SCHIRN KUNSTHALLE FRANKFURT,
13 FEBRUARY 2020 – 24 MAY 2020
Goddess, she-devil, doll, fetish, nymphet, or wonderful dream creature—women were the central subject matter of Surrealist male fantasies. It was often only in the role of companion or model that female artists could succeed in penetrating the circle surrounding André Breton, the founder of the group of Surrealists. However, on closer examination it becomes evident that the participation of women artists in the movement was considerably larger than is generally known or reported.
The SCHIRN is now presenting the female contribution to Surrealism for the first time in a major thematic exhibition. Female artists differed from their male colleagues above all in their reversal of perspective: They often embarked on a search for a (new) model of female identity by exploring their own reflection or by adopting different roles. Contemporary political events, literature, and non-European myths and religions are further subjects that the Surrealist women examine in their works.
The exhibition focuses on women artists who were directly associated with the Surrealist movement founded in Paris in the early 1920s, though sometimes only for a short period. Featuring about 260 remarkable paintings, works on paper, sculptures, photographs, and films by 34 artists, the exhibition covers a wide range of styles and subjects. Besides well-known figures like Louise Bourgeois, Claude Cahun, Leonora Carrington, Frida Kahlo, Meret Oppenheim, and Dorothea Tanning, numerous as yet lesser-known artists from more than three decades of Surrealist art, such as Toyen, Alice Rahon, and Kay Sage, also await discovery. The exhibition features representative selections of works by each of the artists, while at the same time reflecting networks and friendships among the women artists in Europe, the US, and Mexico.
An exhibition of SCHIRN KUNSTHALLE FRANKFURT, in cooperation with Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk.
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Leonora Carrington, Autoportrait, à l'auberge du Cheval d'Aube, 1937/38, oil on canvas, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Bridget Tichenor, The Surrealists/The Specialists, 1956, Oil on Mazonite, 40 x 30,2 cm, Private Collection Mexico, © Bridget Tichenor
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Toyen, Le Paravent, 1966, Oil and collage on canvas, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris / The Roger-Viollet Photoagency © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Toyen, Le Paravent, 1966, Oil and collage on canvas, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris / The Roger-Viollet Photoagency © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Dorothea Tanning, Voltage, 1942, Oil on canvas, Collection Ulla und Heiner Pietzsch, Berlin, © The Estate of Dorothea Tanning/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020, Photo: Jochen Littkemann, Berlin
Kay Sage, At the Appointed Time, 1942, Oil on canvas, Newark Museum of Art, Bequest of Kay Sage Tanguy, 1964 © Estate of Kay Sage/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Dora Maar, 29 Rue d'Astorg, 1936, Photomontage, silver salt print, Musée national Picasso-Paris, Dation Pablo Picasso 1979, MP3623, © bpk / RMN - Grand Palais / Dora Maar / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Jacqueline Lamba, André Breton, Yves Tanguy, Cadavre exquis, 1938, collage on paper, Private Collection, Courtesy of the Mayor Gallery, © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Frida Kahlo, Selfportrait with thorn necklace, 1940, Oil on canvas mounted to board, Collection of Harry Ransom Center, The University of Texas at Austin, Nickolas Muray Collection of Modern Mexican Art © Banco de México Diego Rivera Frida Kahlo Museums Trust/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Leonor Fini, Chtonian Deity Watching over the Sleep of a Young Man, 1946, Oil on Canvas, 27,9 x 41,3 cm, © Weinstein Gallery, San Francisco and Francis Naumann Gallery, New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2020
Ithell Colquhoun, Tree Anatomy, 1942, oil on board, 57 x 29 cm, The Estate of the late Dr. Jeffrey Sherwin and the Sherwin Family, © Samaritans, Noise Abatement Society & Spire Healthcare