Meret Oppenheim – An Empowering Surrealist and Dadaist Artist

Meret Oppenheim defied the role of artist mistress and muse to become a critically acclaimed artist. She deftly united Surrealist themes of dreams and death with Dada’s focus of using found and random objects.

Meret Elisabeth Oppenheim was born October 6, 1913, in Berlin, Germany, to a forward-thinking family of Swiss-German analysts who were devoted art patrons. As a young child, Meret’s aunt introduced her to the works of Paul Klee, and an eager Meret soon discovered Modernism, Expressionism, Fauvism, and Cubism. In 1928, at the age of 14, her father introduced her to the writings of fellow Swiss citizen and psychoanalyst Carl Jung, and she was quickly inspired to record her dreams, a practice she continued for the rest of her life. She later used Jungian motifs in her works, such as spirals and snakes, and objected to being referred to as a “female artist.” Instead, she embraced Jung’s term “androgynous creativity”, where masculine and feminine images are both blurred and equal.

At age 18, Meret moved to Paris and studied painting at the Académie de la Grande Chaumiere, using a hotel room as her first studio to showcase her drawings and paintings. In 1933, she met sculptors Hans Arp and Alberto Giacometti, and after visiting her studio, they invited her to participate in their next Surrealist exhibition in Paris. Under Giacometti’s direction, she created and displayed her bronze sculpture titled “Giacometti’s Ear.” She later met Andre Breton, known as the “pope of Surrealism,” and soon became a regular associate among other well-known Surrealists, including Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, and Max Ernst. Enchanted by her movie star looks, Man Ray featured Meret in a series of sexually charged pics in 1933 titled “Erotique Voilee,” with her nude body covered in ink and as she posed alongside a printing press. However, it was her charm and sense of adventure that allowed her to be the first woman to join the exclusive circle of all-male Surrealists, who had previously prohibited women from joining. She would contribute to Surrealist exhibitions until 1960, although in her later years, she would reject the term surrealism altogether.

In 1936, Meret held her first solo exhibition in Basel, Switzerland, and in 1937, caught the art world’s attention with her most iconic piece, “Object: Le Déjeuner en Fourrerre” (Object: Breakfast in Fur). Striking, dreamlike, and even a little unsettling, a teacup, saucer, and spoon are covered in Chinese gazelle fur. According to art legend, her inspiration came one afternoon while having coffee with Pablo Picasso and photographer Dora Maar. Meret was wearing a fur covered bracelet, and Picasso commented that just about anything can be covered in fur, which Meret responded, “Even this cup and saucer.” Using a title suggested by Breton, Meret presented random found objects (although she purchased the porcelain cup and saucer) in a way that “liberated” them from their ordinary everyday function. Some art critics, however, have interpreted the work as sexual and bordering on “Surrealist fetishism,” claiming that the cup represents a womb, the spoon, a penis, and the fur as body hair.

In the late 1930’s, Meret used her fashion-forward sense and collaborated with fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli to create unique, avant-garde pieces, the most famous being gloves with painted red fingernails attached. Next to “Object,” her second most risk-taking piece is “Spring Banquet (1959),” her version of the Japanese practice of nyotaimori, in which sushi is eaten off a naked woman’s body. Renamed “Cannibal Feast”, again by Breton, foods such as fish, fruits, and nuts were placed on a naked woman’s body, with plates and silverware set alongside. Originally, a live woman was used, however, the piece evolved to using a mannequin. Once again, art critics were swift to respond, calling it, among other descriptions, degrading towards women and bordering on cannibalism. Meret, however, explained that it was made as a celebration of life, love, fertility, and mortality.

Meret experimented with various art styles throughout her career. She moved permanently to Bern, Switzerland in 1967 and remained active in the art scene, winning the Berlin Art Prize in 1982. She died on November 15, 1985, at the age of 72.

Today, she is considered one of the few artists who successfully merged both Dadaist and Surrealist themes. She influenced several prominent feminist artists in the 1960s and 1970s, and her modern-day influence is noticeable with Lady Gaga’s “Meat Dress” and fashion designer Tokio Kumagai’s “Edible Shoes.”

Other notable works:

My Nurse (1936)

Steinfrau (Stone Lady) (1938)

Fur Gloves with Red Fingernails (1936)

X-ray of Meret Oppenheim’s Skull (1964)