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Tate Modern Exhibition

Surrealism: Desire Unbound

20 September 2001 – 1 January 2002
Desire Unbound
Desire Unbound

Desire Unbound

… desire, the sole motivating principle of the world, the only master humans must recognise.
André Breton

The surrealist movement originated in Paris in the 1920s, drawing its members from many countries in Europe and beyond. Although it began as a literary movement, it soon developed to encompass the visual arts, engaging with ideas from psychoanalysis, philosophy and politics as well. The surrealists opposed what they saw as the stultifying and oppressive aspects of society, and celebrated a vision of the world in which men's imaginations and desires were set free. The group was led by the poet André Breton. In the manifesto that launched the movement in 1924, Breton wrote that surrealism aimed to reveal 'the real functioning of thought'. For the surrealists this meant finding ways of bypassing conventional reason and rationality in order to explore the mind's potentially limitless capacity to imagine, dream and invent. Surrealism: Desire Unbound charts the varied paths of surrealist desire, ranging from the sublime to the transgressive. Desire was central to the surrealists' vision of love, poetry and liberty. It was the authentic voice of the inner self, and the key to understanding human beings.

Tate Modern

Bankside
London SE1 9TG
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Dates

20 September 2001 – 1 January 2002

Sponsored by

Morgan Stanley

Morgan Stanley

In partnership with

The Guardian

The Guardian

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  • Artist

    André Breton

    1896–1966
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