As beautiful as the chance meeting on a dissecting table of a sewing machine and an umbrella this is how the poet Comte de Lautréamont describes a key aspect of Surrealist art theory. The strange objects and sculptures produced by the Surrealists manifest the interplay of bizarre contrasts, of a shaken reality that forges the subconscious and dreamy states. This is the first comprehensive publication to focus exclusively on the Surrealists three-dimensional works about 180 of them in all. From today s perspective, many of them seem surprisingly fresh and contemporary, not at all like historical artifacts. The selection presents more than fifty artists of the Surrealist period, including familiar names such as Duchamp, Magritte, Dalí, Picasso, and Man Ray, but also many other artists whose striking works are yet to be discovered by a wider public.
