Many phrases by André Breton, the famous father of surrealism in the world, made history, this doctor was marked by his poems, his essays, his novels and, of course, by his theoretical contributions to surrealism.
André Breton’s phrases are cited and repeated to this day as a symbol of an era and an intellectual stance. Surreal manifests? They served as a beacon for a whole generation, who saw in them a new way of seeing the world.
- «(?) Today no one is outraged.
- Society has found ways to undo the provocative potential of a work of art.
- Adopting an attitude of consumerist pleasure towards it.
- “- André Breton-.
The thought of this extraordinary French artist was a mixture of psychoanalysis, Marxism and anarchy, hence a unique artist was born, startled by great men of his time, such as Octavio Paz and Salvador Dalí, some of André. Breton’s most memorable phrases.
? What is wealth? Nothing, if it is not spent; nothing, so badly spent ?.
This is one of André Breton’s most ingenious phrases about the paradoxes of culture. It shows the despicable reality that exists around the concept of material wealth. In addition, it denounces, in a way, the deep void that surrounds this concept.
In fact, wealth is a passing reality that, one way or another, is always surrounded by nothing, as Breton said, if it is not spent it is like having nothing, and if it is wasted, it also becomes trivial and dull. .
“Fools are, to some extent, victims of their imagination, in the sense that it encourages them to break certain rules, rules whose transgression defines the quality of madmanhood. “
In this sentence, André Breton combines three concepts: madness, imagination and transgression, the point of reference is the rules, so it is they that serve as a starting point to define what is crazy and what is not.
Anyone who breaks certain rules is called “crazy” but who says who follows the rules can’t be rated that either?It is one of André Breton’s phrases that shows this dialectic between the so-called “reasonable” because it is established and the “irrational” because it departs from the prescribed.
“Rebellion and only rebellion is the creator of light, and this light can only take three paths: poetry, freedom and love.
In this sentence, André Breton reveals his spirit of eternal revolutionary, engaged in the processes of change, however, instead of linking the subject to political aspects, he associates it with great values.
This French poet, moreover, has always been debated between political activism and creative freedom, finally he decided on the latter, so his thinking was more oriented towards the great internal and daily transformations that have generated changes in power systems.
“The man who can’t see a horse galloping on a tomato is an idiot. “
The phrase, of course, is a metaphor for the deepest surrealist spirit, a strong statement in favor of the imagination, above reason and the senses, this function to go beyond the material that is also unique to the human being.
In the symbolic world, the impossible in the material world becomes possible and the human being, with dreams and dreams, can access these impossibility, which nevertheless give full meaning to many realities that would otherwise be insipid or absurd.
“We must not carry our thoughts with the weight of our shoes. “
What André Breton has done is exalt the imagination to the highest level. It is due to the famous motto used by French students in May 1968 that read: “Imagination to power”.
So when he talks about not spending his thoughts under the weight of his shoes, what he does is a call that is not “realistic”. If it is a virtue for those who make life a project and utilitarianism a priority, it also ends up being a prison for human beings. Some fall to the ground, others fly.
André Breton’s phrases are an eternal manifesto that cries out for freedom, which is finally made through art and imagination. The remnants of this thought have thus marked an entire era and have been the origin of many human creations.