Making a Surrealist Object, Collage, or Poem with Erika Manning

Posted on April 18, 2023 by Sandy Weisman

 

Saturday, May 13 & Sunday, May 24

Register by the 1st of May and receive a 10% discount ! 

All CMCA members receive a 10% discount on all workshops.

Remember your children’s Mix ‘n Match books – the crocodile head on the butterfly body?  Remember last night’s bizarre dream?  Remember Mad Libs?  All are examples of Surrealist thinking, your unconscious at play, a juxtaposition of dissimilar objects, words and ideas that create new meaning, a somehow logical illogic.

Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself.  Think Freud discussing dreams with Picasso, or Max Ernst making collages with Joseph Cornell.  Even if you don’t know these artists and writers you can see in the Exquisite Corpse drawing above the bizarre mash-up of ideas that produced these sometimes hilarious, sometimes poignant art works.

 

You might have some fun titling this exquisite image – A Bird in the Hand, perhaps, or Dressed Up with No Where to Go. 

Perhaps you’ll write an accidental poem, as we did with poetry magnets not so long ago, trying not only to make the random words mean something, but unleashing new ideas to incorporate in the poems you have in process.  How about this stanza of a poem by Wallace Stevens?

I.

The man bent over his guitar,

A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.

They said, “You have a blue guitar,

You do not play things as they are.”

The man replied, “Things as they are

Are changed upon the blue guitar.”

And they said then, “But play, you must,

A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,

A tune upon the blue guitar

Of things exactly as they are.”

The Surrealist movement of the 20th century has inspired so many artists, designers, and writers, and continues to do so.  Erika Manning will inspire you during this exciting exploration!  Please come and join us for a creative weekend intensive workshop!

Go to: www26splitrockcove.com/workshops to register for this workshop !!