The Dada Art Movement: A Brief History Dada or Dadaism is a cultural movement that began in Zürich, Switzerland, during World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1922. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature, poetry, art manifestoes, art theory, theatre, graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a rejection of the prevailing standards in art through anti-art cultural works. Marcel Duchamp, Fountain 1917 Dane Jones

The Great War Total Casualties : Approximately 37.5 million Dane Jones Dada’s purpose was to ridicule what its participants considered to be the meaninglessness of the modern world. In addition to being anti-war, dada was also anti-bourgeois and anarchistic in nature. Dada was an informal international movement, with participants in Europe and North America. The beginnings of Dada correspond to the outbreak of World War I. For many participants, the movement was a protest against the bourgeois nationalist and colonialist interests, which many Dadaists believed were the root cause of the war. Many Dadaists believed that the 'reason' and 'logic' of bourgeois capitalist society had led people into war. They expressed their rejection of that ideology in artistic expression that appeared to reject logic and embrace chaos and irrationality. Total Casualties : Approximately 37.5 million Dane Jones

German author and poet Hugo Ball expressed it, "For us, art is not an end in itself ... but it is an opportunity for the true perception and criticism of the times we live in.“ A reviewer from the American Art News stated at the time that "Dada philosophy is the sickest, most paralyzing and most destructive thing that has ever originated from the brain of man." Art historians have described Dada as being, in large part, a "reaction to what many of these artists saw as nothing more than an insane spectacle of collective homicide." Max Ernst Untitled, 1920

Dada: anti-war, anti-art Man Ray American, 1890–1976 Cadeau (Gift), c. 1958 (replica of lost 1921 original) painted flat iron with row of tacks, heads glued to bottom According to its proponents, Dada was not art, it was "anti-art". Everything for which art stood, Dada represented the opposite. Where art was concerned with traditional aesthetics, Dada ignored aesthetics. If art was to appeal to sensibilities, Dada was intended to offend. Through their rejection of traditional culture and aesthetics, the Dadaists hoped to destroy traditional culture and aesthetics.

George Grosz A Victim of Society, 1919 Years later, Dada artists described the movement as "a phenomenon bursting forth in the midst of the postwar economic and moral crisis, a savior, a monster, which would lay waste to everything in its path. It was a systematic work of destruction and demoralization... In the end it became nothing but an act of sacrilege. Dada artist George Grosz later recalled that his Dadaist art was intended as a protest "against this world of mutual destruction." George Grosz A Victim of Society, 1919

http://www. youtube. com/watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJgzoTp82SU Dada : A 5 Minute history Dane Jones

World War I G. Swiderski 1914-1918. The war involved the major European powers of the time, and spread to European colonies around the world. More than 15 million deaths. An estimated 8 million were civilian casualties. Some 62 million soldiers took part in the war. Nearly 20 million soldiers were wounded. Humanity had never before seen death and destruction on such a massive scale. Source: www.gwpda.org/photos Video on the aftermath: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hl5OqQVaD9Y Video on Shell Shock: Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I www.teacheroz.com/wwi/htm http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SS1dO0JC2EE

How did people in Europe react and respond to WWI? (www.shorpy.com/files/images/Ruins.D_C.preview.jpg) G. Swiderski (faculty.virginia.edu)

One response came from Dada… Dada: An artistic and literary movement which began with international artists in war-neutral Zürich, Switzerland, active from 1916-1922. Dada is said to have begun at the Cabaret Voltaire, a tavern owned by the poet Hugo Ball, in Zürich. The Cabaret Voltaire attracted artists who had come from all over Europe to neutral Zürich to escape the war. Dadaists were “United in their frustration and disillusionment with the war and their disgust with the culture that allowed it, the Dadaists felt that only insurrection and protest could fully express their rage. ‘The beginnings of Dada,’ Tristan Tzara remarked, "were not the beginnings of art, but of disgust.’ As Marcel Janco recalled: ‘We had lost confidence in our culture. Everything had to be demolished. We would begin again after the tabula rasa. At the Cabaret Voltaire we began by shocking the bourgeois, demolishing his idea of art, attacking common sense, public opinion, education, institutions, museums, good taste, in short, the whole prevailing order.’” (Hoffman 2001, np.) Dadaism spreads its ideas to other cities in Europe and New York largely through Dadaist journals and publications. At the end of WWI in 1918, many Zürich Dadaists returned to their home cities furthering the spread of Dadaism. The movement reached a peak in 1920 when many of the original founders came to Paris. In the following years Dada would merge with Surrealism, and other artistic movements. Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dada. Hoffman, I. Documents of Dada and Surrealism. www.artic.edu/reynolds/essays/hofmann.php. G. Swiderski Der Dada 3, ed. Raoul Hausmann (Berlin, April 1920), cover. Hannah Höch, Cut with the Dada Kitchen Knife through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany, 1919, collage of pasted paper.

Dada Quotes: “In Zürich in 1915 losing interest in the slaughterhouses of the world war, we turned to the Fine Arts. While the thunder of the batteries rumbled in the distance, we pasted, we recited, we versified, we sang with all our soul. We searched for an elementary art that would, we thought, save mankind from the furious folly of these times”. Hans Arp (source: www.historyguide.org/europe/lecture8.html). “We had lost confidence in our culture. Everything had to be demolished. We would begin again after the “tabula rasa”. At the Cabaret Voltaire we began by shocking common sense, public opinion, education, institutions, museums, good taste, in short the whole prevailing order.” Tristan Tzara (source: noah-cicero.blogspot.com/2007/05/quotes-from-tzaras-dada-manifesto.html). G. Swiderski

Tristan Tzara Tzara (b.1896, Moinesti, Romania-d. 1963, Paris France). Poet, essayist and playwright, Tzara is best know for his role as one of the principal and founding figures of Dada. Tzara was one of the international artists who came together at the Cabaret Voltaire. By the end of WWI Tzara had taken up the role as one of Dada’s main voices. He wrote numerous essays, poems, plays and took part in many controversial performances. Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tristan_Tzara#Symbolist_poetry. members.peak.org/~dadaist/English/Graphics/tzara.html. G. Swiderski

Tzara’s directions for making a Dadaist poem: To make a Dadaist poem: Take a newspaper. Take a pair of scissors. Choose an article as long as you are planning to make your poem. Cut out the article. Then cut out each of the words that make up this article and put them in a bag. Shake it gently. Then take out the scraps one after the other in the order in which they left the bag. Copy conscientiously. The poem will be like you. And here you are a writer, infinitely original and endowed with a sensibility that is charming though beyond the understanding of the vulgar. -Tristan Tzara (source: www.madsci.org/~lynn/juju/surr/games/dada-poem.html) Note to Instructor: You should read the instructions to the class, noting that this is also a Dada poem in and unto itself. My poem created with this technique may be read as a model. The class will begin with the line “Shake it gently.” (Preferably the articles will already be cut to save time). After reading Tzara’s ‘directions,’ pass out the materials and circulate through the class as they are working. G. Swiderski

DADA COLLAGE OR POSTER GOAL: Using images from popular culture, make a statement about our society. NATHANIEL BOOMHOWER

Dada used satire to ridicule society What is satire? comedians often use satire… an example: http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/d8e838fb1a/george-bush-george-w-bush-hunting-from-nino?rel=by_user Wikipedia says: In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement.[Although satire is usually meant to be funny, its greater purpose is constructive social criticism, using wit as a weapon. NATHANIEL BOOMHOWER

Images are everywhere! Use creativity! NATHANIEL BOOMHOWER

Dada artists wanted to attack and ridicule society. Notice his eyes and mouth… This man was an art critic… Dada artists wanted to attack and ridicule society. NATHANIEL BOOMHOWER

NATHANIEL BOOMHOWER

NATHANIEL BOOMHOWER