Discussion hosted by the International Society for the Study of Surrealism
Sunday, February 25th, 2024
7-8:15 PM UK time; Please convert to your own time zone

Palpable Impalpable: Susana Wald’s surrealist trajectory
 
This session will feature Susana Wald, exploring her earliest perception of automatism as well as her assumption of surrealism as a way of life in partnership with Ludwig Zeller. Her art, her writing, her curatorial and publishing work will come alive in a presentation that traces her trajectory within international surrealism. Starting in Chile, through the phenomenon that was Casa de la Luna, and activities such as the landmark exhibition Surrealismo en Chile, followed by her decades-long and vibrant participation in the Phases movement while living in Canada, Susana will draw us into her rich world as an artist devoted to surrealism and its environs. The session will take the form of a dialogue between Susana Wald and her daughter, surrealist poet Beatriz Hausner.
 
Biographies:
Susana Wald (1937) was born in Budapest. Her family immigrated to Buenos Aires after WWII, where she went to art school, specializing in ceramics. Her first marriage took her to Chile, where she had her three children and, significantly, would go on to form a life-long collaboration and relationship with Ludwig Zeller. After immigrating to Toronto in the early 1970s, Wald became active in the Phases movement, participating in collective activities and exhibitions, as well as holding solo shows in Canada and internationally. With Zeller, she established Oasis Publications, which saw the publication of major Latin American and European surrealists, usually in bilingual editions. Wald, who speaks several languages, works mostly in English and Spanish, both as a translator and as an author of several books, including En busca de Laurette Sejourné (December 2023). Her work has been featured in major exhibitions, including the edition of the Venice Biennale dedicated to art and alchemy, curated by the late Arturo Schwarz. En busca de lo inasible, Instagram
 
Beatriz Hausner (1958) was born in Chile and immigrated to Canada with her family when she was a teenager. She has published several poetry books, including The Wardrobe Mistress (2004), Sew Him Up (2010), Enter the Raccoon (2012), Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart (2020) and She Who Lies Above (2023). Her work has been published internationally and translated into several languages, including her native Spanish, Dutch, and Greek. Hausner is an active participant in the international surrealist movement. She is a respected historian and translator of Latin American surrealism. Her translations of poets like César Moro, Enrique Gómez-Correa, Olga Orozco, Jorge Cáceres, and Rosamel del Valle have exerted an important influence on her own writing. She lives in Toronto where she publishes The Philosophical Egg. https://beatrizhausner.com