "go to nature," Gauguin advised, "but dream in front of it." Symbolism pushes past the material, physical world of nature that characterizes Realism and the optical reality of Impressionism to get at a more subjective view (nature seen through a temperament); as Gauguin said, Impressionism "neglected the mysterious centers of thought." Interested in the visionary and dreams as a source for creative inspiration; influenced by Symoblist poets like Mallarme, who was the first to write with blank spaces in his text, indicating the limits of words . . . Deliberately ambiguous rather than defined, hinting at the invisible (the unconscious) and things that cannot be put into words. Finding new symbols for a modern age; images that correspond to one's inner feelings rather than external environment. | ||
