Surrealism and the Exotic

Part documentary narrative and part sustained critique, this is the story of the obsessive mutual relationship between the surrealist intellect and non-Western culture. It raises controversial questions about material desire, artistic representation and the exploitative nature of fantasy.
"Surrealism is allied with peoples of colour, first because it has sided with them against all forms of imperialism and white brigandage and second because of the profound affinities between surrealism and primitive thought. Both envision the abolition of the hegemony of the conscious and the everyday, leading to the conquest of revelatory emotion" (Andre Breton, 1945, interview with Rene Belance). The influence of the primitive on Surrealism has been largely ignored by classical accounts of the movement; yet exoticism lies at the very heart of surrealism's distinctive aesthetic. The artistic proteges at the forefront of the avant garde - including Andre Breton, Max Ernst and Georges Bataille - were themselves lyrical advocates of their own imaginative debt to esoteric cultures; eager voyagers not simply of the unconscious landscape but of its perceived material parallel, exotic art. Part documentary narrative and part sustained critique, "Surrealism and the Exotic" is the story of the obsessive mutual relationship between the surrealist intellect and non-Western culture. Describing the distant travels across Africa, Oceania, Mexico and the Caribbean made by wealthy young aesthetes