Figure

1924

Joins Breton's Surrealist group

Together with Leiris and Artaud, Masson joins the Surrealists led by André Breton and becomes one of the most enthusiastic practitioners of automatic drawing, making a number of automatic works in pen and ink. Other accounts say he entered the Surrealist circle as early as 1923; later he takes part in the First Surrealist Exhibition at the Galerie Pierre.

1924

Befriends Georges Bataille

Masson becomes friends with Georges Bataille, later illustrates his books, contributes to the journal “Acéphale” and deeply absorbs his philosophy of eroticism and violence.

c. 1926

Brings automatism into painting: glue and sand

Masson pours glue onto the canvas, adheres sand to the wet surfaces and adds painted areas inspired by the sandy shapes that formed at random.

1929

Breaks with Breton and leaves the Surrealists

By the end of the 1920s Masson finds Breton's insistence on the Surrealists' allegiance to the French Communist Party stifling, leaves the Surrealist movement and turns to a more structured figurative style, often with violent or erotic themes; he joins the “dissident Surrealists” gathered around his close friends Michel Leiris and Georges Bataille.