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DALIBOR VESEL
UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE

Surrealism, Mannerism
and Disegno Interno

The world always looks straight ahead; as for me,

Iturn my gaze inward, Ifix it there and keep it active.
(Michel de Montaigne, The Complete Essays)
Modern movements, including Surrealism, are treated
too often as homogenous and isolated, ignoring their
historical background, transformation and internal
differentiation. In the case of Surrealism, there is
atendency to define the movement using one of its
aspects, automatism or objective chance, for instance,
as asufficient characteristic of its whole history. This is
problematic particularly in relation to amovement that
lasted for several decades and went through important
changes in its long duration. It is true that Breton
himself considered automatic writing apermanent
source of creativity to the end of his life, but his notion
of automatism was always qualified and modified
by historical circumstances and changing tasks of
the movement.1 However, Bretonsunderstanding
of automatism was not generally shared.
The ambiguity of the inner model
The Surrealist movement was treated by many as
coherent and dominated most often by the spontane
ity of automatism, described sometimes as inner
model. Agood example of such understanding was
in Prague, the most important centre of Surrealist
activity after Paris and Brussels.2 There the main
protagonist and voice of the movement, Karel Teige,
saw Surrealism as imaginative art and the spontaneity
of automatism as inner model. [1] In his view: inner
model emerges from the darkness of the unconscious and
we are dealing here with the selfportrait of the psyche.3

Teigesunderstanding of the creative process is

based on the assumption that the inner model is aresult
of psychic automatism, as acompleted image, which is
fixed in aparticular medium, canvas for instance. The
aim is to fix with utmost accuracy afaithful picture of the
inner model onto the canvas: the craftsman paints the vision
of the poetsmind.4 In Teigesopinion, the painting should
be afaithful copy of the inner model. Any external
intervention, he believes, arrests the process of psychic
automatism, removes the result from its source and turns
it into astylised mask.5 The authenticity of the work
of art depends entirely, in his view, on its proximity to
the spontaneous life and inner world of the artist.
This rather narrow and problematic understanding
of creativity is based on adeeply introverted identity of
the modern self, aresult of along development in which
the anomaly of individualism became anorm. The identity
of the modern self is the main dilemma of modernity,
but its origins are deeply rooted in Christian tradition.
The identity of the modern self
In Christian tradition, the reference to self is related
to personal will, responsibility and salvation, but it
remains situated in the field of culture dominated, until
modern times, by something which is always above the
human self.6 The activity which is mine is grounded on and
presupposes something higher than I, something which Ishould
look up to and revere.7 This changed in the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, when the Augustinian path and
spirituality became acritical influence on the generation
of Descartes and continued into the Enlightenment. The
changing nature of individual identity is revealed in the
changing nature of the subject (subjectum). The subjectum

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in the traditional understanding does not yet mean ego

or self in modern sense. It is not yet men and not at all the I.
What happens between the fifteenth and seventeenth
centuries is that men become the subjectum as myself, to
which all that exists is related and depends on. Men become
the first and real subjectum, the first and real ground.8
What it means to be areal ground and what are
the consequences is well illustrated in the writings of
Michel de Montaigne,9 whose aim to stay and settle
in himself does not lead to peace, but to astate of
fantasy and monstrous hallucinations, as he himself
acknowledges: It seemed to me Icould do my mind no
greater favor than to let it entertain itself in full idleness
and stay and settle in itself, which Ihoped it might do more
easily now, having become weightier and riper with time.
But Ifind that, on the contrary, like arunaway horse, it
gives itself ahundred times more trouble than it took for
others, and gives birth to so many chimeras and fantastic
monsters, one after another, without order or purpose.10 [2]
The state of disengaged fantasy is aresult of
aseparation from the natural conditions and order
of existence. Disengagement from the natural (cosmic)
order meant that the human agent was no longer to be
understood as an element in alarger, meaningful order.
His paradigm purposes are to be discovered within. He
is on his own. What goes for the larger cosmic order will
eventually be applied also to political society. And this
yields apicture of asovereign individual, who is by
nature not bound to any authority. The condition of being
under authority is something which has to be created.11
The disengagement (emancipation) of the modern
self from the traditional cultural context and author
ity led to asearch for anew form of identity through
novelty, originality and selfexpression. Among many
tendencies that contributed to the emancipation of
the modern self, the most important was the tendency
towards aperspectival transformation of reality.
Perspective and lineamenti
The formation of perspective in the fifteenth century
was aculmination of aprocess of change that included
culture as awhole.12 The change took place on all levels
of culture, from ideas and explicit intentions to the
implicit forms of embodiment. On the level of explicit
intentions, the emerging pictorial perspective (perspectiva
artificialis) is an integration of medieval optics (based
on the pyramidal radiation of light) and geometrical
interpretation of visual reality. This was described by
Leonardo as aprinciple of two pyramids, the pyramid
of vision and pyramid of representation.13 [3]
The central axis of the two pyramids links the
human eye with the vanishing point representing
potential infinity, the NeoPlatonic one and possibly
God.14 Perspectival representation became apowerful
setting for the cultivation of selfidentity and for
artificial mental constructions (experimentum mentis).

1 / Karel Teige, cover for Andr Bretons book

What is Surrealism?, Brno 1937
Photo: Institute of Art History, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague

This new creative freedom was articulated very

clearly by Leon Battista Alberti in his discussion of line
amenti, the abstract (eidetic), geometrical structure of
buildings. The appropriate place, exact numbers, proper scale
and graceful order for whole buildings can be determined by
lines and angles only. In fact, Alberti goes one step further
when he says it is quite possible to project whole forms in the
mind without any recourse to the material, by designating and
determining afixed orientation and conjunction of the various
lines and angles.15 Albertisimaginary vision of apossible
form of abuilding anticipates the disegno interno of the
Mannerists and the internal model of the Surrealists.
On the level of embodiment, the perspective
transformation took place in late Renaissance gardens, in
the fabric of cities, in the nature of individual buildings
and in the tangible aspects of everyday life. The most
tangible perspectival transformation of reality is visible
in architecture, and for the first time in the works of
Filippo Brunelleschi. Albertisconcept of lineamenti,
expressed in the statement that it is quite possible to project
whole forms in the mind without any recourse to the material,
throws an interesting light on Brunelleschistreatment
of architectural space, where he anticipates not only

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2 / Max Ernst, The Temptation of Saint Anthony, 1945

oil on canvas, 108128 cm
WilhelmLehmbruckMuseum Duisburg
Photo ADAGP, Paris Bernd Kirtz

Albertislineamenti, but also the Mannerists disegno

interno. Brunelleschischoice of dark stone instead of light
marble as amaterial for the main architectural elements
illustrates his intention to emphasise the abstract nature
of the elements.16 This is very clearly demonstrated
in San Lorenzo, for instance, where the main nave is
structured as aprecise perspectival projection. [4] It is
the transformation of the threedimensional elements
(arches) of the nave into their twodimensional equiva
lents on the wall of the aisle that follow the principles of
the perspectival relation. The main elements, columns,
pillars, arches, entablatures, architraves and frames of
the openings, all appear like lineamenti, clearly defined
on the background of the white surface of the walls.17
It is in relation to the white background that we can
appreciate better the meaning of Brunelleschisprimary

architectural elements, their relation to Albertisline

amenti, but also to the Mannerists disegno interno. These
relations are supported by the NeoPlatonic way of
thinking, in which the source of light is also the source
of intelligibility. For the Mannerists the disegno interno
was asupreme form of intelligibility, since the human
intellect, by virtue of its participation in Godsideational
ability and its similarity to the divine mind as such, can
produce in itself the intelligible forms of all created things
and can transfer these forms to matter. In the Mannerist
understanding of art the critical term was disegno.
Mannerism and disegno
In most of the Mannerist treatises disegno is divided
into disegno naturale (produced by nature), artificiale

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3 / Leonardo da Vinci,
manuscript A37r, 1492,
pyramids of vision and
perspectival representation
Reproduction: Dalibor Vesel,
Architektura ve vku rozdlen
reprezentace, Praha 2008

4 / Filippo Brunelleschi,
San Lorenzo, Florence, interior
Photo: Institute of Art History, Academy
of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague

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5 / Rosso Fiorentino, Moses Defending

the Daughters of Jethro, c. 1523
oil on canvas, 160117 cm
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence
Photo 2013 Scala, Florence courtesy of
the Ministero Beni e Att. Culturaliw

exemplare (inventions, historical and poetic concetti),

and artificiale fantastico (capricci, inventioni). Federigo
Zuccaro, whose interpretation of the nature of disegno
is the most complete, makes adistinction between the
disegno interno and externo.18 The disegno interno brings
together imagination and intelligibility. It is the source
of all artificial things, this is its speculative side; the
practical side is bringing the knowledge of artificial things
into the reality of painting, sculpture or architecture.
Disegno interno is aparticipation in the divine image
impressed in us, it is an Idea, impressive and formative
spirit of all things impressed in us, concetto of all concetti,
form of all forms, Idea of all thoughts, through which
all things are in our mind. Zuccaro sees the similarity
of man and God in the nature of the disegno interno, and
describes the similarity as asign of God in us (segno di
Dio in noi).19 The difference between the disegno interno

and externo is defined by the different nature of imita

tion. Instead of imitating nature, the artist creates like
nature and thus does not imitate nature, but art.20 [5]
The relation between Surrealism and Mannerism
can be traced on several levels, mainly on the level of
dream, Hermeticism and the principle of analogies
(poetics). In Surrealism the boundary between dream
and reality disappears. There is aclose link between
dream, daydreaming and fantasy, based on imagination,
which transcends into the sphere of the imaginary.
In psychoanalytic terms, this process can be seen
as emancipation from the reality principle.
The role of dreams
For the Surrealists, the world of dreams was asubstitute
for the outside world. It had the richness of spontaneous

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Surrealism, Mannerism and Disegno Interno

6 / Jindich tyrsk, Omnipresent Eye III, 1936

pencil, red chalk and pastel on paper, 4127.5 cm,
private collection, Prague
Photo: Jan Mal

associations but most of all the ability to transform

conventional reality into fantastic reality. It also opened
up the possibility of an encounter with the cosmic
symbols, sky, earth, water, trees and stones and with the
origins of things anticipated in myths. The bestknown
technique, which was akey to adreamlike state of
mind, was that of pure psychic automatism, which
promised the elimination of contradictions, temporal
ity and the substitution of external reality by psychic
reality.21 [6] This promise was based on the belief that the
mystery of life is revealed in the content of dreams.22
Louis Aragon wrote ashort but important com
mentary on dreams afew months before the publication
of the First Surrealist Manifesto.23 Max Ernst was one
of the Surrealists who took Freudsinterpretation of
dreams as the main source of inspiration for most of his
works. Ernstsunderstanding of dreams was influenced
by his knowledge and studies of psychiatry and madness,
as well as by romantic art and literature and esoteric
writings. This made him move, quite early, away from
the spontaneity of automatism to the level of acritical
interpretation of creative fantasy.24 Dreams also play their
role in the background of what Salvador Dal defines
as the paranoiaccritical method aspontaneous
method of irrational knowledge based upon the critical
interpretative association of delirious phenomena.25 There
is aclose proximity of delirium to dreamlike reverie,
which opens the possibility of acritical interpretation
of what may appear to be, but is not, spontaneous.26
The understanding of dream, its nature and role
in the drama of human life in Mannerism, has its source
in the cryptic, but very influential Hypnerotomachia
Poliphili.27 Written almost certainly in Florence, in the
circle of Marsiglio Ficino, and not in Venice, where it
was only published, this text represents the journey
and ascent of the human soul to the NeoPlatonic One,
the equivalent of the divine mind. 28 [7] The journey of
Poliphilo is treated as adream, based on the Neoplatonic
reference to the human soul, which shows that all things
human are nothing but adream. Within Poliphilosdream,
the images presented to the reader are the contents of
the narratorsimagination, and the trajectory of these,
mostly architectural, images traces the journey of his
soul. Ficinosconcept of theology is not founded on
supernatural revelation but on onesrational powers

7 / The Ruins of the Polyandrion Temple, 1499

woodcut illustration of Francesco Colonna, Hypnerotomachia
Poliphili, Venice (Aldus Manutius) 1499
Reproduction: Dalibor Vesel, Architektura ve vku rozdlen reprezentace, Praha 2008

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8 / Pieter Brueghel the Elder

Alchemist, c. 1558
engraving by Philips Galle
Reproduction: Dalibor Vesel, Architektura ve vku rozdlen
reprezentace, Praha 2008

to reach the divine itself.29 The main inspiration for

the role of the dream in the Hypnerotomachia was the
treatise On Dreams by Synesius.30 The role of dream in
the culture of Mannerism is felt on all its levels, and is
more or less universal.31 The second most important link
between Surrealism and Mannerism is that of the esoteric
disciplines belonging to the tradition of Hermeticism.
The recurrence of Hermeticism
In the Second Manifesto of Surrealism, Breton writes:
Ithink we would not be wasting our time by probing
seriously into those sciences, which for various reasons are
today completely discredited. Iam speaking of astrology,
among the oldest of these sciences, metapsychics among
the moderns. It is merely aquestion of approaching these
sciences with aminimum of mistrust and for that it suf
fices, in both cases, to have precise and positive idea of the
calculus of probabilities.32 However, of all the discredited
sciences, the discipline with the greatest influence
on the Surrealists experience was alchemy. [8]

It began with the reference to the famous phrase

from RimbaudsUne Saison en enfer, the Alchemy of the
Word.33 The phrase can be considered to be only abeginning
of adifficult undertaking which Surrealism is alone in pursu
ing today Iwould appreciate your noting the remarkable
analogy, as far as their goals are concerned, between the
Surrealists efforts and those of the alchemists.34 Agood
example of the link between the Surrealist efforts and
alchemy is the art of Max Ernst: His child spirit identifies
itself clearly, at adistance of four centuries, with that of
another native of the same city, the great archsorcerer himself,
Cornelius Agrippa. Asingle trait suffices to distinguish the
mental concepts they share from those of anyone else.35
Among the artists with close links to Mannerism and
alchemy, the work of Salvador Dal stands out. [9] Apart
from his deep interest in the work of Arcimboldo and his
contemporaries, which he shares with the other Surrealists,
Dal takes avery decisive inspiration from the paintings
and drawings of Jacopo Pontormo and Rosso Fiorentino,
the writings of the sixteenthcentury magus Cornelius
Agrippa (14861535), and the polymath Giambattista Della

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9 / Salvador Dal, The Endless Enigma, 1938

oil on canvas, 114.3144 cm
Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofa, Madrid
Photo: Photographic Archives of Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofa
Salvador Dal Foundation Gala Salvador Dal, OOA-S 2013

Porta (15351615). It was not only the content, but also the
syncretic and handbooklike nature of Agrippasmain
work, De Occulta Philosophia, that contributed to its
influence not only on him, but also on later generations,
particularly in the epoch of Romanticism and Surrealism.36
The influence of Agrippastext in the time of the late
Renaissance and Mannerism is particularly conspicuous
in Drersengraving Melencolia I(1514). The engraving
is based on apassage on melancholy from AgrippasDe
Occulta Philosophia.37 Melancholy was in aperfect
resonance with the troublesome nature and insecurity
of Mannerism.38 Melancholy is not only an attribute of
ingenious people; it belongs more to the constitution of
the modern individuum and to the essence of modern
existence generally.39 Melancholy became in Mannerism
aresult (syndrome) of the emancipation of the self in
its search for the participation in the divine inspiration
and doubts about the relevance of traditional knowledge.
The hermetic disciplines dominated Mannerist culture
to such an extent that it would be more difficult to say
who was not influenced or involved than who was.40

The common ground of all hermetic disciplines was

magic. Its role and appeal became the main link between
Mannerism and Surrealism.41 However the nature of
magic and its role in culture is rather ambiguous. Magic
differs from other forms of religious activities in that
the desire to dominate and control reality is inherent in
its essential nature. The separation of magic from the
traditional ritual (liturgy) became asignificant phenom
enon only under certain historical conditions because
the domination by will has one essential condition: before the
reality can be thus controlled it must be transferred inwards
and man must take it into himself. He can actually dominate
it only when it has in this way become an inner realm. For this
reason all magic is aform of autism, or living within oneself.42
Historically, this became possible for the first time in the
Hellenistic period, when the disintegration of the cultural
and political institutions of the polis led to the disintegra
tion of traditional corporate rituals and left people to
their own resources and in relative isolation. The second
time that magic became part of mainstream culture was
during the Mannerism of the sixteenth century, following

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10 / Domenico Piola Georges Tasnire, frontispiece of

Emanuele Tesauro, Il cannocchiale aristotelico, 1670
Reproduction: Dalibor Vesel, Architektura ve vku rozdlen reprezentace, Praha 2008

the disintegration of the MedievalRenaissance world.

In times of crisis, magic is commonly the last resort of the
personally desperate, of those whom man and God have alike
failed.43 The persuasive power of magic was closely linked
to the growing interest in other esoteric disciplines such
as astrology, alchemy and theurgy, as well as to the new
interest in mechanics and technicity.
Objective chance and the poetics of analogies
In the later history of Surrealism, the period of dreams
was followed by aperiod very often referred to as
objective chance (or objet trouv), characterised by the
play of imagination (desire) and the unpredictable,
chance encounters with the objects of everyday
reality. The unpredictable encounters were gradually
transformed into an intentional discovery of poetic
(marvellous) phenomena and their relationships in
the structure of the given world. The main key to
the discovery was the principle of analogy, rooted
in the metaphoricity of language and experience.44
The analogical method, though held in honor in
antiquity and the Middle Ages, was thereafter grossly

supplanted by the logical method which has led us to our

wellknown impasse. The first duty of poets and artists
is to reestablish analogy in all its prerogatives.45
The role of metaphor in Surrealism is very closely
linked with the role of metaphor in sixteenthcentury
Mannerism, where it was acentral issue under the
name of argutezza (sometimes acutezza or agutezza).
This term illustrates the difference in understanding
the nature of metaphor, which for the Surrealists was
apure poetic device, while for the Mannerists it was
atool revealing the hidden structure of the universe.
Argutezza has its source in the mapping of experience,
described in Mannerist texts as ingegno, which can
be translated as ingenuity, intelligence, gift, or in its
introverted form (disegno interno) as talent or genius.
Argutezza is an activity based on the gift and richness of
the ingegno, where fantasy and judgement meet. In the
Mannerist literature we usually find the following sources
of argutezza: disbelief, double meaning, contradiction,
darkness of metaphor, allusion, sharp wit and soph
ism. What makes argutezza atrue creative activity is
metaphor. In metaphor is revealed not only the potential
of argutezza but also the transparent power of ingegno.46
Metaphor has its source in the complexity of as
sociations as well as in all the phenomena of the world.47
We can therefore understand why the metaphor was
for the Mannerist poets the queen of verbal figures.48 It
contributes to the continuity of reference, as aprecondi
tion of communication, source of orientation, identity,
situatedness and meaning. Metaphor can discover
new relations of words, can create sentences, which
Emanuele Tesauro describes as continuous metaphors
(metaphore continuate), and finally form schemata or
figures (concetti).49 [10] In its essential sense, concetto is
aconcept which, in the sixteenth century, is closely linked
to Idea.50 As aconsequence, the idea, awitty conceit,
can mirror the whole of Godscreation and help us to
discover that and how the cosmos speaks to us. Using
wit (argutezza) we know the universe by means of the
coupling of things in different categories. In asimilar way
as the Surrealists, the Mannerists saw that the quality
of metaphor depends on the distance of the second
reference and on what is unusual, and that the alchemy
of words should be seen as aparalogical configuration.51
In late Mannerism the unlimited play of metaphor
ical transformations reached apoint that resembles
the mirror of the world. The chaos of phenomena
is artificially structured by the ingenious dance of
metaphors. However, metaphoricity creates only an illusory
certainty of the artificially harmonized world. This under
mines the conventional vision of the optimistically organized
traditional world and using highly artificial paradoxes

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11 / Mikul Medek, Infantile Landscape I, 1947

oil on canvas, 4585 cm
GASK-Gallery of the Central Bohemian Region
Photo: Gallery of the Central Bohemian Region Zdenk Matysko

creates amagical world of nonrelative magical unity.52

There is alink and similarity, but also an important
difference, between Mannerism, where metaphor comes
from God, and Surrealism, where it comes from Man.
The dialogue of Surrealism and Mannerism
The creation of the artificial world as an introverted
projection (disegno interno) was permanently challenged
by the latent presence of cultural reality constituted as
along tradition and norm. The result was an oscillation
between the natural and artificial, divine and human
worlds, apparent in Mannerist literature and painting
but most clearly in music. Iam thinking, as an example,
of Gesualdo da Venosa and his use of wild chromatic
scales, dramatic changes of rhythm, and unorthodox
harmonies in contrast to the wellestablished tradition
of tonality. The oscillation (dialogue) between the natural
and artificial worlds in Mannerism has its analogy in
the relation of Surrealism to its historical background,
which had agreat influence on its development. In
Mannerism the sense of cultural uncertainty was
compensated by originality, novelty and individual
maniera;53 in Surrealism by dreams, spontaneity
of automatism and the search for anew myth.
In its later stages, mainly during and after the
Second World War, Surrealism went along way from
the poetic automatism of the dream period. In the
Prolegomena to aThird Surrealist Manifesto (1942) Breton

writes: Man is perhaps not the center, the cynosure of the

universe. One can go so far as to believe that there exists above
him, on the animal scale, beings whose behavior is as strange to
him as his may be to the mayfly or the whale. 54 The changes
in the nature of Surrealism became visible in the years
that coincide with the publication of the new magazine
Minotaure (19331939). In contrast to the earlier areas of
interest, the individual issues of Minotaure addressed very
different new topics. Apart from poetry, literature and
visual art the magazine included articles on architecture,
anthropology, ethnography, mythology, African, Oceanic
and primitive art, etc.55 On the whole, the content of the
magazine illustrates ashift from the introverted personal
experience to the areas of cultural history and natural
world. The shift is demonstrated even more clearly on
the first pages of BretonsMad Love (L Amour fou) where
he writes: Moving from force to fragility, Isee myself now
in agrotto in the Vaucluse , contemplating alittle limestone
deposit upon the very dark earth, looking just like an egg in an
eggcup. From the ceiling of the grotto, drops fell with regularity
against its delicate upper surface, of ablinding white.56
Bretonsappreciation of natural phenomena
culminates in his eulogy to the crystal: There could be no
higher artistic teaching than that of the crystal. The work
of art, just like any fragment of human life considered in its
deepest meaning, seems to me devoid of value if it does not
offer the hardness, the rigidity, the regularity, the luster on
every interior and exterior facet, of the crystal. Ihave never
stopped advocating creation, spontaneous action, insofar as

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12 / Mikul Medek, Iron Cross I, 1961

oil on canvas, 130162 cm
Ale South Bohemian Gallery, Hlubok nad Vltavou
Photo: Ale South Bohemian Gallery, Hlubok nad Vltavou

the crystal, nonperfectible by definition, is the perfect example

of it [creativity]. The house where Ilive, my life, what Iwrite:
Idream that all that might appear from far of like the cubes of
rock salt.57 The search for the ultimate source of creativity
in nature revealed the vision of creativity representing
the latest development of Surrealism. In crystal, Breton
writes, the inanimate is so close to the animate that the
imagination is free to play infinitely with these apparently
mineral forms, reproducing their procedure of recognizing
anest, acluster drawn from apetrifying fountain.58
The Surrealists vision of creativity is similar to the
visions of other movements, as the following text, refer
ring to cubist paintings, illustrates: The crystal in nature
is one of the phenomena that touch us most, because it clearly
exemplifies its movement towards geometrical organization.
Nature sometimes reveals to us how its forms are built up by
the interplay of internal and external forces Nature and the
human mind find common ground in the crystal as they do
in the cell and as they do wherever order is so perceptible to

the human senses that it confirms those laws which human

reason loves to propound in order to explain nature.59
Bretonsfascination with the crystal shows how
the radicalisation of the introverted orientation of
creativity reached the point where it is dissolved in
the anonymity of the creative process and in that
anonymity discovers the world. To discover the
world means that all the will of the artist is powerless
to reduce the opposition which naturesunknown ends set
against his own aims. The feeling of being set in motion,
not to say being played with by forces which exceed ours,
will not, in poetry and in art, cease to become more acute
or overwhelming: It is false to say: Ithink. One ought
to say: Iam thought. Since then, ample room has been
given to the question: What we createis it ours?60
There is aclose analogy between the development
of Surrealism and modern philosophy. The transcendental
egoism of Descartes, Kant and Husserl, challenged
by Heideggersdiscovery of the embodiment of

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consciousness in the world, can be compared with

asimilar discovery in the development of Surrealism.61
The discovery of the world
The development of Surrealism from its dream period
to the discovery of the world brings us back to our
question about the nature of the inner model and the
spontaneity of automatism. After the Second World
War the future of Surrealism became an open and hotly
debated issue. The debate took place mostly in countries
where Surrealism had established itself as amovement
with the expectations of apossible continuity. One such
place was Prague. In Prague it was difficult to ignore the
role and influence of Teige and his vision of Surrealism.
The vision he propagated and finally left behind became
asource of debate between those who closely followed
him and those who felt that Surrealism had its own
history that might preserve its continuity, but should
be amovement with adistinct orientation and identity,
due to changing historical circumstances. In the ongoing
debate the position of Teigesfollowers, believing in
the universality of the inner model, was challenged
by agrowing number of sceptics. Among the latter
was the representative voice of Mikul Medek, who
started as aSurrealist [11] but moved very soon beyond
the orthodox boundary of the movement, illustrated by
thefollowing judgement: Ibelieve that Surrealism is dead.
Perhaps not entirely dead as far as the quantity of artifacts
are concerned. In them the surrealist world will continue
to vegetate as abizarre, slightly humorous iconography.
Ihave no doubts about its artificially prolonged agony.62
This rather negative judgement was to agreat extent
aresponse to those who dogmatically defended the doctrine
of the inner model. Against their argument he con
tended: The inner model is not an autonomous product ofour
unconscious experience, but is aproject of the movement of
theobjective reality in us.63 The work of art is not an illustration
or transcript of the world of mental situations or images, but is,
or is trying to be, afull and unlimited realisation of the state of
the world.64 The relation between reality and its representa
tion is not arelation between two independent realities,
but areciprocity, where the corporeality of the painting is
an extension of our own corporeality. Medeksown work
represents acontinuity with his earlier Surrealist period,
but the work is elevated to anew level. [12] What makes the
level new is an intimate engagement with the material of
the paintings, where afiguration that comes into existence
is not just aresult of personal experience or the work of
the hand, but of the whole of the authorsexistence and the
world in which he is situated. His world was not represent
ed only by paintings, but also by literature, theatre, music
and philosophy. The radical materiality, concreteness and
the world of his paintings are linked with the work of some
of his contemporaries at home and abroad (Burri, Tpies),
but most of all with the tendencies in European culture to
move from the introverted representation of reality to the

discovery and acceptance of the world and its embodiment

in the work of art. These tendencies coincide with the his
tory and transformation of Surrealism, which reached its
point of fulfilment and opened the possibility to overcome
itself. The development of its background in Mannerism,
mediated by Romanticism and Symbolism, anticipates
its new stage, which does not have aname yet. We do not
know its name, but we know that it will have to be based
on different foundations than Surrealism has been.
For the laying of the new foundations it will be
necessary that the onedimensional emphasis on the
prereflective experience will have to be reconciled
with the humanistic form of intelligibility in order to be
compatible with the current state of authentic culture.
This will also change the wrong association of intelligibil
ity with instrumental reason that so many Surrealists
make. The main task will be to choose and develop
away of thinking that would help us to understand as
best as possible the cultural nature and role of art.
The time may come when somebody will be able
to write the fourth manifesto of Surrealism, but under
different name.

notes

1In one of his later and most complete statements about the nature

of automatism, Breton writes: The term automatic writing has always

seemed to me the limit towards which the Surrealist poet must tend, but without
losing sight of the fact that, contrary to what spiritualism proposes that is
the dissociation of the subjectspsychological personality Surrealism proposes
nothing less than the unification of that personality. Andr Breton, Le
message automatique, in: idem, Point du Jour, Paris 1970, p.181 (originally
published in 1934).
2Lenka Bydovsk Karel Srp (eds), esk surrealismus 19291953,
Praha 1996. Vratislav Effenberger, Vtvarn projevy surrealismu, Praha
1969. Derek Sayer, Prague, Capital of the Twentieth Century. ASurrealist
History, Princeton Oxford 2013.
3Karel Teige, The Inner Model, in: Eric Dluhosch Rostislav
vcha (eds), Karel Teige / 19001951: L Enfant Terrible of the Czech Modernist
AvantGarde, Cambridge, Mass. London 1999, p.342. By imaginative
or poetic painting we understand mainly surrealism. Ibidem, p.346, n. 1.
Originally published as Vnitn model, Kvart 4, 1945, no. 2, pp. 149154.
4Ibidem, p.342.
5Ibidem, p.345. In his last statement about the nature of the inner
model, Teige chose slightly more flexible language: In the same way
as psychic automatism, the inner model is aconcept, which cannot be taken
absolutely or dogmatically. The inner model is, during the painters work
exposed to certain changes, that, as far as they preserve the character, similar
to what Freud, in reference to the life of dreams, describes as secondary
transformation, do not disturb the psychic reality and the truth of the result.
Karel Teige, Osvobozovn ivota apoezie. Studie ze tyictch let. Vbor
zdla III, ed. Ji Brabec Vratislav Effenberger Kvtoslav Chvatk
Robert Kalivoda, Praha 1994, p.412.
6St. Augustinesturn to the self was aturn to radical reflexivity, and
that is what made the language of inwardness irresistible. It was Augustine
who introduced the inwardness of radical reflexivity and bequeathed it to

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the Western tradition of thought. The step was afateful one, because we have

seen as azone of transcendence, as asource of transcendental light in

certainly made abig thing of the first person standpoint. Charles Taylor,

asimilar way as the white or gold background in mediaeval paintings and

Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity, Cambridge 1996, p.131.

manuscripts.

7Ibidem, p.134.
8Paul Ricoeur, The Question of the Subject, in: idem, The Conflict of
Interpretation. Essays in Hermeneutics, Evanston 1974, p.228.
9In his Essays, he described the new sense of identity more clearly

18Federigo Zuccaro, LIdea de Pittori, Scultori ed Architetti, divisa

indue libri, Torino 1607, in: Scritti darte di Federico Zuccaro, Firenze 1961.
Inhis treatise Zuccaro closely follows AristotlesDe Anima (431b432a).
19Ibidem, p.196.

than many of his contemporaries: The world always looks straight ahead; as

20So great and such is the faculty (disegno interno) and its authority

for me, Iturn my gaze inward, Ifix it there and keep it active. Everyone looks in

to traverse, to see and penetrate the whole, and to give complete satisfaction

front of him, as for me, Ilook inside of me; Ihave no business but with myself;

to this same soul, to the very intellect, that is very clearly comprehended to

Icontinually observe myself. Others always go elsewhere, if they stop to think

be truly its clear light, and the food and life of all thoughts, and of our opera

about it, they always go forward, as for me, Iroll about in myself. Michel de

tions. The image and similitude of God in us, is infused in our soul as rector

Montaigne, The Complete Essays of Montaigne, trans. Donald M. Frame,

and governor of our senses, of the intellect, and of all our human operations.

Stanford 1976, p.499.

Ibidem, p.293.

10Ibidem, p.21.

21One of the most important contributions to the understanding

11Taylor (see note 6), pp. 193194.

of the essence of dreams is the work of Jindich tyrsk, particularly his

12The change that included culture as awhole should be seen

publication Sny (Dreams), where the poetic narrative and interpretation

as aprocess of aperspectivisaton of culture, or simply as cultural

of dreams is combined with their visual representation. Jindich tyrsk,

perspectivity. For an outline interpretation of the change, see Dalibor

Sny, ed. Frantiek mejkal, Praha 1970.

Vesel, The Perspective Transformation of the Medieval World, in: idem,

22The first survey of dreams was published in La Revolution

Architecture in the Age of Divided Representation, Cambridge, Mass.

surraliste (1924); the second most complete in 1938: Trajectoire du rve

London 2004, pp. 109175.

/ Cahier G.L.M (Septime cahier de Mars 1938 consacr au rve). Textes

13In the practice of perspective the same rules apply to light and to the

indits: Documents de Paracelse, Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, Carl

eye. Jean Paul Richter, The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, New York 1970,

Philipp Moritz, Albrecht Drer, Jerome Cardan, etc., Andr Breton, Michel

vol. 1, p.45. Perspective, in dealing with distances, makes use of two opposite

Leiris, Benjamin Pret, Pierre Mabille, Paul Eluard, Georges Hugnet,

pyramids, one of which has its apex in the eye and the base as distant as the

Gisle Prassinos, Freud, Armel Guerne, Ferdinand Alqui, Gui Rosey,

horizon. The other has the base towards the eye and the apex on the horizon.

Maurice Blanchard, Marcel Leconte, Guy LvisMano, Georges Mouton,

Now the first includes the visible universe, embracing all the mass of the objects

Henri Pastoureau, J. M. Bellaval. 18 illustrations dont 4 horstexte par:

that lie in front of the eye; as it might be avast landscape seen through avery

Chirico, Ernst, Tanguy, Man Ray, Dal, Masson, Magritte, Dominguez,

small opening The second pyramid is extended to aspot which is smaller in

Maurice Henry.

proportion as it is further from the eye; and this second perspective (pyramid)
results from the first. Ibidem, p.56.
14There is ahidden sense of power attached to perspective, which

23Nothing can make people understand the true nature of reality, that it
is just an experience like any other, that the essence of things is not at all linked
to their reality, that there are other experiences that the mind can embrace

in its capacity to be represented mathematically, which was believed to be

which are equally fundamental such as chance, illusion, the fantastic, dreams.

the representation of divine order of reality, made man feel like aGod. As

These different types of experience are brought together and reconciled in one

Alberti writes, the virtues of painting therefore are that its masters see their

genre, surreality. Louis Aragon, AWave of Dreams, trans. Susan de Muth,

work admired and feel themselves to be almost like the Creator. Leon Battista

London 2010, p.3; first published as Une vague de rves in 1924.

Alberti, On Painting, trans. C. Greyson, London 1991, p.6.

15Leon Battista Alberti, De Re Aedificatoria, trans. Joseph Rykwert
Neil Leach Robert Tavernor, Cambridge, Mass. London 1988, Chapter
I.44v, p.7.
16The novelty of Brunelleschistreatment of the main architectural
elements was recognized already by his first biographer, Antonio Manetti,

24Carlo Sala, Max Ernst et la demarche onirique, Paris 1970.

Elisabeth M. Legge, Max Ernst. The Psychoanalytic Sources, Ann Arbor 1989.
25Andr Breton, Surrealism and Painting, trans. Simon Watson
Taylor, New York 1972, p.134.
26Dawn Ades, DalsOptical Illusions, New Haven 2000.
27Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, Ubi Humana Omnia Non Nisi Somnium

who describes the elements as members and bones. Brunelleschi seemed

Esse Docet. Atque Obiter Plurima Scitu Quam Digna Commemorate, Aldus

to recognize very clearly acertain arrangement of members and bones (il

Manutius, Venice 1499.

conoscere un cierto ordine di membri e dossa) just as if God had enlightened

28For amore detailed new and interpretation of the Hypneromachia,

him about great matters. Antonio di Tuccio Manetti, The Life of Brunelleschi,

its genesis and meaning, see Tracy Eve Winton, ASkeleton Key to

introduction by Howard Saalman, trans. Catherine Enggass, The

PoliphilosDream: the Architecture of the Imagination in the Hypnerotomachia,

Pennsylvania State University Press, 1970, p.51 (line 317).

unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Cambridge 2002.

17Brunelleschischoice of neutral white walls can be explained by

29Poliphilostransformation during the journey is selfeffected;

Albertisreference to Cicero and Plato, who reject the variety and frivolity

his task is selfknowledge and selfperfection. Creative thought,

in the ornament of their temples and value purity above all else. There is,

characteristic of human naturesparticipation in the divine, is set to

however, also adifferent possible explanation. The vanishing point in

work in two ways: to develop onescreative faculty to the fullness of its

perspective designates the ultimate depth in relation to infinity. This

potential, thereby fulfilling oneshuman or personal destiny; and to use

is not easy to visualize, as it is quite clear from the variety of solutions

this power to work on and transform the self. This activity draws on

in the Quattrocento paintings that most often situate the vanishing

models of divinity in which creative powers are key attributes. Hence the

point in some zone of indeterminacy. The zone of indeterminacy can be

dream environment displays motifs of modern creation mythology.

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umnart4lxI2013
DALIBOR VESEL
Surrealism, Mannerism and Disegno Interno

30The life in question [dream life] is founded on imagination or on that

38This was rather pessimistically but persuasively expressed by

intellect which makes use of imagination. This envelope of soulmatter which

John Donne in his wellknown poem An Anatomy of the World: And new

the happy have called the enveloping soul, is in turn god, demon of every sort,

philosophy calls all in doubt, the element of fire is quite put out, the sun is lost,

and phantom, and in it the soul pays its penalties, for the oracles are agreed

and the earth, and no mans wit can well direct him where to look for it It is

about this, to wit, the similarity of the soulsway of life in another world to the

all in pieces, all coherence gone, all just supply and relation this is the worlds

imaginings of the dream condition; and philosophy concludes that our first

condition now. John Donne, The Works of John Donne, Ware 1994, pp. 177178.

lives are but the preparation for second lives, and that the best conduct in the
case of souls lightens it [pneuma], whereas the worst imparts astain to them.
Through the attractive forces of nature, therefore, the soul is drawn upwards

39Ludger Heidbrink, Melancholie und Moderne. Zur Kritik der

historischen Verzweiflung, Mnchen 1994, p.30.
40The degree of involvement in hermeticism is illustrated by the

by reason of its own warmth and dryness. This is the winged flight of the soul.

fate of Parmigianino, who stopped painting in the last years of his life and

Synesius of Cyrene (Bishop of Ptolemais), On Dreams, Nabu Press, 2012,

spent his time practicing alchemy. Sydney Joseph Freedberg, Painting in

bk. 5. The other sources of inspiration were the treatises on dreams

Italy 1500 to 1600, London 1979, p.263.

by Artemidorus and Macrobius. Daniel E. HarrisMcCoy, Artemidorus

41This is clearly demonstrated by the title L Art Magique,

Oneirocritica: Text, Translation, and Commentary, Oxford 2012.

Bretonslast major publication, in which he brought together examples

Macrobius, Commentary on the Dream of Scipio, New York 1990.

of visual art in accordance with his understanding of authenticity

31The following selection illustrates the role of dream in visual

and Novalis principles (criteria) of magic art. What attracts us to

arts: Gian Paolo Lomazzo (15381592), The Book of Dreams (Libro dei

the conception Novalis had of magic art is that it is an assimilation of

sogni, ms., 1563; ed. acura di R. p.Ciardi, Firenze 1974); in poetry and

esoteric data which compose its definition , and at the same time abrilliant

literature: Frederick Alfred De Armas, Life as Dream and the Philosophy

apprehension of aneed for extrarationalist investigation and intervention

of Disillusionment, in: idem (ed.), The Prince in the Tower: Perceptions of La

(today called surrationalist)aneed which has grown only deeper and more

vida es sueo, Lewisburg 1993, pp. 118131; and in theatre: Pedro Caldern

persistently. Breton, LArt Magique, Paris 1991, p.23.

de la Barca (16001681), Life is aDream (1636; London 2009). There is

aclose link between dream and fantasy (fantastic form of imagination).
They seem to share the same structure of space, which in dreams does
not have any perspective and is indeterminate in its extent because it

42Gerardus van der Leeuw, Religion in Essence and Manifestation,

trans. Smith, P., Gloucester, Mass. 1967, p.548.
43Eric Robertson Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational, Los Angeles
1968, p.288.

does not havedefinable borders. Nor does it have any distances that can

44In Bretonsunderstanding the difference between metaphor and

be measured; they change according to the motivation and nature of the

analogy is negligible. Given the present state of poetic research, little should be

situation. The indeterminate character of space is not always alimitation,

made of the purely formal distinction which might be established between metaphor

but can also be the source of unusual possibilities for movement

and comparison (analogy). It suffices to say that both (metaphor and analogy)

andspatial configurations. This may be seen as akey to the manneristic

constitute interchangeable vehicles of analogical thought and that if the first offers

treatment of space, particularly in painting, where bodies are juxtaposed

flashing resources, the second, which one must judge by Lautreamontsbeauti

and very often intertwined, their shapes modified and twisted (figura

ful as, presents considerable advantages of suspension. Andr Breton, Signe

serpentinata) and colors follow dreamlike (fantastic) or personal

Ascendant, in: idem, La Cl des champs, Paris 1979, p.138.

emotional associations.
32Andr Breton, Second Manifesto of Surrealism, in: idem,
Manifestoes of Surrealism, Ann Arbor 1972, p.178.
33Bretonsunderstanding of the Word in this phrase is more and,

45Ibidem, p.139.
46Poetic analogy has in common with mystical analogy that it
transgresses the deductive laws in order to make the mind apprehend the
interdependence of two objects of thought situated on different planes, between

forthe cabbalists, it is nothing less, for example, than that in the image of which

which the logical functioning of the mind is unlikely to throw abridge, in fact

the human soul is created; we know that it has been traced to the point of being

opposes apriori any bridge which might be thrown. Ibidem, p.137.

the initial example of the cause of causes, it is, therefore, as much in what we
fear as in what we write, as in what we love. Ibidem p.176.
34Ibidem pp. 173174.
35Andr Breton, Surrealism and Painting (see note 25), p.159. An
interesting case of reference to alchemy is Max Ernstsmural in Paul
Eluardshouse (1923) titled: You may as well dream of opening the doors to the
sea, inspired by alchemical literature. The painting alludes to an alchemical

KlausPeter Lange, Theoretiker des Literarischen Manierismus Tesauros

und Pellegrinis Lehre von der Acutezza oder von der Macht der Sprache,
Mnchen 1968, p.90.
47Ibidem, p.129.
48Gustav Ren Hocke, Manierismus in der Literatur, Hamburg
1959, p.69.
49Tesauro refers to the metafore continuate, as the secret of secrets.

imagery; the heavenly twins are ruled by Mercury, and, the fish are asymbol of

Emanuele Tesauro, Cannocchiale Aristotelico, osia, Idea dellarguta et

astage of the alchemical process. Legge (see note 24), p.126.

ingeniosa elocutione che serve tutta lArte oratoria, lapidaria et simbolica.

36Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, De Occulta Philosophia libri tres, Paris

1531 and Cologne 1533, modern edition Three Books of Occult Philosophy,

Esaminata co principi del Divino Aristotele, Torino 1655, p.481.

50Hocke (see note 48), p.157; on the use of the term idea, see the

trans. James Freake, ed. Donald Tyson, St. Paul 2003. Giambattista della

titles of Zuccaro (see note 18), Lomazzo (Idea del Tempio della Pittura),

Porta, Magia Naturalis, sive de miraculis rerum naturalium, Napoli 1558.

Scamozzi (Idea del Architettura Universale) etc.

37Agrippa, Three Books (see note 36), p.731. Raymond

51This is clearly expressed in Baltazar Gracians(16011658) Agudeza

Klibansky Erwin Panofsky Fritz Saxl, Saturn and Melancholy, London

y Arte de Ingenio en que se explican todos los modos y diferencias de conceptos,

1964. Frances Yates, The Occult Philosophy and Melancholy: Drer and

Madrid 1642. The witty use of logical fallacy may reveal amystery, disclosing

Agrippa, in: eadem, The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age, London

an order beyond the reach of the correct processes of logical reasoning.

1979, pp. 4961.

A.J.Smith, Metaphysical Wit, Cambridge 1991, p.48.

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Wit (argutezza) is agodlike faculty in man which discovers aharmonious

yet surprising order in the universe. s.L. Bethell, Gracian, Tesauro and the

umnart4lxI2013

56Andr Breton, Mad Love, trans. Mary Ann Caws, Lincoln

1987, p.10 (L Amour fou, Paris 1937).

Nature of Metaphysical Wit, The Northern Miscellany of Literary Criticism,

57Ibidem, p.11.

no. 1, Autumn 1953, pp. 1940.

58Ibidem.

52Hocke (see note 48), p.68.

53For adetailed discussion of the cult of novelty (gusto per la
novita), see Matteo Pellegrini (15951675), Delle Acutezze che altrimenti
Spiriti, Vivezze e Concetti volgarmente si appellano, Bologna 1639, p.12.

59Amde Ozenfant CharlesEdouard Jeanneret, La Peinture

moderne, Paris 1925, pp. 137138.
60Breton (see note 41), p.50.
61In the interview with Dominique Arban in May 1947, Breton

Forthe recommendation of deformations (deformita) see ibidem, p.90.

answers the question about the relation between Surrealism and

The deformation of language can be described as pararetorica wrong

Existentialism: Ihave already stressed the possibility of linking Surrealism

figures of speech. What Aristotle considered as wrong figures of speech,

with Heideggersthinking on myth. Such alink exists: the work of Hlderlin,

the Mannerists adopted as positive option.

which Heidegger has superbly analysed. Andr Breton, Conversations:

54One of the meanings of cynosure is North Star or something

that is the center of attention; an object that serves as afocal point of
attraction and admiration.
55Andr Breton, The Great Transparent Ones, in: idem, Manifestoes
of Surrealism (see note 32), p.293. Amore detail description and
interpretation of individual issues can be found in Dawn Ades, Minotaure,
in: eadem, Dada and Surrealism Reviewed, London 1978, pp. 279289.

TheAutobiography of Surrealism, New York 1993, pp. 211212 (Paris 1969).

62Mikul Medek, Texty, ed. Antonn Hartmann Bohumr Mrz,
Praha 1995, p.87.
63Ibidem, p.101.
64Ibidem, p.119.

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