Didn't Dali and Bunel - two towering surrealists - produce the surrealist film,
Un Chien Andaluke?
I don't recall Dali ever painted melted saxophones or melted Glockenspieles, either.
But wait. Let's draw back and define surrealism.
Wikipedia notes:
Surrealist works feature the element of surprise, unexpected juxtapositions and non sequitur; however, many Surrealist artists and writers regard their work as an expression of the philosophical movement first and foremost, with the works being an artifact. Leader André Breton was explicit in his assertion that Surrealism was above all a revolutionary movement.
Surprise, unexpected justapositions, non sequitur... sounds like whimsy to me. And ukuleles are surely whimsical, or at the very least promote a state of whimsiness.
A revolutionary movement? And what else is it when ukulele owners storm the gates of their local music store demaning it stock models, strings and straps for our instruments? Or loudly demand Dave G produce a tenor model of his renowned banjo ukulele? That's a revolution!
Surrealism developed out of the Dada activities of World War I...
Ukuleles developed out of the MDHF* movement around the same time. Surely that is as surreal as a movement based on a child's name for its father!
Andre Breton, founder of the movement, wrote in his Surrealist Manifesto that surrealism is...
Pure psychic automatism, by which one proposes to express, either verbally, in writing, or by any other manner, the real functioning of thought. Dictation of thought in the absence of all control exercised by reason, outside of all aesthetic and moral preoccupation... based on the belief in the superior reality of certain forms of previously neglected associations, in the omnipotence of dream, in the disinterested play of thought. It tends to ruin once and for all other psychic mechanisms and to substitute itself for them in solving all the principal problems of life.
Aside from the rather significant babble (and Babel!) factor in Breton's screed, I put forward that UAS is the surreal manifestation of ukulele realism, since it prompts purchasing ukuleles "in the absence of all control exercised by reason, outside of all aesthetic and moral preoccupation."
And certainly many conversations on this forum meander "in the disinterested play of thought."
"It tends to ruin once and for all other psychic mechanisms and to substitute itself for them in solving all the principal problems of life." Well, doesn't the ukulele ruin you for other instruments? How many of us now have guitars and other instruments gathering dust since we took up the uke?
Hmmph.
~~~~~
* My Dog Has Fleas.
:wallbash:
