roberttracyphd
“Although the dream is a very strange phenomenon and an inexplicable mystery, far more inexplicable is the mystery and aspect our minds confer on certain objects and aspects of life.” Your thoughts on de Chirico in particular and Surrealism in general?
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De Chirico paintings have this lovely absence of life. This emptiness invites you to fill in the blanks. The landscapes also can be very disturbing evoking a feeling of loneliness. His work can make someone feel uncomfortable…I like knowing that his dad was an engineer and that he lived by a railroad. It’s interesting to see how these childhood are remembered. He paints the enigma of the experience.
I personally enjoy the carefully thought out simplicity of De Chiricos painting. There does not need to be a lot of action or elements in the piece, just what is important to the artist. The color palette is not outragious, but it does show strength in its own uses. The other way one could look at this painting is that it is void of life, making the viewer a bit unsettled by this piece. It could be viewed as baran and lonely. Whenever someone is admiring a piece of work, it is all about how the viewer interprets what the artist is trying to portray. With De Chirico, he invites the viewer to make up their own story about his artwork.
Alot of surrealist paintings seem to be very far fetched and strange just like a dream. Some of these strange paintings include things like women going through sowing machines. What I like about De Chiricos painting is that it is still dream like, but it is simple as if it that scene could still be seen in real life. Its not just a picture of a building and a statue. It has a dream like feeling that makes me think that I’m trying to get to the tower, but I just can’t seem to reach it and the statue is trying to get me and keeps coming and blocking my way. I agree with Kristin Brewer that it is unsettling. There’s a great tower and a great statue, but no one around to see it and no one around to guess who made it. It is like there used to be a great many people there, but they all had to leave for some reason or they are all in hiding for some reason. I think this is one of the reasons it feels more dream like than reality.
As we look at more surrealists work, I’m beginning to see more things that unify the style. The lifeless color palette that is present here in “The Red Tower” can be seen in many other works such as Ernst’s “Murdering Airplane” and “The Elephant Celebes.” It does seem, however, that most work is highlighted with small but bold spots color, such as the rich reds and blues seen in “The Elephant Celebes.” Even Dali’s “Persistence of Memory,” which has a more lively color scheme, still depicts strong shadows and genreally limited color palette. One can clearly see the styllistic influence that the surrealists painters had on one another when viewing the work together.
When I look at this painting, I wonder a couple of things: where are the people, why are we viewing this from the dark, and who is that statue of. I feel the statue being cut off where we can’t tell who it is makes the work more interesting. This work makes me want to create a story from it That the statue is of a ruthless dictator and the town’s people are all in hiding because they are all terrified of him. The void spaces and emptiness gives the feelings of negative emotions. But maybe the mysteries of this painting is what surrealism is all about.
This image is effective because:
The figure is unknown and placed inexplicably (it is a statue, but this is only known on careful examination.) The approaching figure is on a higher eye level than us, invoking childhood fears.
The sky is dark but the sun creeps beneath them, an unusual weather phenomenon which suggests the swift onset of night.
The viewer is situated in passive position hidden from the light, characteristic of a person who is hiding.
The directional elements of the horse and the shadow suggest deliberate movement and tension within the intruding world of light from which we are hiding.
The absence of other figures involves the viewer and casts the viewer as the target of the implied pursuer, and the absence of any other cover apart from our sole hiding place creates a primitive, survival-based anxiety which would be appealing to the dadaists.
The Beauty of Surrealism, is not the exectution of the form, however the execution of the slightly off put colors and menacing structures. The slightly tweaked and manipulated buildings. The giant statue that rivals that of the red tower. This is almost exactly how most of us dream. The haze of objects in our peripherals, and the detail in the slightest attention gathering images of emotion. Though that detail is fading just as quickly as it is percieved.
Next time you are in your own dream. Look at your clock and read what time it is.
Giorgio de Chirico was an Italian Surrealist painter. He emphasized that the image of
the painting used an illusionary object. His painting, The Red Tower, shows us
inexplicable elongated shadows and the absence of perspective with the object. Chirico’s Surrealism manifested hallucination more than precision in his painting’s appearance. He is truly a free painter who does not follow the traditional art style and appearance of an object. I think that his quote means that, although dreams are strange and hard to understand, Chirico thinks that it is much harder to understand is how or minds deal with and categorize real objects and ideas.
Happy Halloween and Happy Nevada Day!
De Chirico’s work is so dreamlike and represents surrealism very well. I think that art during this period is very eerie. I feel like the purpose of the dreaminess is to relate to the viewer on a personal level. Every has dreams, even if they don’t remember them. Everyone remembers what dreams are visually like. Hoping that a viewer can relate to a specific feeling of a piece, is a shot in the dark, but dreams are a for sure relation. The Elephant Celebes is another piece of work that is think with imagination. The mind must be open to create these sort of masterpieces, but the viewer must be even more accepting of the illogical images.
chirico’s painting reminds me of dreams that i’ve had; they are bad dreams but in them i know i’m dreaming and i’m trying to wake myself up. his painting is very unrealistic and overpowering as well as animated which leads you to know that it is an imaginary place, yet (as a viewer in the painting) you are in a place that envokes fear and anxiety, but you know that it is not real and you can walk away or ‘wake up’ fom it. he seems to capture more than a dream in his paintings, he captures a feeling, sometimes a feeling that only happen in your dreams when we truly let our minds run free
What I like about Chirico’s painting is how well it captures the feeling of being in a dream. I believe paintings have a “sound” to them and The Red Tower is silent, just like how dreams often are. The perspective also seems skewed and the ground warped, like everything may melt away and transition into some other scene just like how that happens in dreams. Like how many others have said, the painting has a very unsettling feel to it, as if everything could quickly turn into a nightmare, again just like how it happens in actual dreams.
De Chirico’s painting captures both the mysterious dream-like quality and the uneasiness experienced by the brain in reality. What was that flash of light captured in the peripheral vision? What is that blurry uncertainty when a person just wakes up, wondering if they are still dreaming? The mind interprets the world in different and mysterious ways. This painting displays that unease and yet picturesque quality of mystery. The simple starkness and muted color palette make this piece unique and it explores the unknown and asks the mind to fill in the missing pieces.
De Chirico can best be described as an artist in constant flux. His association with Surrealism only spanned a little over a decade but his impact was lasting, inspiring several notable individuals in both painting and literature to elaborate on the foundation that he created. He gave painting a new style that conveyed literal imagery with a separate focus on the perception of that imagery, much like Magritte with his Treachery of Images. His simple, stylistic treatment of objects was used to exemplify a mind’s eye snapshot view that would rival any naturalistic depiction of the same objects painted from reality itself. His Red Tower stands at the end of a corridor that opens up to a landscape of imagination giving us no concept of a true vantage point; this disorients the viewer and lulls them into an interpretive hallucinatory state of nonreality. The painting is divided by an equestrian statue that is hidden behind a part of the wall of the hallway. Only the shadow of the statue casts itself entirely through the picture which could allude to this concept of negative space that divided the object and its context. Dream-state was the negative space, the subtext of all that an individual experiences in life, and de Chirico gave artists a new way to express that side of themselves. Dali, Magritte, even contemporary giants such as Duane Michals, owe some of their legacy to de Chirico’s influence.
On the topic of Surrealism specifically, without it, contemporary art would not exist. Ideas would have run out long ago. Automatism and all that went into the movement itself introduced way of a psychologically-charged interpretative dance with subject matter that artists could delve into. A rock would no longer be a rock, but a conceptual project subject to further study. Surrealism kept art alive.
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I enjoy de Chirico’s void and uneasiness. I can hear the silence. I can envision myself standing between the two foreground buildings, alone. I can see possible life in the distance, maybe behind the red tower, in the white buildings? What is going on back there… Is this a reminder of what my dreams are like? I don’t know. Maybe a representation.
My opinion on Surrealism in general… ehh. I think for me, it lost some intensity. Dada seemed so intense. The Vienna Successionists were like a guilty pleasure. Surrealists seem flighty. For the time, definitely progressive. It is the my least favorite 20th Century movement.
De Chirico’s paintings have the sense of emptiness they are filled with a vacancy feeling. Especially this painting in particular The Red Tower. it is described and seen with having a feeling of emptiness, this painting also has a a building in the center that looks like a small castle with small windows at the very top it can almost be seen as an edifice where it’s used for observational purposes. This image can come across as a place that maybe used to prepare soldiers for some type of warfare. This print has a sense of bareness it can almost be noticed as a reverie. It has the sense of worry, nervousness and once again the feeling of emptiness by having dark shadows and ahorse on the background that may symbolize some sort of preparation for battle. De Chirico’s paintings are very mysterious I think. They are also very surreal it almost feels as if one can take a trip in a dream and experience De Chirico’s dreams in a painting. I like De Chirico’spaintings, works, because it makes me think so much of where of where I can be. It has a calming feeling it makes me focus , wonder,and dream at the same time. I think his paintings are great…
De Chirico handled his paintings with precise detail and care. His work is throughout and he took very seriously. Surrealism was an interesting period. Artists were looking for answers and trying to explain very abstract ideas and dreams. His color use really exemplifies his work and brings about a different dynamic. One can really get that dreamlike affect from his somewhat bland color palette. His colors seem to have a gray undertone which gives that drowsy unrealistic feel. I enjoy surrealism. The paintings are always interesting and something new to offer.
De Chirico’s painting looks more like a nightmare to me instead of a dream. Our view point is from the shade from where all we see is is the horseman monument. I too, like Ericka, want to write a background story as to why this place is so empty and barren, where are the people? why it is the colours that are chosen dull the piece and add to the nightmare? From where we stand, our central focus is the red tower – could it be all the answers we are looking for are in the one tower? Though this is a nightmare, to me, it fits perfectly in the Surrealist world. Surrealist loved bringing the dreams to reality in hopes that we could say we had something similar. The painting is empty so that our mind can fill in the blanks so that we can better relate to it. There are no small minor details in it to help us decipher it, like in Dali’s work where ants have a meaning.
Surrealism in general just seemed to happen because to the Surrealist artist Dada was just crazy, it was all over the place. It wasn’t structured or confined, it just went in every direction it saw fit. If Dada hadn’t happened Surrealism and its dream like pieces or stream of consciousness would have never come to light.
Surrealism, bases most of the works with the since of a dream state or something obscure to reality, based upon many concepts brought up by Sigmund Freud. Giorgio de Chirico and The Red Tower, display this sense of the dream state in this painting. In our dreams how many times have you dreamt and been the only one in your dream? How many conversations do you have? The abscense of people give the viewer the dark sense of loneliness. After all Human beings are social creatures by nature, we crave social interaction for existence. Chirico places within the viewer the urge to follow through the painting almost as if you are searching for someone else lost within this scene. It captures them through the realistic rendering, while at the same time poses the question is this real or is it a dream.
I love the movement of Surrealism, but visually it is either a great hit or miss for me. De Chirico’s work is not very visually appealing to me, but I do enjoy his work conceptually. As far as Surrealism in general I enjoy it because it translates the mysterious workings of the subconscious mind into bizarre, fantastical works. The bizarre has always been fascinating to me. Breton’s techniques of automatic writing as an attempt to record an tap into the subconscious are very interesting and I have tried it myself. The literal translation of the French surrealism is “beyond realism”. I prefer all artwork that takes us a little bit or a lot beyond realism. The Surrealist movement conjures up parts of the brain to work and think that may not be often consciously utilized. Therefore, I consider it to be a very important part of the Modernist movement. In my opinion, some of the greatest contemporary artists are those that have been influenced by this movement.
I agree with Alexandra Bevilacqua, while I don’t care for De Chirico’s style and technique, I really can appreciate the expression and motive behind his work. The featured image reminds me of a dream where you don’t always remember the details. When you wake up from your dream, you find that you cannot recall all the details or specifics of an object, you really just have a fuzzy basic outline. In your dreams, often times you cannot focus on other people, all that exists is in the forground and visible line. His ability to convey these emotion that tends to seem so elusive is something that I really admire.
Honestly, I don’t like many surrealist paintings and they’re style, but I have learned to appreciate their messages and what they are trying to convey. After looking at the artists’ background, I tend to enjoy viewing the painting while keeping that information in mind.
Obviously, this is probably what most surrealist artists wanted to achieve. They had to ability to paint and draw realistically, but prefered to change things in order to focus on the emotion and dreamlike qualities of their imagined environments.
I think paintings like de Chirico are priceless has to how they document what is happening in a culture and how they illustrate topics that are being discussed. The de Chirico documents how the study of dreams was a prominent topic during this time period in Europe. I like the feeling of isolation that he captured, because in my dreams I also feel isolated and silence is only sound that echoes. In addition to the pure flow of thought and the exploration of the mind while we are unconscious, I think Surrealism also gave the world a rare opportunity to see into the dreams of artist.
De Chirico’s work has a creepy quality to it in the fact that living beings cannot be seen for the most part yet there will be clues of their existence. There will be present a cast shadow or a leg or arm with the rest of the body hidden. It forces the view to put together their own conclusions. It is sort of like a dream they need to piece together. it is out of this realm. Surrealism tapes into the dream state. It makes a viewer travel into their unconsciousness. De Chirico’s artwork does just that…
this painting reminds me my city,Thessaloniki (Greece). We also have a tower,that we call it The White Tower but many years before we call it The Red Tower.Near this tower is a really big statue of Alexander the Great riding his horse. So many similarities from a artist that was born in Greece…
you are 100% correct!
i just connected this fact now…
he was born in volos, 2-3 hours from thessaloniki
the position of the tower and the statue must be an inspiration from thessaloniki!