Theresa Thompson explores the mind of polymath Desmond Morris

Surrealism – the term may bring to mind images of Dalí’s melting clocks, Magritte’s clouds, or Miró’s joyful paintings and sculptures bursting with Catalan colour – but in Oxford right now we have an exhibition by the last of the British surrealists, Desmond Morris who was exhibiting in the 1940s when the movement was still active.

Oxford-based Morris, better known for his work as a zoologist, broadcaster and author of popular books on human behaviour, above all his acclaimed The Naked Ape, has all along had a parallel career as a surrealist painter. From his first surrealist exhibition held in 1948 in Swindon where he grew up, to this in Oxford, his career as an eminent international artist spans 67 years.

An arresting sight awaits you as you enter the O3 Gallery in Oxford’s Castle Quarter. Step in via the door on the lower ground level and you encounter an array of surreal paintings of figures and heads facing you on the opposite wall, and curving up the stairways yet more of the 40 or so drawings and paintings by Morris on display. All around are groups of complex juxtapositions and strange combinations of colour, figure and form, some dream-like, some semi-recognisable, some indecipherable...

One of the first paintings has a pair of blue staring green-lidded eyes balanced over a bulbous red nose and brown jaw. The apparently dismembered head floating on an olive green ground looks benign although its title The Headliner has me wondering what mysteries those soulful eyes withhold.

Wonder is a constant companion when looking at surreal art. Biomorphic beings populate Morris’ works, motifs repeat, colours surprise, and the titles are food for thought. Did the title follow the painting, or the painting the title? Where is the spikily pointed The Goal-seeker going so determinedly? What about the droopy eye-lidded Head-case with holes in its ‘brain’? “As with all surrealist art, my paintings spring directly from the unconscious mind where, in my case, a whole world of strange biomorphs has been evolving since the 1940s,” Morris said.

Morris is a prolific artist, as creative in paint as in his other work. It’s rare to have two careers running in parallel, but it looks as if one may have facilitated the other: Morris’ life-long keen observation of human behaviour accruing in his mind and presumably inspiring his art; likewise, an innate inquisitiveness inspiring both art and science.

The title of Predicting the Past, painted in 2011, had me smiling. Nearby, Twice in a Blue Moon, also oil on board, in which two creatures with crested heads, bodies sweeping together, limbs or wings butterflying out behind, seem to engage in some sort of courtship dance while a blue moon and other obscure shapes look on, had me thinking. I wondered how much if any crossover there is, consciously or unconsciously, between his parallel careers of zoology and art? “My painting has always been biomorphic and has been influenced by my knowledge of natural growth patterns and biological shapes. But I have attempted to create a separate world in my art,” he said.

Imagination is all. Everything is up for grabs. This is surrealism! And this is a fascinating exhibition.

Desmond Morris drawings and paintings
O3 Gallery, Oxford. 
Until July 26
o3gallery.co.uk