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Introduction
The Surrealist art movement ‘sought to channel the unconscious as a means to unlock the power of the imagination’ (The Art Story, 2011). Surrealist artists aimed to present this creative potential of the unconscious mind by subconsciously visualising it through different artistic mediums. I am interested in the relationship between the unconscious mind and the conscious decisions that have been made to explore these visually. I want to explore the subconscious process of dreaming, the images our minds produce during that process and how these are affected by our conscious lives.
Surrealism originated in the late 1910s and early 1920s; at the heart of the movement was the process of ‘automatism or automatic writing, which allowed artists to forgo conscious thought and embrace chance when creating art’ (The Art Story, 2011). It sought to capture the imagination of the unconscious. The movement progressed to include the photographic medium in the early twentieth century.
The connection between dreams and reality is one of my main points of research. The work of psychologist Sigmund Freud was extremely important for Surrealist. Their ideas where influenced heavily by his book ‘The Interpretation of Dreams (1899). ‘Freud legitimized the importance of dreams and the unconscious as valid revelations of human emotion and desires; his exposure of the complex and repressed inner worlds of sexuality, desire, and violence provided a theoretical basis for much of Surrealism’ (The Art Story, 2011).
Throughout my essay, I will explore how photographers and artists look at the relationship between the conscious and the unconscious mind in their work. My first chapter will explore how the artists Man Ray and Andre Masson have explored subconscious processes throughout their work and how this has affected their final outcomes. In my second chapter, I will explore dreamscapes and the idea of displacement in relation to the conscious mind. In chapter three, I want to explore the idea of the nightmare and how our conscious minds bleed images and information into the subconscious process. In essence, I want to investigate the connection between our everyday lives and what happens in our minds when our conscious brain is no longer in charge.
Marquise Casati, Man Ray, 1922 & This Man, Andrea Natella, 2008
The unconscious mind is by far one of the most difficult things to document as the very process of documentation revolves around the conscious process of said documentation. The Surrealist movement sought to discover and explore the unconscious mind and learn about the processes of the mind. (The Art Story, 2011)
My project started with me trying to explore and document unconscious processes, starting with looking at visual artist, Man Ray and his photograph entitled, Marquise Casati (1922) and presents a ghostly figure with little contrast.
Marquise Casati appears ghostly and distorted within this photograph, this evokes an uncomfortable emotion within the viewer. The photograph is angled directly at the figures eye-line. This is synonymous with traditional portrait photography; making the subject at the same height in relation to the viewer as the subject is framed in the centre of the image. This makes the viewer feel as if they are in the same room as the figure and therefore connects with the subject further. However, the shocked and sincere expression is in direct contrast to traditional portrait photography.
The subject in the photograph is in focus, however the photograph has low amounts of light and a high contrast, leading to the ghostly and mostly flat-looking figure of the subject in the photograph. The front-lighting that creates the flat looking photograph just adds to the mystery and allure of the photograph, leaving the viewer with many questions surrounding the photographs intentions and origins. This mystery and stark effect also comes from the images black and white format. The two tones provide contrast and draw the viewers image to look at the ghostly figure of the subject. I think the photographer evokes an uneasy emotion from the viewer creating and uneasy and foreboding feeling through the use of the images stark format and the subjects expression and the unknown origins. This relates to the subconscious process of facial expressions we make as humans, something that we can only control when we consciously reference it. We subconsciously create expression directly related to our emotions, something we cannot consciously control.
The subject of Marquise Casati appears in a distorted form, presented in a similar way to the infamous ‘This Man’ illustration published by Andrea Natella in 2008 (Wikipedia, 2023). ‘This Man’ is a figure many people believe they have seen in their nightmares. I sought to explore both the chemi-photographical process of creating this photograph and recreating it using the same techniques as I have a preference for physically created photographs with practical effects and chemical altering over-relying on digital tools to create my pieces. I used a point-and-shoot film camera and took pictures of people when they weren’t expecting it to capture raw expressions, a pure sign of something we all do subconsciously.
Are you even paying attention?, Henry Anderson, 2023
This relates to the surrealist movement of artists that sought to explore things we do as human without conscious thought. Artist André Masson explored these unconscious processes through his ‘Automatic Drawing’ project in 1924. Masson created this art work by ‘letting his hand move freely across the page while in a state of semi-trance’. (Savannah Phelan, 2012)
This relates to the surrealist movement of artists that sought to explore things we do as human without conscious thought. Artist André Masson explored these unconscious processes through his ‘Automatic Drawing’ project in 1924. Masson created this art work by ‘letting his hand move freely across the page while in a state of semi-trance’. (Savannah Phelan, 2012)
The contrast of the artwork being presented in black and white highlights the intricacies of each pen stroke, framing every subconscious mark Masson wrote to create this piece. Every subconscious mark was a way to explore the unconscious mind. Masson sought to explore the creative potential of the unconscious without being restricted to think what we was going to create on the blank page.
Automatic Drawing, André Masson, 1924 & Untitled, Claude Cahun, 1928
Human Pretzel, Henry Anderson, 2023
I then wanted to explore the idea of subconscious movement. I explored this, inspired by the work of Claude Cahun. He created photographs with human figures positioned in obscure and unique ways. Cahun was a strong influence in the surrealist movement and was one of the first artists to explore the movement through photography especially with the expression of human figures. I explored the freedom and expression of the human figure without the presence conscious mind.
I wanted to follow this with an experimental process of light painting with fire, partly inspired by the incredible Pablo Picasso light painting photography. Picasso’s created artwork in many different mediums. His artwork spanned from documentarian to surrealist. He created a series of light paintings based on the style of his work. Picasso’s work explored his abstract view of people. His photographs were perfectly executed with every detail meticulously thought through.
Freud again remarked in his book; ‘The impressions which have had the greatest effect on us—those of our earliest youth—are precisely the ones which scarcely ever become conscious’ (Freud, 1995). Freud is talking about the idea of the things we lean and take in very early in life are the things that we take on unconsciously, later on in life. Relating this back to the pieces above, we think about the freedom to move and draw without thought. The idea that we take these things on with us at an early age, such as the way we walk and the way we talk. The unconscious processed in our life we learn at an early age.
Untitled, Pablo Picasso, 1949
Firecracker, Henry Anderson, 2023
I was inspired by Pablo Picasso’s medium and the process André Masson used when creating his ‘Automatic Drawing’ series using subconscious movement. Movement without a plan, without engaging the conscious mind in the process, only engaging the conscious mind on the thought of the process of the medium. I was inspired used matches to create light paintings as a form of mark making to produce these photographs. This way I had different amounts of time to play with and therefore couldn’t plan or have a conscious bias to what I would create.
The Surrealists had a history of exploring subconscious processes such as expression and movement as these are way to explore the unconscious mind. These subconscious processes present the raw uncontrollable emotion of the mind which has inspired me in my own work. After exploring unconscious movements and automatic processes within my photography, my work naturally progressed into exploring dreams; one of the most significant concepts within surrealist work.
Dilemma, Dreamscapes, Mindaugas Gabrenas
Chapter 2: Displacement of Dreams – The Moment Between Dream and Awakening
For the next stage of my research, I will be exploring dreams as a ‘window into the subconscious mind which is the part of us that interprets the world without us being aware.’ (Hinckley). I want to explore how ‘the subconscious mind remembers everything you have felt and experienced’ (Hinckley) to discover where our unconscious mind creates our dreams from.
Dreams are a true expression of the unconscious mind with memories bleeding over from the conscious mind into the creative pool of the unconscious mind. Dreams are a complete expression of the unconscious mind at work. Familiar elements and places from the conscious ‘real world’ are mixed with fantastical elements from the mind. ‘Dreamscapes’ was a collection of work created by photographer Mindaugas Gabrenas.
Dilemma is part of a larger collection of photographs, entitled Dreamscapes. Gabrenas framed this photograph in a square format and has framed the subjects silhouette in the centre of the photograph. Balanced on either side of the subject are two flowers, that, because of the perspective feel larger than the subject and therefore feel displaced. The camera is angled upwards at the subject. This gives the subject of the photograph authority over us and therefore, we as the viewer feel vulnerable when viewing the photograph. The positioning of the flowers in front of the camera makes the viewer feel as If they are hiding from the subject, therefore adding to uneasy and tense atmosphere the photograph creates.
The image is highly contrasted in tones and therefore the environment within the photograph feel uncomfortable and uninviting. It feels cold and isolation to the viewer. The photograph has a shallow depth of field with the girl being in sharp focus but the flowers in the foreground being out of focus. The photograph is stylised in black and white with the emphasis being placed on the subject within the photograph.
The photograph creates an uneasy, displaced atmosphere, one where the viewer is not made to feel welcome. it presents a slightly distorted and abstract view of the subject, creating a dream-like environment that feels like its straight out of one’s unconscious.
I explored this through my displacement photoshoot with familiar objects displaced in unfamiliar surroundings. I wanted to explore how the unconscious mind jumbles and demonises what we know into something we are scared of, something we should be afraid of. Within my photograph entitled Concrete Jungle, I wanted to contrast the comfortability of the cosy home environment with the unsettling empty void of a concrete car park at night. I wanted the subject to be displaced buy wholeheartedly unaware of his displacement, distracted by his book.
This naturally let me onto one of my most pivotal photoshoots where I wanted to explore a phenomena called false awakenings, within dreams. False awakenings is the feeling of waking up, whilst you’re inside a dream. In this instance, the subject is waking up, inside their dream, as their bed is sinking in a lake. False awakenings is an example of unconscious creativity as the mind is working without conscious thought (Green, 2015). ‘False awakening is a state in which a person believes they are waking up and going through their usual routine, only to find that they are having a realistic dream’ (Levi, 2022). This often goes hand in hand with the concept of displacement within dreams.
Concrete Jungle, Henry Anderson, 2023
Drowning In It All, Henry Anderson, 2023
The photograph visually striking and it is a scene that feels unnatural as you don’t normally see this collection of things together, a bed in a lake, someone asleep in a full suit. I wanted to present the sensation of waking up inside your bed and finding you are in unfamiliar surroundings, sinking into a vast body of water. This again is an example of the subconscious mind creating a story from the bank of knowledge collected from the conscious mind, learning from everyday life. The unconscious mind analysing for danger and demonising the everyday knowledge you have,
Within Freud’s book, The Interpretation of Dreams, he says; ‘When the work of interpretation has been completed, we perceive that a dream is the fulfilment of a wish.’ (Freud, 1995). Freud is talking about the idea of dreams are interpretation of unconscious wishes we had a child. Hence our childlike dreams and fantasies such as flying and floating on the ocean in our beds. Then our brains analyse the danger and twist these dreams into night terrors like falling from the sky and drowning in the ocean. The development as we grow, analysing danger and understanding the pessimism that consumes our lives.
Similarly, surrealist painter, René Magritte, explored this idea of known places with uncomfortably unusual situations in the piece, Golconda. He presents the location in a regular, everyday fashion, just with men in suits raining from the sky. A distorted as confused view of the world, one where the subconscious creates from the bank of knowledge collected from the conscious mind, learning from everyday life, searching for danger. Phycologist Sigmund Freud talks about displacement; ‘Second activity of the dreamwork, displacement, refers to the decentring of dream thoughts, so that the most urgent wish is often obliquely or marginally represented on the manifest level’ (Freud, 1995). Freud talks about how the mind manifests what it knows, searching for desire and danger.
Golconda, René Magritte, 1953
I’m just tired lol, Henry Anderson, 2023
Artists working within the surrealist movement have constantly looked at environments that feel ‘muddled up’ and confused. Natural, everyday elements becoming demonised and analgised by the mind, in search of the danger, a natural response from the mind. After displacement within dreams and the idea of false awakenings with my photography, my work naturally progressed into exploring how these dreams and nightmares bleed over to our conscious minds and how they are related to our real lives.
I don't know who I am, I don't know where I am, Nicholas Bruno, 2018
Chapter 3: Blurring Between Nightmares and Reality. When Nightmares Bleeding into the Conscious
Dreams are our thoughts in the conscious mind bleeding over into the unconscious. However, sometimes these are not directly in the sense that we see the same people, the same places. Often our dreams can make no direct correlation or sense in relation to our conscious life, our conscious mind. Phycologist Sigmund Freud speaks about dreams and their relevance to our lives in his book; The Interpretation of Dreams. Freud states; ‘The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to a knowledge of the unconscious activities of the mind’ (Freud, 1995). Freud talks about how dreams become a window into the unconscious and tell us things about our own lives, an expression of fear and desire, an expression of the emotion we feel as humans. Freud often talks about the common dream of falling and how this is often related to the idea of a loss of control in your conscious life.
‘Inspired by dreams and nightmares’, (Bruno, 2024) Nicholas Bruno’s work presents these elements through haunting scenes. Bruno suffers from sleep paralysis and experiences these night terrors on an almost nightly basis. Bruno took to visual arts and photography to create his nightmares in the real world.
Bruno framed this photograph in a square format, with the bed frame placed in the centre of the photograph with the subject laying in the centre of the broken bed. The river pierces through the middle of the bed and appears to continue on straight, as far as they eye can see. The subject appears to be asleep, alone as he has made no attempt to escape. Perhaps the subject doesn’t wat to escape and feel comfortable in the environment. It presents a complete displacement of an environment of rest within an environment of complete chaos.
The camera is angled down at the subject as if the viewer is looking down onto the subject, giving the viewer authority over the lifeless subject. This makes the viewer feel like they are watching the events occur below them, with no recognition from the subject. This makes the viewer feel like they are observing something they perhaps shouldn’t be. The photograph presents the idea of sleep paralysis and the nightmares of your unconscious mind blending and seeping into the real world with the physical presence of the bed where one sleeps and dreams up the nightmares that the subject is petrified of.
Bruno takes his nightmares, through his experience of sleep paralysis and creates his dreams and turns them into visual artworks, through his photography. This relates to Freud explaining that the way we interpret dreams allows us to understand the unconscious mind and hence more about ourselves. Bruno states in a documentary that he feels he can understand his condition of sleep paralysis and the meaning behind his nightmares more through his exploration of the nightmares through his work (VICE, 2018).
Freud talks about the idea that dreams ‘serve the purpose of prolonging sleep instead of waking up. Dreams are the GUARDIANS of sleep and not its disturbers’ (Freud, 1995). Freud talks about the idea of wondering and discovering. Dreams being the subconscious part of the brain that wants to explore these things, the things in our nightmares. The brain wants to understand and explore the danger, allowing it to know how to cope and react in the real world.
I wanted to explore the concept of the relationship between the conscious and the subconscious mind further so, as part of my development, I interviewed people about their nightmares and how they could relate to their conscious real lives. I also interviewed a psychology teacher to further understand how these dreams relate to real life and what they mean.
I then took these interviews and then went out and created the nightmares as in image in the physical world, these would then all help form part of my final piece. I came back after creating the images and presented each image to the person. I wanted to see their reactions to the nightmares being created in the physical world and how they would react to being shown them. I wanted to see if they found it similar to the experience presented to them from their subconscious.
Through exploring nightmares and their connection to real life, we can begin to understand how our dreams, the expression of the unconscious mind is connected to our emotions and our conscious thoughts, a theory that has been explored by artists and photographers within the Surrealist art movement and psychologist Sigmund Freud. Naturally this led me onto creating my final piece, I wanted to continue exploring the idea of people and their nightmares and how their nightmares, a window into their unconscious mind is related to their conscious thoughts.
Conclusion
For my final piece, I wanted to create a window into a person’s subconscious mind, a window into a person’s dreams. I was partly inspired by my false awakenings photoshoot where I look an old hospital bed into a lake. I wanted to again take this bed and create an outline of a person on the duvet, like you may get the outline of someone sweating after a nightmare. I wanted this to then bleed over into the conscious mind with threads coming of the bedsheet and leading up to the regular pictures on the bedroom wall.
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