6th International Symposium
Surrealism Laid Bare
18 - 20 June 2010

We are pleased to announce that the 6th International Symposium on Surrealism will be held the weekend of 18-20 June 2010 at West Dean College, near Chichester, England. The theme of this year’s Symposium will be an assessment of Surrealism’s claim to emancipate human desire.

Whilst lavish attention has been bestowed upon the broad topic of eroticism, and questions of gender, Surrealist scholars have tended to shy away from the more contentious issue of non-normative sexuality.  Breton’s intolerance of homosexuality is well known. But what also demands to be recognised is the very considerable number of queer artists and writers, photographers, and filmmakers who were drawn to Surrealism. It is evident that, particularly as Surrealism moved away from France, it offered a milieu wherein a plurality of desires and identities could be affirmed. The issue of sexuality is relevant to Surrealism’s reception in England, the United States, Spain, Mexico, Australia, and elsewhere. Arguably, also, it is in work engaging a queer sensibility that some of the most radical legacies of Surrealism are to be found.

As the symposium will coincide with Surreal Friends, three major exhibitions of the work of Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo and Kati Horna at Pallant House Gallery (Chichester: 19 June – 12 September 2010, Sainsbury Centre for the Visual Arts, Norwich: 28 September – 12 December 2010), we are privileged to offer a private view of the exhibition and a morning session at Pallant House where we will look at these artists from the vantage-point of gender and sexuality.

More information can be found on the West Dean website.