Donna L. Nicholas
American, born 1938Angel Altarpiece, n.d.
Not on view
Raku pottery
Dimensions24 × 10 in. (61 × 25.4 cm)
Gift of the Art Faculty and Staff of Genesee County Community College in memory of Raymond Phelps, 1971.7
The human brain is hard-wired to understand what it sees. When confronted with an unusual image, our minds instinctively try to make sense of it. Surrealists wanted to weaken the hold on our mind’s ability to do this—to present an image or an object that can only be understood by one’s unconscious mind.
In 1931 Salvador Dalí published an essay titled "Surrealist Objects" where he stated that objects function symbolically and the potential meanings of them are not revealed to all but only the individual viewer who brings their own emotions and experiences to it.
