Seen at the Bechtler: Surrealist Art on Loan

The Bechtler Museum of Modern Art currently houses a trio of Van Every/Smith Galleries-owned works, which I had the opportunity to view courtesy of the Davidson Art Department’s Museum Crawl. During this special new event, a lucky group of students, faculty, and staff visited three major art museums in Uptown Charlotte. One stop on the crawl was the Bechtler, which now has a few familiar faces on its walls – in the exhibition Chance Encounters: Surrealism Then and Now, the Bechtler presents works from its own collection alongside three on loan from Davidson, including Heri Dono’s A Composition with Figures and a Cart, Trenton Doyle Hancock’s A Sweet Hell, and Shoshanna Weinberger’s Busted Seams 36DD.

The exhibition centers around the artistic movement of Surrealism, which appeared in the 1920s and has flourished around the world since. Tying in Freudian psychoanalytic ideals with artistic techniques like automatism, surrealists attempt to access their own unconscious through their art. Sigmund Freud (a bizarre, misogynistic, yet very influential character in the field of psychology) proposed that we all have internal conflicts and desires that can not be reached by our conscious mind; instead, we must use techniques like dream analysis and free association to figure out what we really want or fear. Artists interpreted these measures into their works by allowing their hand and immediate thoughts to dictate their art in unpredictable directions and experimenting with imagery and unedited process. Iconic surrealists like Max Ernst, Meret Oppenheim, and Joan Miró, all of whom have work in the Bechtler’s exhibit, make up the “then” section of the show as early members of the movement who pushed boundaries with their explorations of the unusual, the unseen, and the unconscious.

The Van Every/Smith Galleries supplies three works for the “now” selection of the exhibit, including a mixed-media work by current artist Heri Dono. A Composition with Figures and a Cart depicts colorful, expressive figures whose large eyes stare out at the viewer against a dark red backdrop. Small details, including a comic-like scene of an airplane and a pink stamp across one figure’s face, create a dream-like surrealist collage scene that provides new meanings to images through the use of symbols, another staple of psychoanalysis.

Hailing from Jakarta, Dono (Indonesian, b. 1960) is internationally known for his paintings and installations that experiment with satire, performance, storytelling, and other elements of Indonesian culture. His works incorporate traditional symbols and techniques to honor and connect with his Indonesian roots, as well as to reflect on the social and political issues of the nation.

Trenton Doyle Hancock’s A Sweet Hell also graces the walls of the Bechtler’s exhibit, after appearing in the hall of the VAC last year. A nightmarish scene of reds, blacks, and whites, A Sweet Hell takes the psychoanalytic exploration of the unconscious to heart with its unusual shapes and fantastical imagery. With its bony hands, falling droplets (of rain? of blood?), and a mysterious sword, lock, and bucket, the print overwhelms the eyes and draws the viewer into its odd, chaotic dreamscape that appears to be pulling from a particularly conflicted unconscious.

Inspired by artists like Max Ernst and Hieronymus Bosch, Hancock (American, b. 1974) creates paintings and prints that illustrate narratives of good vs. evil, likely drawing from his religious upbringing. Using cultural and fictional imagery, Hancock blends myth with personal reality to depict symbolic dichotomies and other stories via striking, exploratory, and surrealist techniques.

Lastly, Shoshanna Weinberger’s Busted Seams 36DD moves away from the chaos of the prior two pieces but continues to utilize symbolism through its atypical combination of shapes. The painting features a single leg with a high-heeled shoe, multiple breasts that just barely define the contours of a face, and braided coils of hair. The silhouetted “body” of sorts is wrapped in gold chains, possibly a symbol for the metaphorical shackles placed on women in a patriarchal society or, more literally, the constraints of slaves in American history.

As a biracial artist from Kingston, Jamaica, Weinberger (Caribbean-American, b. 1973) often creates art in the context of the cultural scripts she lives with and the complex identities she holds. She considers herself a “visual anthropologist” and focuses her art on challenging the stereotypical notions of femininity and beauty in society, as well as tackling issues of race and gender through symbolic works.

The Bechtler’s exhibit sparks a fascinating reflection by placing the ‘original’ works of surrealism by the movement’s pioneers alongside the modern-day creations of current artists who take the style in whole new directions. Laden with symbolism inspired by the psychoanalytic techniques of the 1920s, the three contemporary works use personal, social, and cultural trends and traditions as a starting point to explore new ideas through imagery, form, and color. The Van Every/Smith Galleries’ three loaned works, each with their unique contexts and techniques, contribute to the Bechtler’s exploration of surrealism’s evolution and legacy to honor the movement’s 100^th anniversary.

See the exhibit while you still can at the Bechtler Museum of Modern Art in Uptown Charlotte from August 31, 2024 to March 3, 2025, before the three loaned artworks return home to Davidson College.

– Gaby Sanclimenti ‘25