Posted: November 4th, 2022

All About Dream

How does the power of the human imagination influence artists and designers in producing fantastic, dreamlike creation? Have you ever imagined you slept in an ‘over-sized’ shirt, as a bed you usually sleep on? Have you ever dreamt about dressing into a hot air balloon or have you ever thought that you saw a strange thing in the world which was a fish but had a human body? People always think these kinds of thoughts are over the top, but this is all about fantasy, our dreams and human imagination. Designers are able to create fascinating work; artists are able to construct gorgeous creations, because of the human imagination.
In 1940 Dali summed up his aspiration to create objects, ‘I try to create fantastic things, magical things and things like a dream. The world needs more fantasy. Our civilization is too mechanical. ’ I will never forget his words, especially when he said, ‘We can make the fantastic real and then it is more real than that which actually exists. ’ I agree with him. I think the world needs more fantasy. People seem to forget how to dream and what dreams are. They are too sensible now. In my personal study, I would like to look at how the power of the human imagination influences artists and designers in their creations.
I will first of all look at the surrealism movement which first appeared in Paris in 1924. In Oxford Intermediate Learner’s Dictionary, ‘surreal’ is an adjective which means images mixed together in a strange way like in a dream. In art, it is an expression of eccentric thoughts of the subconscious mind. Surrealist artists always create something which people think are nonsense, because their creation is influenced by their imagination and it is something that comes from dreams. There were lots of famous artists who came from the surrealism movement; Rene Magritte is one of the popular artists within this movement.

Unlike other surrealist artists’ work, of rich and complex layers, Magritte’s works are straight forward and accessible. In “Magritte” written by Richard Calvocoressi, he described the way Magritte’s style was concentrated on the relation between the image of an object and object itself. I am totally in agreement with him. In addition, I have chosen to look at The Listening Room by Magritte. This is an example of the relation between the object and another object, by reducing the size of the room and enlarging the size of the apple.
Magritte had tried to provoke a reaction from the audience. I found this picture especially interesting, because it clearly demonstrates how the artist uses his imagination and sub conscious to express his ideas. In 1956, Magritte wrote, ‘For me the conception of a picture is an idea of one thing or several things that can become visible through my painting. ’ I think Magritte means that his paintings are a means of expressing his ideas and his imagination. In The Listening Room which has a gigantic apple in its tiny room is one of the examples of Magritte’s variation of the objects scale.
The apple is depicted realistically but the fact that it is so large within the room is very disconcerting. We cannot tell whether the apple is too big or the room is undersized. In his book Richard Calvocoressi has interpreted the painting as “a feeling of claustrophobia, of near panic,” this is generated by the sight of the objects, “behaving irrationally or adopting human characteristics. ” I strongly agree with his idea that the painting makes you feel breathless in the room which makes the audience have a deep impression.
In ‘VOGUE’ April 2006, there was an article with a surreal photograph which linked in the topic of ‘Small space, Big Idea’. The idea of the picture is basically same as ‘The listening room’. A model suffered in an unfitted room which is as big as she is. It seems that the model is a giant, otherwise is a model come to a draft house. When I first look at this picture, a feel of claustrophobia and uncomfortable were came into my mind. The picture had just gave a very deep impression to the audience. Magritte has written that, ‘The only thing that engages me is the mystery world. I think this means that he likes to challenge his audience with a sense of unusual and the strange. Calvocoressi went on to say ‘these ideas were in the nature of speculation on the world. ’ I think that by this he means that surrealist artists were challenging their audience to look at the world in a different ways, and try to introduce the world of fantasy. Magritte is also successfully bringing surreal fantasy into our daily life. Just like Magritte, Salvador Dali is another famous surrealist. He had and enormous impact on twentieth-century painting.
He based all his work on the human imagination and sub conscious. I found ‘Three Young Surrealistic Women Holding in Their Arms the Skins of An Orchestra’ which is painted in 1936 is particularly interested me, because the image in the objects in the painting are strange and behaving in a strange way. In his seminal essay ‘The conquest of the Irrational'(1935), Dali has described his quest, ‘My whole ambition in painting manifest the images of concrete irrationality in terms of authoritative precision…images which for the moment can neither be explained nor reduced by logical systems or rational approaches. I think Dali means he is trying to show irrational images using a visual language. Therefore his fantasy world could actually come ‘alive’. This is another great example of Dali’s variation of objects melting. It shows three shapely but mysteries women who are standing on a sandy place, holding fluid instruments which seem to be slide away from them. The colour of the piano is sandy colour which is confusing as to whether the piano is made of sand or not. The women are portrayed with heads of flowers, which adds a calming and serene effect to the painting.
In Dalinian symbolism the heads of flowers represent the sexuality of the woman. In the background, we have a landscape of Catalonia, the rocky crags that line the Mediterranean Sea near Port Lligat and Cape Creus. Behind the woman who is holding the piano skin, there seem to be a reflection of the rocky crag, but because of the colour of the ground, we cannot tell whether there is the sea or not. It seem to me they are inside a very quiet place, which I believe is the colour effect, because the major colour of the picture is white, which represent innocence, purity and virginity.
In 1938, Elsa Schiaparelli interprets images from three Dali’s painting of 1936, which are Necrophiliac Springtime, The Dream Place Its Hand On Man’s Shoulder and Three Young Surrealist Women Holding in Their Arms The Skins of An Orchestra. She create a real dress taking the idea out of those three painting. ‘The real dress (like the dream dress in the paintings) dissolves the boundary between clothing and body. ’ In Surreal Things by Glislaine Wood.
The dress is like the garment wear in the painting Three Young Surrealist Women Holding in Their Arms The Skins of An Orchestra, Schiaparelli may use a flimsy fabric with a next to the skin cutting to bring the woman in the painting into the live. The pattern on the fabric designed by Salvador Dali, which is ‘printed with the illusion of torn animal skin’, suit in the painting, where the women are wearing a torn white dress. Another accompanying with the garment is the veil which ‘appliqued with fabric that adds a third dimension to the illusionary tears. The collection finale has featured a traditional wedding dress but twisted in the surreal way, which again synthesized human imagination as well as surrealist’s dream and bring it into the daily life. ‘Schiaparelli’s designs often lost their Surrealist references when the original model copied by department-store couture salons or by manufacturer who adapted them for the mass market. ’ By Glislaine Wood. When surrealism’s designs faced the population, they often lose some of their colours. We are still in a realistic world; instead of a dreamland create by ourselves.
We still need to be more realistic about the fashion we wear in our daily life. Although that is the fact, human imagination is affecting our daily life. In the way, I have chosen to look at Viktor & Rolf ‘s collection in Fall Winter 2005, because they had put their imagination into the real life, every garment in this collection are fantasy creation. They had been inspired everything by bed, and able to convert this idea to a wearable collection. Viktor & Rolf dreamed up a surreal idea, ‘Why not go to work in your bed? ‘(written by Sarah Mower in style. com). It had make me queries about this idea.
Firstly, we will never go to work in our bed, also how can this dreamlike idea come to realistic; secondly, how can it link to their collection. As soon as I looked at the collection, my queries had all been answered. The first model had come down on runway with her hair spread over on a lace-edged cotton pillow as a ‘collar’, with neatly folded over sheet as her coat. On my personal view, she looked like a sleeping beauty and dressed into a sleeping bed. In fact, ‘Viktor & Rolf don’t allow surrealist antics to block the view of their increasingly accomplished way with smartly normal cloth'(written by Sarah Mower in style. om). After the sleeping beauties, they had a second part of the collection. The most eye catching garment was a white lacing edges with a great contribution of folded fronts. The garment has show the exaggeration a normal white shirt created by human imagination. The garment was a very simple design but after twisted by imagination of the design, it became a dreamlike fantasy. The Viktor & Rolf Fall Winter 2005/06 collection had show a series of surrealistic ideas, the power of human imagination had influenced Viktor & Rolf’s creation.
By having simple daily object, bedspread needlework, the idea had been turned into a array of skirts, jackets and pant. The result is they had made up a dreamy night. ‘In many ways, Surrealism carried the seeds of its own commercialization. ’ By Glislaine Wood. Surrealism has influenced lots of craft work and design, especially fashion design. ‘Fashion design has long had a huge admiration for this movement and many of our leading designers will admit to be influenced by it. ’ By Alexandra Shulman. Surrealism had inspired lots of fashion designers’ works, especially for the haute couture.
A sense of exaggeration needed to provoke the audience in haute couture fashion show. The Haute Couture in Christian Dior by John Galliano will be a great representation. John Galliano has a little reformation on 22nd of January, 2007 with glamorous, recreated the traditional Japanese art in his extraordinary style, transferred these ideas on to fabric and created a speechless fashion show for Christian Dior haute couture spring 2007. Everything about this collection is inspired, John Galliano said,” by Pinkerton’s affair with Cio-Cio San, Madame Butterfly” With regard to this nspiration, every models in this collection has given a ‘fully painted, red lips and full Kabuki style make up’ ( Camilla Morton, elle. com) The make up are obviously overstate, but the clothes do not make the audience be disappointed as well. The first exited model shown a bright pink formal jacket with an enlarged origami collar and pockets, decorated with beading and embroidery; the other model came to the stage with a big lily origami laid over on her shoulder, the fabric used for the lily look like a traditional Japanese origami paper.
On my personal view, she looked like a flower fairy dance on the stage. The surprise will never ended in Galliano’s creation. A bright green kimono-like jacket, with a exaggerated large gathered sleeve and very traditional Japanese pattern, underneath this gorgeous jacket, we have a sleeveless, long shaped yellow dress with the same pattern on the jacket. This garment was really stand out because of the colour. This collection ‘reconfirmed his unique talent to evoke beauty, sensitivity, narrative, and emotion in fashion show’ (written by Sarah Mower in style. om) These garments to the population are over-the-top, but they are coming from human imagination, they are dreamlike creature, the most important point is they are not just a art pieces but wearable. Although the collection has a theme of Japanese costume, but it is different from the original. They are full of imagination and dreamlike creature, this make Sarah Mower in style. com think, ‘What psychological process did it take to lift John Galliano to the extraordinary place of brilliance he reached–or rediscovered–in his spring couture? From the stage set decorated with cherry blossoms, to the garments themselves, everything is surreal and has been exaggerated. The Japanese art of paper folding has been used in fabric and give the garment an extra decoration. Everything is like a dream in this fashion, something different and something new has explored by John Galliano. Using a culture as a theme does not mean changing something on the traditional clothing, but by research the art of culture and putting them into the design are always important. ‘The world needs more fantasy. Our civilization is too mechanical. ’ By Salvador Dali in 1940.
I believed in what he had said, I thought our world is too reasonable and sensible. Those realist think the people have dream are having a airy-fairy mind. For those dreams which can not become true, the realist using their realistic mind thinks we are just a dreamer, no contribution, nonsense and desk studying. However they have never recognized how important dream and human imagination is, without those unrestrained and vigorous idea, we cannot progress and penetrate more. Nowadays the society is too realistic, we have so many rule to constraint ourselves, therefore we need dreams and imagination to break through those inappropriate rules. We can make the fantastic real and then it is more real than that which actually exists’ By Salvador Dali. This world should be a unconstraint world, people are realistic, because we live in a commercial world, everything is particulars in their own values. No one would like to pay more; this is how our society becomes self-concerned world. If we can imagine more, create more and pay more attention to the surrounding, and try to be less realistic than before, we can produce the real fantasy and it will be ‘more real than that which actually exists. ’

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