The canonisation of Surrealism in the United States

In a pointed assessment of the first show of Surrealism in New York, in 1932, the New York Times art critic asked, 'How much of the material now on view shall we esteem "art," and how much should be enjoyed as laboratory roughage'?1 The question encompassed the problem Surrealism posed for art history because it essentially went unanswered. This article sketches a brief survey of a half-century of Surrealism's reinterpretation in the United States by American curators to give a richer picture of the complications and contradictions that Surrealism presented to the formation of a canon for modern art.