The Surrealists believed that dreams and reality could be resolved into a kind of absolute reality — or, as they dubbed it, surreality. Here, Tanguy presents what he called a mindscape: an eerie, illusionistic landscape that combines aspects of both realms.
The soft, opalescent palette and mysterious, biomorphic forms (bonelike shapes interconnected by delicately etched lines) give the feeling of being in another world, while the artist’s use of traditional perspective creates the illusion of realistic, three-dimensional space.
On view on floor 2 as part of Open Ended: SFMOMA's Collection, 1900 to Now
Audio Stories
Painting from the unconscious
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NARRATOR:
The forms scattered in this troubled landscape seem to emerge from the unconscious. They suggest figures, even perhaps animals, or possibly sculptures or furnishings. But on close inspection you can see that they are entirely imaginary. Their surfaces look soft and undulating, yet their edges are sharply drawn. Notice that many of them are connected by threads or filaments, which may suggest some unknowable network of relationships. These forms cast shadows that seem more solid, more real than the forms themselves. The light comes from behind us, lighting not only the objects in the landscape but also the eerie atmosphere, a lowering mist that never quite reveals the horizon. Enigmatic landscapes like this are characteristic of the painting of Yves Tanguy, who was one of the major Surrealist painters along with Salvador Dalí, Max Ernst and Joan Miró.
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