The paranoiac-critical method is a

surrealist technique Surrealism in art, poetry, and literature uses numerous techniques and games to provide inspiration. Many of these are said to free imagination by producing a creative process free of conscious control. The importance of the unconscious as a so ...

developed by

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (; ; ; 11 May 190423 January 1989) was a Spanish surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarre images in ...

in the early 1930s. He employed it in the production of

painting Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...

s and other

art Art is a diverse range of human activity, and resulting product, that involves creative or imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas. There is no generally agreed definition of wha ...

works, especially those that involved

optical illusions Within visual perception, an optical illusion (also called a visual illusion) is an illusion caused by the visual system and characterized by a visual percept that arguably appears to differ from reality. Illusions come in a wide variety; the ...

and other multiple images. The technique consists of the artist invoking a paranoid state (fear that the self is being manipulated, targeted or controlled by others). The result is a deconstruction of the psychological concept of identity, such that subjectivity becomes the primary aspect of the artwork.

Origins

The surrealists related theories of psychology to the idea of creativity and the production of art. In the mid-1930s André Breton wrote about a "fundamental crisis of the object". The object began being thought of not as a fixed external object but also as an extension of our subjective self. One of the types of objects theorized in surrealism was the phantom object. According to Dalí, these objects have a minimum of mechanical meaning, but, when viewed, the mind evokes phantom images which are the result of unconscious acts. The paranoiac-critical arose from similar surrealistic experiments with psychology and the creation of images such as

Max Ernst Max Ernst (2 April 1891 – 1 April 1976) was a German (naturalised American in 1948 and French in 1958) painter, sculptor, printmaker, graphic artist, and poet. A prolific artist, Ernst was a primary pioneer of the Dada movement and Surrealis ...

's frottage or

Óscar Domínguez Óscar M. Domínguez (3 January 1906 – 31 December 1957) was a Spanish surrealist painter. Biography Born in San Cristóbal de La Laguna on the island of Tenerife, on the Canary Islands Spain, Domínguez spent his youth with his grandmother ...

decalcomania Decalcomania (from french: décalcomanie) is a decorative technique by which engravings and prints may be transferred to pottery or other materials. A shortened version of the term is used for a mass-produced commodity art transfer or product l ...

, two surrealist techniques, which involved rubbing pencil or chalk on paper over a textured surface and interpreting the phantom images visible in the texture on the paper.

Description

The aspect of

paranoia Paranoia is an instinct or thought process that is believed to be heavily influenced by anxiety or fear, often to the point of delusion and irrationality. Paranoid thinking typically includes persecutory beliefs, or beliefs of conspiracy co ...

that Dalí was interested in and which helped inspire the method was the ability of the brain to perceive links between things which rationally are not linked. Dalí described the paranoiac-critical method as a "spontaneous method of irrational knowledge based on the critical and systematic objectivity of the associations and interpretations of delirious phenomena". Employing the method when creating a work of art uses an active process of the mind to visualize images in the work and incorporate these into the final product. An example of the resulting work is a double image or multiple image in which an

ambiguous image Ambiguous images or reversible figures are visual forms that create ambiguity by exploiting graphical similarities and other properties of visual system interpretation between two or more distinct image forms. These are famous for inducing the ...

can be interpreted in different ways. André Breton (by way of Guy Mangeot) hailed the method, saying that Dalí's paranoiac-critical method was an "instrument of primary importance" and that it "has immediately shown itself capable of being applied equally to painting, poetry, the cinema, the construction of typical Surrealist objects, fashion, sculpture, the history of art, and even, if necessary, all manner of

exegesis Exegesis ( ; from the Greek , from , "to lead out") is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text. The term is traditionally applied to the interpretation of Biblical works. In modern usage, exegesis can involve critical interpretation ...

".Breton, Andre(1934)
What is Surrealism?
(A lecture given in Brussels on 1 June 1934 at a public meeting) In his introduction to the 1994 edition of Jacques Lacan's ''

The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis ''The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis'' is the 1978 English-language translation of a seminar held by Jacques Lacan. The original (french: Le séminaire. Livre XI. Les quatre concepts fondamentaux de la psychanalyse) was published in P ...

'',

David Macey David Macey (5 October 1949 – 7 October 2011) was an English translator and intellectual historian of the French left. He translated around sixty books from French to English, and wrote biographical studies of Jacques Lacan, Michel Foucault and ...

stated that "Salvador Dalí's theory of 'paranoic knowledge' is certainly of great relevance to the young Lacan."

Origins

Description

See also

References

Further reading