1934. The Ella Gallup Sumner and Mary Catlin Sumner Collection
Wadswort Atheneum Hartford, Connecticut
Dali's output from 1930 to 1934 is a particularly indicative of the method he used to systematize his observations. He called this system the "paranoiac-critical method"
and gave the following explanation of it: "Paranoiac-critical
activity: spontaneous method of irrational knowleadge based on the critical and systematic
objectivity of the associations and interpretations of delirious phenomena."
Breton was smart enough to pay homage to this discovery becouse he realized that Dali
had just endowed "Surrealizm with an instrument of primary importance, in particular
the paranoiac-critical method, which has immediately shown itself capable of being applied
equally to painting, poetry, the cinema, the construction of typical Surrealist objects, fashion, sculpture, the history of art, and even, if necessary, all manner of exegesis."
