The Surrealists were part of an art movement where the weird and wonderful came about through their art work. Among Surrealist techniques was a kind of collective of images called the 'Cadavre Exquis', or exquisite corpse. Based on an old parlour game of the 1920s several people would be assigned a section of the body each time they played, and a sheet of paper would be used to record their image, starting with the head. Once the image was done the paper was folded over to conceal it, leaving a mere mark of where it ended and then the next person would continue the body drawings, folding their's over once finished and passing it on, and so on. So, you might draw a head, fold the paper down and pass it on, just leaving a very small indication of where the neck ended. You would then receive a folded sheet from another player who had completed their 'head', and you would draw the body, fold over and pass on. This carries on until completed bodies are drawn and then the last person opens up the finished sheet. This gives rise to some interesting, and very amusing, images of the body. Some only vaguely resemble the human form!
The Surrealists thought this was a good technique for encouraging what Nicholas Calas called 'the unconscious reality in the personality of the group'. It is a good game for a group of people, and I decided to get a group to play, and then create a boxed book after the game, with samples of the images on each page. You might have come across it using phrases instead of images.
For my box I used 2 images - one made from Collage and the other from a lino cut. The lino cut was made from an image of my face seen in a spoon, so is greatly distorted on purpose! I liked using the black background so that I could make something eye-catching and use lighter colours on top for features.
These drawings are some that didn't make it into the book, and show what sort of fun can be had.
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