Essentials: Dreams

"If someone were to tell me I had twenty years left, and ask me how I'd like to spend them, I'd reply 'Give me two hours a day of activity, and I'll take the other twenty-two in dreams.'" Luis Buñuel

Cinema has flirted with the fantastic since its origins, but the most potent and penetrating explorations of the unfathomable world of the unconscious can be found in artists' work. Essentials: Dreams collects together the mythic, the nightmarish and the psychedelic to present pioneering artists' wondrous visions, revealing cinema in all its magical intensity. Featuring celebrated and influential work by Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí, Lawrence Jordan, Jan Svankmajer, and Suzan Pitt.

Programme curated by George Clark.

Films

Image from the film Un Chien Andalou

Un Chien Andalou
Luis Buñuel & Salvador Dali | France | 1929 | 17min
"The most famous short film ever made" Roger Ebert
More...

Image from the film Les Jeux des anges by Walerian Borowczyk

Les Jeux des Anges
Walerian Borowczyk | France | 1964 | 13min
 "Les Jeux des anges was just extraordinary" Terry Gilliam
More...

Image from the film Meshes of the Afternoon

Meshes of the Afternoon
Maya Deren & Alexander Hammid | USA | 1943 | 13min
 The influential first film by Maya Deren is a mesmerising exploration of fractured identity.
More...

Image from the film Dimensions of Dialogue by Jan Svankmajer

Dimensions of Dialogue
Jan Svankmajer | Czechoslovakia | 1982 | 13min
This dark allegory sees the master Czech animator "at his best" The Guaridan
More...

Image from the film Asparagus

Asparagus
Suzan Pitt | USA | 1974-78 | 19min
 An award winning candy coloured nightmare from America's leading independent animator.
More...

Image from Our Lady of the Sphere by Larry Jordan

Our Lady of the Sphere
Lawrence Jordan | USA | 1969 | 10min
"A beauty...a genuinely mystical exercise." New York Times
More...