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Surrealist Art

SURREALIST STYLE

In the wake of World War I’s ravaging of Europe, artists delved into the unconscious mind to confront and grapple with this reality. Poet and critic André Breton, a leader of the Surrealist movement who authored the 1924 Surrealist Manifesto, called this approach “a violent reaction against the impoverishment and sterility of thought processes that resulted from centuries of rationalism.” Surrealist art emerged in the 1920s with dreamlike and uncanny imagery guided by a variety of techniques such as automatic drawing, which can be likened to a stream of consciousness, to channel psychological experiences.

Although Surrealism was a groundbreaking approach for European art, its practitioners were inspired by Indigenous art and ancient mysticism for reenvisioning how sculptures, paintings, prints, performance art and more could respond to the unsettled world around them.

Surrealist artists were also informed by the Dada movement, which originated in 1916 Zurich and embraced absurdity over the logic that had propelled modernity into violence. Some of the Surrealists had witnessed this firsthand, such as Max Ernst, who served in the trenches during World War I, and Salvador Dalí, whose otherworldly paintings and other work responded to the dawning civil war in Spain.

Other key artists associated with the revolutionary art and literary movement included Man Ray, Joan Miró, René Magritte, Yves Tanguy, Frida Kahlo and Meret Oppenheim, all of whom had a distinct perspective on reimagining reality and freeing the unconscious mind from the conventions and restrictions of rational thought. Pablo Picasso showed some of his works in “La Peinture Surréaliste” — the first collective exhibition of Surrealist painting — which opened at Paris’s Galerie Pierre in November of 1925. (Although Magritte is best known as one of the visual Surrealist movement’s most talented practitioners, his famous 1943 painting, The Fifth Season, can be interpreted as a formal break from Surrealism.)

The outbreak of World War II led many in the movement to flee Europe for the Americas, further spreading Surrealism abroad. Generations of modern and contemporary artists were subsequently influenced by the richly symbolic and unearthly imagery of Surrealism, from Joseph Cornell to Arshile Gorky.

Find a collection of original Surrealist paintings, sculptures, prints and multiples and more art on 1stDibs.

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Style: Surrealist
"Picador" 1966 Experimental Surrealist Composition
"Picador" 1966 Experimental Surrealist Composition

"Picador" 1966 Experimental Surrealist Composition

By Morris Broderson 1

Located in Soquel, CA

"Picador" 1966 Experimental Surrealist Composition Intriguing mixed-media piece by prominent California artist Morris Broderson (b. 1928 d. 2011.) A picador sits upon his horse, hol...

Category

1960s Surrealist Art

Materials

Paper, Watercolor, Graphite, Pinhole, Color Pencil

"Fountain"
"Fountain"

"Fountain"

By Natalia Kolpakova 1

Located in Edinburgh, GB

The artwork is print on silk and it is limited edition. "Fountain" – Where Mermaids Reign In the heart of the city, a grand fountain became more than just a landmark—it became home ...

Category

21st Century and Contemporary Surrealist Art

Materials

Silk

Don Quixote
Don Quixote

Don Quixote

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in Hollywood, FL

ARTIST: Salvador Dali TITLE: Don Quixote MEDIUM: Etching SIGNED: Hand Signed by Salvador Dali EDITION NUMBER: 80/100 MEASUREMENTS: 30" x 22" YEAR: 1966 FRAMED: No CONDITION:...

Category

1960s Surrealist Art

Materials

Etching

Miró, Composition, Derrière le miroir (after)
Miró, Composition, Derrière le miroir (after)

Miró, Composition, Derrière le miroir (after)

By Joan Miró

Located in Southampton, NY

Lithograph on vélin paper. Inscription: Unsigned and unnumbered, as issued. Good condition. Notes: From the volume, Derrière le miroir, N° 155, 1965. Published by Aimé Maeght, Éditeu...

Category

1960s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

Pablo Picasso Christian Zervos 33 Volume Books
Pablo Picasso Christian Zervos 33 Volume Books

Pablo Picasso Christian Zervos 33 Volume Books

By Pablo Picasso

Located in Los Angeles, CA

Christian Zervos. Pablo Picasso. Œuvres de 1895 à [1972]. Paris: Éditions Cahiers d'Art, 1949-1986. 33 volumes in 34 (volume 2 in two parts), small folio (325 x 252 mm.), numerous p...

Category

20th Century Surrealist Art

Materials

Offset

1970’s French Surrealist Signed Oil Painting Abstract Cubist Shapes Patterns
1970’s French Surrealist Signed Oil Painting Abstract Cubist Shapes Patterns

1970’s French Surrealist Signed Oil Painting Abstract Cubist Shapes Patterns

Located in Cirencester, Gloucestershire

Tristan Fabris 1970's, French Surrealist artist Abstract Surrealist Figurative study signed & dated oil on canvas, unframed inscribed verso canvas: 32 x 25.5 inches private collectio...

Category

Late 20th Century Surrealist Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Aracne - Woodcut - 1963
Aracne - Woodcut - 1963

Aracne - Woodcut - 1963

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in Roma, IT

Aracne -  "The Divine Comedy" - Song 12 -  Purgatory  is a woodcut print realized in 1963 for a series illustrating the Medieval poem of the "Divine Comedy" by Dante Alighieri. Not s...

Category

1960s Surrealist Art

Materials

Woodcut

Large Museum Scale Surrealist Composition Dalí Circle Catalan Oil Painting art
Large Museum Scale Surrealist Composition Dalí Circle Catalan Oil Painting art

Large Museum Scale Surrealist Composition Dalí Circle Catalan Oil Painting art

By Antoni Pitxot

Located in Sitges, Barcelona

Large Museum Scale Surrealist Composition Dalí Circle Catalan Painting 1987 Artist: Antoni Pitxot Birth–death: Figueres, 1934–2015 Title: Battle of Constantine Series Date: 1987 Technique: Oil on canvas Dimensions: 100 × 100 cm (39.4 × 39.4 in) Signature: Signed and dated “pitxot 87” lower right Condition: Excellent overall condition Frame: Unframed Provenance: Private collection, Barcelona DESCRIPTION Important large-scale surrealist oil painting executed in 1987 by Antoni Pitxot, one of the closest artistic collaborators of Salvador Dalí and a central figure within the visual universe of the Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres. This powerful 100 × 100 cm composition belongs to Pitxot’s Battle of Constantine series, one of the artist’s most ambitious narrative cycles. In this work, his unmistakable geological figuration becomes a theatrical surrealist battlefield, where mineral forms, latent human presences, fossil memory and Mediterranean landscape merge into a monumental symbolic construction. Pitxot’s mature paintings are instantly recognizable for their transformation of stones into anthropomorphic figures and metaphysical architectures. Rather than depicting a conventional landscape, the artist creates a stage of petrified forms, suspended between archaeology, sculpture, mythology and dream imagery. The work is especially strong for its museum-scale square format, its dramatic vertical construction and its direct connection with the Dalí circle. Large paintings by Pitxot with this level of compositional complexity are considerably less common than his smaller cabinet-format works and are particularly attractive for collectors of Spanish surrealism, Catalan modernism, European surrealism and artists connected to Salvador Dalí. A major statement piece with exceptional wall presence, ideal for an important private collection, curated interior or collector focused on late twentieth-century European surrealism. ARTIST BIO Antoni Pitxot (Figueres, 1934 – Cadaqués, 2015) was a Catalan painter and one of the most significant artists associated with Salvador Dalí’s late artistic environment. Born into the historic Pichot family, closely linked to the artistic life of Cadaqués, Pitxot studied drawing in San Sebastián under Juan Núñez, who had also been Dalí’s teacher. During the 1950s and early 1960s he exhibited in Barcelona, Madrid, Bilbao and Lisbon before settling permanently in Cadaqués in 1966. From that moment, he developed his mature and highly distinctive pictorial language based on the rock formations of Cap de Creus. Pitxot collected stones from the coast, arranged them in his studio as sculptural constructions, and then transformed them into oil paintings populated by anthropomorphic mineral figures. His friendship and artistic collaboration with Salvador Dalí became central to his career. Dalí dedicated a permanent gallery to Pitxot’s work inside the Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres. After Dalí’s death...

Category

1980s Surrealist Art

Materials

Oil

Enormous 1980's French Surrealist Painting Rainbow over Greek Fantasy Landscape
Enormous 1980's French Surrealist Painting Rainbow over Greek Fantasy Landscape

Enormous 1980's French Surrealist Painting Rainbow over Greek Fantasy Landscape

Located in Cirencester, Gloucestershire

The Rainbow French School, signed with monogram and dated 1985 oil painting on canvas, unframed: 77 x 31 inches condition: overall very good, a few very small indents to the giant canvas but no holes, rips or damage. provenance: from a collection in France One of the largest paintings we have available at the moment, this staggering painting is very beautiful with the deep blue sky, the rainbow arching through the landscape, set against the backdrop of a fantasy Greek/ Romanesque landscape with ancient columns...

Category

Late 20th Century Surrealist Art

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Eight Mortal Sins Complete Suite
Eight Mortal Sins Complete Suite

Eight Mortal Sins Complete Suite

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in Hollywood, FL

ARTIST: Salvador Dali TITLE: 8 Mortal Sins Suite Anger Avarice Dalinean Envy Gluttony Lust Pride Sloth MEDIUM: 8 Etchings SIGNED: Each piece is Hand Signed PUBLISHER: Jean Schne...

Category

1960s Surrealist Art

Materials

Etching

Leonor Fini, Untitled, from Fruits of Passion, 1980 (after)
Leonor Fini, Untitled, from Fruits of Passion, 1980 (after)

Leonor Fini, Untitled, from Fruits of Passion, 1980 (after)

By Leonor Fini

Located in Southampton, NY

This exquisite heliogravure, titled Sans titre (Untitled), after Leonor Fini, from the album Fruits de la passion, trente-deux variations sur un theme de Leonor Fini (Fruits of Passi...

Category

1980s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

Portrait in Yellow - Lithograph and Stencil
Portrait in Yellow - Lithograph and Stencil

Portrait in Yellow - Lithograph and Stencil

By Paul Klee

Located in Paris, IDF

Paul KLEE (after) Portrait of a Yellow Lithograph and stencil (Jacomet process), on canson paper Printed signature in the plate 50 x 38.2 cm (19.6 x 14.9 in) INFORMATION : This lit...

Category

Early 20th Century Surrealist Art

Materials

Watercolor, Lithograph

Visions Surrealiste Coronation of Gala
Visions Surrealiste Coronation of Gala

Visions Surrealiste Coronation of Gala

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in Hollywood, FL

ARTIST: Salvador Dali TITLE: Visions Surrealiste Coronation of Gala MEDIUM: Lithograph SIGNED: Hand Signed by Salvador Dali EDITION NUMBER: EA MEASUREMENTS: 21.37" x 29.75" YEA...

Category

1970s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

Salvador Dali "Iris (Eyes)" Etching, 1972
Salvador Dali "Iris (Eyes)" Etching, 1972

Salvador Dali "Iris (Eyes)" Etching, 1972

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in Astoria, NY

Salvador Dali (Spanish, 1904-1989), "Iris Germanica cum Ocellis Italicis" [German Iris with Italian Eyes], Etching and Heliogravure in Colors on Arches Paper, 1972, from the "Florals...

Category

1970s Surrealist Art

Materials

Paper, Etching, Photogravure

Salvador Dali "Gladiolus (Ears)" Etchings, 1972
Salvador Dali "Gladiolus (Ears)" Etchings, 1972

Salvador Dali "Gladiolus (Ears)" Etchings, 1972

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in Astoria, NY

Salvador Dali (Spanish, 1904-1989), "Gladiolus Cun Aurium Corymbo Expectantium" [Gladiolus with Golden Clusters Expected], Etching and Heliogravure in Colors on Arches Paper, 1972, f...

Category

1970s Surrealist Art

Materials

Paper, Etching, Photogravure

"L'été"

"L'été"

By Joan Miró

Located in Henderson, NV

Medium: lithograph and pochoir. Catalogue reference: Dupin 1310, Benhoura 396. This lithograph was printed in 1938 at the atelier Mourlot and published in Paris by Teriade for the ar...

Category

1930s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

(after) Marino Marini - "Cavalier et cheval" pochoir

(after) Marino Marini - "Cavalier et cheval" pochoir

By Marino Marini

Located in Henderson, NV

Medium: pochoir (after the lithograph). Printed by the atelier of Daniel Jacomet, and published in Paris in 1955 by Heinz Berggruen. The image measures 5 1/4 x 3 3/4 inches (135 x 10...

Category

1950s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph, Stencil

Man Ray, Untitled, from Electa Editrice, 1980 (after)
Man Ray, Untitled, from Electa Editrice, 1980 (after)

Man Ray, Untitled, from Electa Editrice, 1980 (after)

By Man Ray

Located in Southampton, NY

This exquisite heliogravure after Man Ray (1890–1976), titled Untitled, originates from the 1980 folio Man Ray, Electa Editrice Portfolios. Published by Gruppo Editoriale Electra, Mi...

Category

1980s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

Joan Miro, The Black Sun, from Derriere le miroir, 1965
Joan Miro, The Black Sun, from Derriere le miroir, 1965

Joan Miro, The Black Sun, from Derriere le miroir, 1965

By Joan Miró

Located in Southampton, NY

This exquisite lithograph by Joan Miro (1893–1983), titled Le Soleil Noir (The Black Sun), from the folio Derriere le miroir, No. 151–152, originates from the 1965 edition published ...

Category

1960s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

Joan Miro, Untitled, from Trace on the Water, 1963 (after)
Joan Miro, Untitled, from Trace on the Water, 1963 (after)

Joan Miro, Untitled, from Trace on the Water, 1963 (after)

By Joan Miró

Located in Southampton, NY

This exquisite lithograph after Joan Miro (1893–1983), titled Sans titre (Untitled), from the album Trace sur l'eau (Trace on the Water), originates from the 1963 edition published b...

Category

1960s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

Joan Miro, Miro in Ink I, from Indelible Miro, XXe Siecle, 1972
Joan Miro, Miro in Ink I, from Indelible Miro, XXe Siecle, 1972

Joan Miro, Miro in Ink I, from Indelible Miro, XXe Siecle, 1972

By Joan Miró

Located in Southampton, NY

This exquisite lithograph by Joan Miro (1893–1983), titled Miro a l'encre I (Miro in Ink I), originates from the 1972 album Indelible Miro. Published by Societe Internationale d'Art ...

Category

1970s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

LUVE
LUVE

LUVE

By Tetiana Borys

Located in Zofingen, AG

LUVE is a painterly work that uses the landscape of Volyn (Ukraine) as a point of departure for a much deeper exploration of inner space. Lutsk is not depicted literally; instead, it...

Category

2010s Surrealist Art

Materials

Canvas, Acrylic

1971 L'Académie de Paris, Pencil Signed EA Colorful Etching
1971 L'Académie de Paris, Pencil Signed EA Colorful Etching

1971 L'Académie de Paris, Pencil Signed EA Colorful Etching

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in New York, NY

Salvador Dali 1971 L'Académie de Paris Etching 19x25 inches Image 27x33 inches with frame overall good condition Pencil Signed lower right Pencil Edition Size EA This Large piece is pencil signed and has lots of light Colors "Academy of Paris - Dali" refers to the etching L'Académie de Paris (1971) by Salvador Dalí, created to commemorate his admission to the French Academy of Fine Arts. It also refers to the Dali Paris...

Category

1970s Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

Space Time - Original handsigned lithograph
Space Time - Original handsigned lithograph

Space Time - Original handsigned lithograph

By Jean Allemand

Located in Paris, IDF

Jean Allemand Space Time Original lithograph Handsigned in pencil Limited /275 copies On vellum 76 x 56 cm (c. 29.9 x 22 in) Excellent condition

Category

Late 20th Century Surrealist Art

Materials

Lithograph

'Early Marshes' — Mid-Century Surrealism, Atelier 17
'Early Marshes' — Mid-Century Surrealism, Atelier 17

'Early Marshes' — Mid-Century Surrealism, Atelier 17

By Ian Hugo

Located in Myrtle Beach, SC

Ian Hugo, 'Early Marshes', from the portfolio 'Ten Engravings'. engraving, 1943, edition 50. Signed, dated, titled, and numbered '37/50' in pencil. A fine impression, with delicate overall plate tone, on cream wove paper, the full sheet with margins (2 5/8 to 7 inches), in excellent condition. With the blind stamp 'madeleine-claude jobrack EDITIONS', in the bottom right margin. Matted to museum standards, unframed. Image size 5 x 5 7/8 inches (127 x 149 mm); sheet size 15 x 11 inches (381 x 279 mm). Ian Hugo originally created "Ten Engravings" in 1945 and the portfolio included a foreword by his partner and collaborator, Anais Nin. In 1978, Hugo republished the portfolio with Madeleine-Claude Jobrack, an American master printmaker who studied under Stanley William Hayter at Atelier 17, Paris, and with Johnny Friedlaender. When Jobrack returned to the States she managed the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Studio in New York before opening her own printing studio, Madeleine-Claude Jobrak Editions. “The sign of the true artist is one who creates a complete universe, invents new plants, new animals, new figures to transfer to us a new vision of the universe in which dream and reality fuse. Ian Hugo's plants have eyes, the birds have the delicacy of dragonflies, their feathers have the shape of fans. Humor is apparent in every gesture. He uses a fine spider web to give a feeling of flight, speed, lightness. The body of a woman reveals the structure of a leaf, a plant. Wings are moving in a world unified by mythological themes. This is an animated world, humorous and levitating, elusive and decorative, which by its unique forms and shapes gives us the sensation of a rebirth, a liberation from the usual, the familiar, a visit to a new planet.” —Anais Nin, from the forward to the portfolio ‘Ten Engravings’ ABOUT THE ARTIST Ian Hugo was born Hugh Parker Guiler in Boston, Massachusetts, on February 15, 1898. His childhood was spent in Puerto Rico—a "tropical paradise," the memory of which stayed with him and surfaced in both his engravings and his films. He attended school in Scotland and graduated from Columbia University where he studied economics and literature. Hugo was working with the National City Bank when he met and married author Anais Nin in 1923. The couple moved to Paris the following year, where Nin's diary and Guiler's artistic aspirations flowered. Guiler feared his business associates would not understand his interests in art and music, let alone those of his wife, so he began a second, creative life as Ian Hugo. Ian and Anais moved to New York in 1939. The following year he took up engraving and etching, working at Stanley William Hayter’s experimental printmaking workshop Atelier 17, established at the New School for Social Research. Hugo began producing surreal images often used to illustrate Nin's books. For Nin, his unwavering love and financial support were indispensable—Hugo was the "fixed center, core... my home, my refuge" (Sept. 16, 1937, Nearer the Moon, The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin, 1937-!939). Fictionalized portraits of Higo and Nin appear in Philip Kaufman's 1990 film drama of a literary love triangle, Henry & June. Inspired by comments that viewers saw motion in his engravings, Hugo took up filmmaking. He asked the avant-garde filmmaker Sasha Hammid for instruction but was told, "Use the camera yourself, make your own mistakes, make your own style." Hugo embarked on an exploration of the film medium as a vehicle to delve into his dreams, his unconscious, and his memories. Without a specific plan, He would collect resonant images, then reorder or superimpose them, seeking a sense of self-connection through the poetic juxtapositions he created. These intuitive explorations resembled the mystical evocations of his engravings, which he described in 1946 as "hieroglyphs of a language in which our unconscious is trying to convey important, urgent messages." In the underwater world of his film ‘Bells of Atlantis,’ the light originates from the world above the surface; it is otherworldly, out of place, yet essential. In ‘Jazz of Lights,’ the street lights of Times Square become in Nin's words, "an ephemeral flow of sensations." This flow that she also calls "phantasmagorical" had a crucial impact on Stan Brakhage, who said that without Jazz of Lights (1954), "there would have been no Anticipation of the Night" his autobiographical film which ushered in a new era of experimental modernist filmmaking. Hugo lived the last two decades of his life in a New York apartment high above street level. In the evenings, surrounded by an electrically illuminated man...

Category

1940s Surrealist Art

Materials

Engraving

Picasso: Un Billet Pur la Glorie, Salvador Dali
Picasso: Un Billet Pur la Glorie, Salvador Dali

Picasso: Un Billet Pur la Glorie, Salvador Dali

By Salvador Dalí­

Located in Fairfield, CT

Title: Picasso: Un Billet Pur la Glorie Year: 1974 Medium: Engraving on Arches paper Edition: F.122/195, plus proofs Size: 25.75 x 19.75 inches Condition: Good Inscription: Signed an...

Category

1970s Surrealist Art

Materials

Engraving

Surrealist art for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Surrealist art available for sale on 1stDibs. Works in this style were very popular during the 21st Century and Contemporary, but contemporary artists have continued to produce works inspired by this movement. If you’re looking to add art created in this style to introduce contrast in an otherwise neutral space in your home, the works available on 1stDibs include elements of blue, orange, purple, red and other colors. Many Pop art paintings were created by popular artists on 1stDibs, including Salvador Dalí, Marc Chagall, Joan Miró, and Leonor Fini. Frequently made by artists working with Paint, and Lithograph and other materials, all of these pieces for sale are unique and have attracted attention over the years. Not every interior allows for large Surrealist art, so small editions measuring 1 inches across are also available. Prices for art made by famous or emerging artists can differ depending on medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $1 and tops out at $1,450,000, while the average work sells for $1,426.