Tate Research Centre: Surrealism and its Legacies
Tate is a partner in the Centre for the Study of Surrealism and its Legacies, with the University of Manchester and the University of Essex.
Surrealism occupies a unique position in the intellectual and cultural history of the twentieth century. Marking a crisis in post-Enlightenment thought, and active in every sphere of creative life, surrealism had enormous influence upon modern culture, and many of its ideas retain a critical force today.
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Claude Cahun Untitled 1936 © Claude Cahun Estate |
Bringing together scholars from many fields and museum professionals, the Centre aims to stimulate fresh thinking and generate new cross-disciplinary research about the movement and its legacies. Current research priorities include:
- Contemporary artistic legacies, particularly the themes of eroticism and sexuality, obsolescence, the everyday as a topic of theoretical as well as artistic reflection, and modern artists' use of automatist and collage techniques.
- Surrealism's intellectual heritage, exploring its influence on later movements and developments in thought
- Surrealism beyond Europe, exploring its influence on later movements and developments in thought
- Surrealism and sexuality, with a special emphasis on non-normative sexualities.
The Centre hosts a varied programme of events including workshops, an international conference in association with the Edward James Foundation, visiting scholars and artist residences, as well as an annual postgraduate student symposium. A particular aim of the Centre is to bring together academic and museum research in this field, through exhibition-making and through collaborative doctoral studentships. The Centre also publishes an online journal, Papers of Surrealism, which contains a mix of scholarly articles, reviews, interviews and translations, reflecting new directions in research in the field.
Events:
- PhD symposium, University of East Anglia, December 2009.
- Surrealism Laid Bare, international conference at the Edward James Foundation, June 2010.
- Invocations and Evocations: Queer and Surreal film programme, Tate Modern, 26-29 March 2010
- Brushes with Genius: Salvador Dalí Technical Studies, symposium to be held at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, 2011; a partnership between Tate, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia and the Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueres.
Projects:
- Surrealism and Sexuality, an AHRC project exploring non-normative sexualities within surrealism, 2008-11, led by Professor David Lomas, University of Manchester.
- Katie Croll-Knight, The Early Photography of Man Ray, collaborative PhD dissertation, supervised by Professor Dawn Ades, University of Essex, and Jennifer Mundy, Head of Collection Research, Tate.
For further information, please contact Professor David Lomas (University of Manchester), Professor Dawn Ades (University of Essex, ades@essex.ac.uk or dawnades@aol.com), or Jennifer Mundy (Head of Collection Research, Tate).
Updated September 2009
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