Ernst, Max (1891-1976), was a German artist associated with the development of the Dada and Surrealist movements. He joined with several other artists and writers as a leader of the Dada movement, founded in 1916. He created Dada works by combining photographs, scientific and technical illustrations, and newspaper clippings into pasted compositions called collages. His images often deal with symbolic meanings taken from philosophy and psychiatry, which he studied as a young man. Ernst moved to Paris in 1924 and helped to found the Surrealist movement there. His Surrealist works suggest nightmares and hallucinations. They often portray mysterious and menacing forests.
Ernst was born on April 8, 1891, in Bruhl, Germany. He lived in the United States in the 1940’s. He died on April 1, 1976.
See also Dadaism; Surrealism.
