"Surrealism itself was divided on the issue of what relation, if any, it should have to commerce. It was all very well to say, as some did, that the movement was born of a marriage of Freudian psychoanalysis with Marxist critiques of capitalism; certainly there had been a long flirtation with [Leon] Trotsky on the part of some surrealists in the 1920s and 1930s. ...
"But artists have to earn a living. In 1926, both Max Ernst and Joan Miro did backdrop designs for a production of 'Romeo and Juliet,' by Serge Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. ...
Most of the surrealists, including [Andre] Breton, made their living by dealing, 'art advising,' involvement in photography, advertising and the fashion industry. Indeed, without the patronage of fashion, it is hard to see how surrealism would have made its way in Paris at all.
"[Salvador] Dali, in particular, received a lot of flak for his relations with the rich. But he never made any pretense about this, unlike [Pablo] Picasso, whose communist sympathies were mostly wind. 'Picasso is a genius!' Dali would later exclaim. 'Me too! Picasso is a Spaniard! Me too! Picasso is a communist! Me neither!' "
— Robert Hughes, writing on "L'Amour Fou," in the Guardian
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