Goddess, she-devil, doll, fetish, child-woman or wonderful dream crea­ture – in various guises, women were the central subject of male Surre­alist fantasies. Women artists initially found their way into the circle surrounding André Breton, the founder of the Surre­alist group, as compan­ions or models. Yet they quickly broke out of those tradi­tional roles and confi­dently created inde­pen­dent work. Female artists differed from their male colleagues above all in their reversal of perspec­tive: they ques­tioned their own reflec­tion or took on different roles in search of a (new) model of female and artistic iden­tity.

Fantastic Women, Surreal Worlds From Meret Oppenheim to Frida Kahlo, an exhi­bi­tion that debuted at Schirn Kunsthalle Frank­furt and is now at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humblebæk, Denmark, from July 25 to Nov. 8, 2020, can be explored with this free digital overview. 

The exhi­bi­tion focuses on women artists who were directly asso­ci­ated with the Surre­alist move­ment founded in Paris in the early 1920s, though some­times only for a short period. Featuring about 260 remark­able paint­ings, works on paper, sculp­tures, photographs, and films by 34 artists, the exhi­bi­tion covers a wide range of styles and subjects.

Besides well-known figures like Louise Bour­geois, Claude Cahun, Leonora Carrington, Frida Kahlo, Meret Oppen­heim, and Dorothea Tanning, numerous as yet lesser-known artists from more than three decades of Surre­alist art, such as Toyen, Alice Rahon, and Kay Sage, also await discovery. The exhi­bi­tion features repre­sen­ta­tive selec­tions of works by each of the artists, while at the same time reflecting networks and friend­ships among the women artists in Europe, the US, and Mexico. 

The exhibition was curated by Dr. Ingrid Pfeiffer at Schirn Kunsthalle Frank­furt, in coop­er­a­tion with the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humblebæk. An exhibition catalogue is available.