The Death and Rebirth of Surrealism in Bohemia

Local Inflections and Cosmopolitan Aspirations in the Cinema of Jan Švankmajer

Bibliographic Data

ID12736985
AuthorsPolona Petek (0000-0003-3743-5684, University of Ljubljana, corresponding author)
Year2009
Volume17
Issue1
Pages75-89
Publication date2009-04-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Contemporary European Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1478-2790 • E-ISSN: 1478-2804
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14782800902844735
OpenAlexW2072732014
LanguageEN
References cited14

Since the mid 1980s Jan Švankmajer's work has attracted the attention of connoisseurs and aficionados of surrealism across the globe. This essay complicates the idea of Švankmajer's universal surrealist appeal by considering it in its specific historical and geopolitical context. It argues that Švankmajer's surrealism has a local, yet emphatically cosmopolitan, inflection. A recognition of this local specificity is not only crucial to a more informed reception of Švankmajer's cinema, it also affords a better understanding of the vicissitudes of surrealism in general, and Czech surrealism in particular. This reading of Švankmajer's work identifies a space where a politicised, rather than utterly commodified, surrealist practice is still possible

Aesthetics · Appeal · Art · Commodification · Context (archaeology · Economy · Geopolitics · Globe · Literature · Movie theater · Political science · Politics · Reading (process · Sociology · Eastern European Communism and Reforms · European Cultural and National Identity · German Literature and Culture Studies · History · Law

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub