UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The Palmer Museum of Art will present a new exhibition, "From Dada to Dalí: Surrealist Works on Paper," from Jan. 12 through May 8.
The Dada movement arose in reaction to the senseless destruction of World War I. First practiced and named in 1916 by writers and artists working in Zürich — among them Jean Arp, Hugo Ball and Tristan Tzara — the idea soon developed independently in Berlin, Paris and New York. The groups were united not so much in style or technique as in their rejection of convention and rationalism. The name Dada, French for “hobbyhorse” and derived, some say, by randomly stabbing a French-German dictionary with a penknife, fittingly denotes Dada’s nonsensical and decidedly anti-art propensities.
Surrealism evolved out of the Dada aesthetic, but rejected Dada’s preference for absurdity and adopted instead more programmed direction in its effort to combat rationalism. Influenced by the psychoanalytical work of Sigmund Freud, the surrealists, including André Breton, Man Ray, André Masson and Salvador Dalí, employed a variety of techniques, in particular, automatic writing and drawing, as a means of expressing the subconscious mind.
"From Dada to Dalí," which features about 40 prints, drawings and texts by surrealist and Dada artists and writers, has been organized in tandem with the April 2016 Center for the Performing Arts presentation of Daniele Finzi Pasca’s "La Verità," a theatrical examination of the life and work of Salvador Dalí.
Exhibition-related events
Patrick McGrady, Charles V. Hallman Curator at the Palmer Museum of Art, will lead a Gallery Talk titled "From Dada to Dalí" at 12:10 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 15, in the exhibition gallery.
Jonathan Eburne, associate professor of comparative literature and English, and Amy Dupain Vashaw, audience and program development coordinator for the Center for the Performing Arts, curated "Surreal Cinema Series: A Thematic Approach to Film," in conjunction with "Consciously Surreal: Photography, the Uncanny, and the Body" and "From Dada to Dalí: Surrealist Works on Paper," and will present "Pioneers of Experimental Films" at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 11; "Experimental Short Films by Women" at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 18; and "Art Films of the 1960s and 1970s" at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 25, in the Palmer Lipcon Auditorium. Films are appropriate for mature audiences.
Eburne will lead a Perspectives Unbound Gallery Talk titled "Surrealism on Paper" at 12:10 p.m. on Friday, April 8.
Susan Hirth, docent, will lead a Docent Choice Tour titled "Surrealism in Works on Paper" at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 24, beginning in the Christoffers Lobby. Light refreshments will be served afterward and all ages are welcome.
Also on view at the Palmer Museum of Art this spring are "Consciously Surreal: Photography, the Uncanny, and the Body" from Jan. 12 through May 8 and "Small Prints, Big Artists: Renaissance and Baroque Masterpieces from Carnegie Museum of Art" from Feb. 2 through May 15. "Small Prints, Big Artists: Renaissance and Baroque Masterpieces from Carnegie Museum of Art" was organized by the Carnegie Museum of Art.The Palmer Museum of Art at Penn State is located on Curtin Road and admission is free. Museum hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and Sunday, noon to 4 p.m. The museum is closed Mondays and some holidays. From Saturday, March 5, through Sunday, March 13, the museum will be open from noon to 4 p.m. The museum will be closed on Sunday, March 27.
The Palmer Museum of Art receives state arts funding support through a grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, a state agency funded by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency.