Happenstance and the Surrealists

Surrealism is an art movement that began in the 1920s and is known for the creation of hybrids of words and images often generated through the experiences of happenstance, a circumstance especially due to chance. Tangible and intangible materials acquired in this way and used within the creative making process include 3-D objects, words/images found in printed material (i.e. collage) and even random thoughts (i.e. automatism writing and art making) are often juxtaposed and thrown into the mix.

The surrealists' use of ‘objective chance’ was driven by a belief in the existence of an unconscious state of mind which could only be accessed obliquely. The surrealists believed the key to finding universal truth was the unconscious mind as defined by the founder of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud (1836-1939).

               …the store of feelings, urges, memories, and thoughts,
               outside a person’s conscious realisation.

Within my own work I most closely identify with the surrealists. I’m fascinated with creatively unlocking the unconscious and I have had a life-long appetite to collect objects as a result of happenstance.

As I recall, my first 3-D artwork created out of found objects was a sculpture made in Mr Plunkett’s eighth grade art class constructed out of rusty metal bits picked up along the nearby railway tracks. It wasn’t very big, stood about 18 inches high and was fixed to a wood base. It looked rather like a flat metal leaning tower with gap-toothed featured edges.

This set the precedence for decades of collecting random objects discovered by chance in the dirt, in the street, in second-hand shops or gifted to me (anonymous people have left things on my doorstep). I have been inspired to creatively rearrange these various serendipities transforming them into something new that sparks child-like curiosity inviting one to creatively explore – the more you look, the more you see.

A good example of this is Swell to Great that explores in a surrealistic manner the influence WW II had on the painters who formed the School of Fantastic Realism in Vienna.

Swell to Great © 2012 KEW
Artwork for Society for Art of Imagination’s 50 Anniversary Exhibition Phantesten Museum, Vienna, 2012 

Serendipitous words and images found in newspapers or magazines also become objects of creativity too such as this collage Can You See Me?

Can You See Me?  © 2011 KEW
October 2011 Exhibition Türe Sanat Galerisi, Konya Turkey

Images put onto a surface through an automatic process, without any preconceived notion is relished and according to the Metropolitan Museum in New York is a way of… unleashing the mind and challenging the rationalism of the modern world.

I have worked in this spontaneous unconscious way for many years creating drawings using white gel pen on black paper then manipulating the images on the computer in a more conscious way. I  have discussed this process in a previous blog Image (July 29, 2024).

For this article I thought I’d have a crack at unconscious automatic writing. I first tried doing it in one minute (too short), then two minutes and finally a five minute exercise. I then consciously attempted to craft the two minute piece – interesting.

Two Minute Automatic Writing Exercise © 2025 KEW

 

in the jungle

elephants waltz
within the tangled vines
managed by humans caught
in concrete nothingness

worms dig, moles dig
into the dry then damp
make tunnels, burrowing
underground, away from

white noise, loud bangs
tranquillity welcome


Thank you for reading, Kate J

Sources:
Cambridge Dictionary, 2025. Happenstance. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/happenstance#google_vignette Accessed 1 March.
Libquotes, 2025. Sigmund Freud – Unconscious Quotes. https://libquotes.com/sigmund-freud/quotes/unconscious Accessed 2 March.
Rank, M.R., 2024. How the surrealists used randomness as a catalyst for creative expression. https://theconversation.com/how-the-surrealists-used-randomness-as-a-catalyst-for-creative-expression-226908 Accessed 1 March 2025.
Watson, K., 2020. Surrealism, Chance and the Extended Mind. Chapter 10, pages 171 – 188 Distributed Cognition in Victorian Culture and Modernism. https://academic.oup.com/edinburgh-scholarship-online/book/37693/chapter-abstract/332025472?redirectedFrom=fulltext Accessed 1 March 2025.
The Met, 2025. Surrealism Beyond Borders. https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/surrealism-beyond-borders/visiting-guide Accessed 1 March.
Study.com, 2025. Freud and the Unconscious Mind/Definition and Theory. https://study.com/learn/lesson/unconscious-mind-psychology.html#:~:text=Sigmund%20Freud%20believed%20that%20the,memories%20in%20the%20unconscious%20mind Accessed 3 March.