Thank God I’m An Atheist
September 4th 2006 12:28
Those are the words of one of my favourite atheists, the filmmaker Luis Buñuel. His lifelong rebellion against organized religion was instilled in him from his early education in a Spanish Jesuit school. In many of his films he mocked the pretension and hypocrisy of the Church with images like a bishop being thrown out a window or a bare-breasted little girl signing and showing off her legs to tempt a saint. “God and Country are an unbeatable team,” he said, “they break all records for oppression and bloodshed.”
By thanking God that he’s an atheist he drew attention to the paradox of being comfortably and unabashedly within the structure that he sought to challenge. He was both interior and exterior, but had the ability to stand outside his cultural self and show the suppressions imposed by bourgeois, patriarchal Catholic societies: “in a world as badly made as ours,” he said, “there is only one road – rebellion.”
A founder of surrealist cinema, his first film was the 1928 collaboration with his friend Salvador Dali, Un Chien Andalou. Images such as an eyeball being sliced with a razor blade have made it remembered as a pioneering surrealist work, and it continues to be shown in film societies regularly. Influenced by Freud’s theories of the subconscious, he explored ideas about desire and sexuality that were radical at the time, and succeeded in shocking the bourgeois and criticizing the avant-garde. Insects, farm animals, gore, women growing beards, and fetishistic shots of feet are combined to create chaotic confusion and form an acid view of the powerful and their excesses.
True to the spirit of surrealism, Buñuel avoided explaining or promoting his art. It is rumored that when his son was interviewed about on of Buñuel's later and most successful films, The Exterminating Angel, he was instructed to do the same. When asked about the presence of a bear he said it was because his father liked bears, and when asked about the repeated scenes he said they were there to increase the running time.
In 1936 the Spanish Civil War began and Buñuel set up a life working on films in Hollywood and in New York at the Museum of Modern Art. After being denounced by Dali as a communist and an Atheist, he resigned from the MOMA and moved to Mexico, where many of Spain's intellectuals and artists had emigrated after the Civil War. He made twenty films there, including the masterpiece of urban surrealism, Los Olvidados (1950), making him an instant world celebrity. He died in Mexico City in 1983.
(Another) quote from Buñuel:
“Age is something that doesn't matter, unless you are a cheese.”
By thanking God that he’s an atheist he drew attention to the paradox of being comfortably and unabashedly within the structure that he sought to challenge. He was both interior and exterior, but had the ability to stand outside his cultural self and show the suppressions imposed by bourgeois, patriarchal Catholic societies: “in a world as badly made as ours,” he said, “there is only one road – rebellion.”
True to the spirit of surrealism, Buñuel avoided explaining or promoting his art. It is rumored that when his son was interviewed about on of Buñuel's later and most successful films, The Exterminating Angel, he was instructed to do the same. When asked about the presence of a bear he said it was because his father liked bears, and when asked about the repeated scenes he said they were there to increase the running time.
In 1936 the Spanish Civil War began and Buñuel set up a life working on films in Hollywood and in New York at the Museum of Modern Art. After being denounced by Dali as a communist and an Atheist, he resigned from the MOMA and moved to Mexico, where many of Spain's intellectuals and artists had emigrated after the Civil War. He made twenty films there, including the masterpiece of urban surrealism, Los Olvidados (1950), making him an instant world celebrity. He died in Mexico City in 1983.
(Another) quote from Buñuel:
“Age is something that doesn't matter, unless you are a cheese.”
Image: Wikipedia
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Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
I wonder about the extent to which surrealism is dead. I remember a teacher in high school talking about some poor Belgium surrealists; they tried to shock the establishment, but the shock has diminished to such an extent that their paintings are now frequented by the bourgeoisie on family outings.
Comment by ag
Eat French Bread
We are an increasingly sophisticated audience and desensitised to shock, so maybe artists should stop trying to be shocking and edgy and original and witty, and just strive to be good?