Friday Recommendation: Immerse Yourself in Some Surrealism

I think I may have tempted fate! I had a fabulous Friday recommendation for you this week, but in the time between thinking it and Friday arriving, things have really been turned upside down.

I hope level four is treating you well, and perhaps my slightly adjusted recommendation will bring you a little break from reality as you disappear into the world of surrealism.

Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending the most excellent BOINZ conference. I had an hour free so I popped across the road to the Surrealist Art exhibition at Te Papa. The collection arrived in June from the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen’s in the Netherlands and features Dali among others.

I remember studying Dali when I was 14 or 15 at school. Back in the day we would have looked at the images in slides on a projector or big heavy artbooks. To literally be standing in front of original Dali artworks - in Wellington, was pretty amazing.??

It is a phenomenal exhibition, and so well curated. There were books, letters and writings going back to the mid 1920s. It gave a real sense that these artists had come out of the horrors of WW1, and their experiences influenced the distortion seen in their art and literature. To be appreciating it years later, and? to have this piece of history captured in art felt very special, and also very relevant for the world we live in right now.

My recommendation was to go and visit the exhibition if you got a chance - and fingers crossed that is soon. But in the meantime, here is a video sharing 50 of Dali’s most famous paintings. Grab a cuppa and enjoy three minutes away from lockdown life.