Surréalisme Au Féminin ?

Exhibition at the Musée de Montmartre, Paris, 31 March - 10 September 2023

A provocative and dynamic movement, Surrealism triggered an aesthetic and ethical renewal in which many women were major players. Surrealism offered them a framework for expression and creativity that was probably unparalleled in other avant-garde movements. Yet it was often by appropriating and extending themes initiated by the movement's "leaders" that they expressed their freedom.

By revealing the work of some fifty artists, visual artists, photographers and poets from all over the world, this exhibition catalogue offers a reflexion on the ambivalent position of women in Surrealism and on the capacity of one of the major currents of the 20th century to integrate the feminine.

The book includes works by major artists such as Claude Cahun, Toyen, Dora Maar, Lee Miller, Meret Oppenheim and Leonora Carrington, and highlights other lesser-known figures such as Marion Adnams, Ithell Colquhoun, Grace Pailthorpe, Jane Graverol, Suzanne Van Damme, Rita Kernn-Larsenn, Franciska Clausen or Josette Exandier and Yahne Le Toumelin.