Andre Breton, the Doctor

A few days ago at my internship (Burton Marinkovich Fine Art), an artist by the name of Cianne Fragione and her husband stopped by to visit the gallery. Ms. Fragione's husband writes extensively on various art works, so I thought I would mention my research to him. He immediately asked me if Andre Breton had actually read the work of Sigmund Freud, to which I responded, "Of course. He explicitly references Freud in many of his writings." Mr. Fragione then told me that referencing is one thing, and that reading is another. This simple statement astonished me. I therefore thought it would be necessary to find a more complete history of Andre Breton's experience with psychoanalysis.

I discovered a lot of interesting information in "Surrealism: the Search for Freedom" (found at the website of Miami Dade College), an essay that contains a useful historical background of Surrealism. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Andre Breton was a doctor himself. He even worked in a psychiatric hospital during World War I, interviewing "deranged soldiers" with Sigmund Freud's techniques for analyzing free associations. Not only did Andre Breton read Freud's theories from a purely artistic standpoint, which is what I originally believed, but he actually used them himself in a hospital when interviewing patients.

Andre Breton as a soldier/doctor during WWI

I find it quite simple to conclude that Andre Breton had a very close understanding of Sigmund Freud's works. Next time I see Mr. Fragione, I will be sure to inform him of my findings: not only did Breton understand psychoanalysis from an artist's perspective, but also from a doctor's perspective.