Ville cranienne (Skull City)

André Masson was a key figure of the Surrealist movement from its beginning in France in the 1920s. His early contribution to the movement consisted of 'automatic' drawings, a spontaneous style of drawing characterized by free-form gestures. In the late thirties Masson adopted a more controlled and figurative mode in subjects often inspired by mythology. "Ville cranienne" is an example of Masson's second phase of Surrealism. In this vivid image, the artist compares the human head to an imaginary city whose complex architecture evokes that of a labyrinth, a visual metaphor for the subconscious.