KUNSTHALLE: Le Surréalisme, c'est moi!

An exhibit at the Kunsthalle, and one I was very excited about seeing, Le Surréalisme, c'est moi! was, I'll be honest, a bit disappointing.

I would consider myself a true Salvador Dali fan. I have seen lots of exhibitions. I even have a finger puppet Dali:

Dali in front of the Trevi Fountain

So I was disappointed to see only a handful of Dali originals, with the rest of the exhibit a painful "contemporary artist do Dali." Yuck. This is a) false advertizing. I expected DALI! and b) not real art if you are just copy catting a great artist.

I did however receive a dual entrance ticket for my €10.50 to see "Das Kabinett des Jan Svankmajer" exhibit on the floor above. I was highly impressed. Svankmajer is a relatively well-known Czech animator and film director. He dabbles in other art forms, but his most famous pieces are short films. I remember seeing Dimensions of Dialogue at some point on TV - maybe the arts channel...here is a link to the first part on YouTube. I remember distinctly the different heads devouring each other, and thought it was weird when I was about 15. But now I find it strangely beautiful. I found the entire exhibit beautiful, in fact. Sometime a bit creepy, but always a true artistic vision.

Svankmajer's Encyclopedia sketches

Svankmajer has been touted as the Czech Tim Burton (though his work predates Burton's, so I would say he inspired Burton). As more or less a contemporary of Ingmar Bergman, I would also compare him to Bergman, in the sense that his films deal with social issues in a surreal or unexpected context. Although Bergman's work is more or less "normal" (set in a contemporary, real-life world) and live-action (no animation), I think they share a conceptual vision, in a way.

Svankmajer's work is dark - no doubt about that - imaginative, and very much influenced by the culture of central Europe. I've noticed in my time here (and in reading plenty of German texts in college) that there is a bit of an obsession with the Devil in German, Bohemian, and Alpine cultures - just look at the Brothers Grimm! Or Kafka, or E.T.A Hoffmann, or Heine. Or basically any German-language author for that matter. His Kafka-esque "The Flat," revamping of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher," and his haunting critique of Communism, "The Garden."

So, although the Dali part was a bust, I think I've found a new favorite cineaste in Svankmajer.