2. • World War I
• began in 1914 with the assassination of Austro-Hungarian
Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the throne of the empire,
• lasted until 1918.
• During the conflict, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and the
Ottoman Empire (the Central Powers) fought against Great
Britain, France, Russia, Italy, Romania, Japan and the United
States (the Allied Powers).
• produced unprecedented levels of carnage and destruction due
to new technological advances which translated in horrific
trench warfare.
• By the end of the war, when the Allied Powers claimed victory, more
than 16 million people, soldiers and civilians, have died.
3. • Dada:
• began in Zürich, Switzerland as a reaction to World War I
• was an artistic and literary movement,
• was the first conceptual art movement; artists focused on
making works that generated difficult questions about society,
the role of the artist, and the purpose of art.
• shortly after its beginning, it spread, to Berlin, Hanover, Paris,
New York, and Cologne, all of which generated their own groups.
• was replaced by Surrealism, but the ideas it generated have
become the cornerstones of various categories of modern and
contemporary art.
The World Turned Upside Down:
The Birth of Dada
4. Marcel Janco (Romanian original name Marcel
Hermann Iancu):
• was a Romanian and Israeli visual artist,
architect and art theorist.
• was the co-inventor of Dadaism and a leading
exponent of Constructivism in Eastern Europe.
• In the 1910s, he co-edited, with Ion Vinea and
Tristan Tzara, the Romanian art magazine
Simbolul. Janco was a practitioner of Art
Nouveau, Futurism and Expressionism before
contributing his painting and stage design to
Tzara's literary Dadaism.
The Cabaret Voltaire and its Legacy
Marcel Janco. Mask.
1919. paper,
cardboard, string,
guache, and pastel. 17-
3⁄4 × 8-5⁄8 × 2” Musée
National d'Art
Moderne. Centre
Pompidou. Paris.
5. • Janco
• parted with Dada in 1919, when
he and painter Hans Arp founded
a Constructivist circle, Das Neue
Leben.
• Reunited with Vinea, he founded
Contimporanul, influential
tribune of the Romanian avant-
garde.
• At Contimporanul, Janco
expounded a "revolutionary"
vision of urban planning.
• designed some of the most
innovative landmarks of
downtown Bucharest.
Marcel Janco. Vila. Street Gigore
Mora. Bucharest. Wexler .
Bucharest.
6. • Hugo Ball and Emmy Hennings founded
the Cabaret Voltaire on February 5, 1916 in
the backroom of a tavern on
Spiegelgasse.
• Ball designed the costume for the
performance of the sound-poem,
"Karawane,“. The poem was made of
nonsensical syllables to create rhythm
and emotion, but nothing resembling any
known language.
• Ball's costume was meant to further
distance him from his audience, making
his speech even more foreign and exotic.
Hugo Ball reciting the poem
Karawane at the Cabaret
Voltaire, Zurich, 1916.
Photograph 28-1⁄8 × 15-3⁄4”
Kunsthaus, Zurich
7. The lack of sense in the
Karawane poem by Hugo
Ball symbolized the inability
of European powers to solve
their diplomatic problems
through rational discussion,
thus leading to World War I –
referencing the biblical
Tower of Babel.
8. • The collage illustrates Arp’s
intent on incorporating chance
into the creation of works of art.
• This went against all norms of
traditional art production.
• The introduction of chance was
a way for Dadaists to challenge
artistic norms.
Jean (Hans) Arp. Collage Arranged
According to the Laws of Chance,
1916–17. Torn and pasted paper,
19-1⁄8 × 13-5⁄8”. The Museum of
Modern Art, New York
9. Sophie Taeuber-Arp
• was a key figure in many of the
important movements of the pre-
World War II art scene in Europe
• was one of the most active figures
around the Café Voltaire in Zurich.
• Considered art for political ends
and for incorporation into
everyday life.
• embraced the principles of
Constructivism; she was and the
most important practitioner of the
movement, outside of Russia.
Sophie Taeuber. Rythmes
Libres (Free Rhythms). 1919
Gouache and watercolor
on vellum. 14-3⁄4 × 10-7⁄8”
Kunsthaus, Zurich.
11. • Arp created a series of
multilayered, painted wood
reliefs.
• By the time Arp created this
work, he had already
perfected his assemblage
technique.
• He had a carpenter execute
them in wood.
Jean (Hans) Arp. Fleur Marteau
(Hammer Flower). 1916. Oil on
wood. 24-3⁄8 × 19-5⁄8”. Fondation
Arp Clamart, France
12. • Alfred Stieglitz created and
managed the internationally
famous avant-garde gallery 291.
• The gallery was located in Midtown
Manhattan at 291 Fifth Avenue in
New York City from 1905 to 1917.
Duchamp’s Early Career
• He changed the course of art
history by challenging the very
notion of what is art.
“The Plumbing and Her Bridges”:
Dada Comes to America
Marcel Duchamp. The Passage
from Virgin to Bride.
Munich, July–August 1912
Oil on canvas. 23-3⁄8 × 21-1⁄4”
The Museum of Modern Art,
New York.
14. Marcel Duchamp
Bottle Rack, 1914. Mixed
media
• In January 1916. Marcel Duchamp
created the very first ready-made by
asking his sister to “activate” a bottle
rack (by signing his name on it) that
had been sitting in his studio in Paris
since 1914.
• It was an unprecedented artistic
revolution.
• Coined by Duchamp, the term
readymade meant mass-produced
everyday object taken out of its usual
context and declared an artwork by
the choice of the artist.
15. The Bicycle Wheel,
• made in 1913, when Duchamp
bought a bicycle wheel and fixed
to a white wooden stool,
• was not the first readymade
because it was not his intent to
call it an artwork.
• was a protest against the
excessive importance attached to
works of art.
Marcel Duchamp. Bicycle Wheel
New York, 1951. (third version, after lost
original of 1913). Assemblage: metal
wheel 25-1⁄2” diameter, mounted on
painted wooden stool 23-3⁄4” high;
overall 50-1⁄2 × 25-1⁄2 × 16-5⁄8”. The
Museum of Modern Art, New York
16. Marcel Duchamp,
Fountain, 1917. Porcelain
The Fountain:
• Is the most famous work and is widely
seen as an icon of twentieth-century
art.
• is the artist’s statement that traditional
values of craftsmanship and esthetic
experience are not essential to a work
of art.
• Was submitted by Duchamp under the
name R. Mutt, to test the openness of
the Society of Independent Artists that
Duchamp himself had helped found
and promote.
• It was not accepted.
17. Marcel Duchamp. The Bride
Stripped Bare by Her Bachelor Even
or The Large Glass
1915–23. Oil, lead wire, foil, dust,
and varnish on glass.
8’ 11” × 5’ 7”. Philadelphia Museum
of Art
19. Picabia
Francis Picabia
• was a French artist who embraced
the many ideas of Dadaism
• early on he worked closely with
Alfred Stieglitz
• Was critical of Stieglitz, as is
evident in this "portrait" , Ideal.
• Created a series of mechanistic
portraits and imagery that do not
celebrate modernity or progress.
Francis Picabia. Ideal, 1915. Ink,
graphite, and cut-and-pasted
painted and printed papers on
paperboard The Metropolitan
Museum of Art, NY.
20. Man Ray.
Seguidilla. 1919.
Airbrushed gouache, pen and
ink, pencil, and colored pencil
on paper Board.
22 × 27-7⁄8”
Hirshhorn Museum &
Sculpture Garden. Smithsonian
Institution Washington, D.C.
21. Man Ray and the American Avant-
Garde
Man Ray
• born in 1890 to a Russian-Jewish
immigrant family in Philadelphia.
• made Paris his home in the 1920s and
1930s,
• In the 1940s returned to United States,
spending periods in New York and
Hollywood.
• worked in styles influenced by
Cubism, Futurism, Dada and
Surrealism.
• is well known for his photographs of
the years between the WWI ad WWII ,
in particular the camera-less pictures
he called 'Rayographs‘.
• regarded himself first and foremost as
a painter.
Man Ray.
Gift , replica of lost original of
1921. c. 1958. Flatiron with nails
height 6-1⁄2 × 3-5⁄8 × 3-3⁄4”
The Museum of Modern Art,
James Thrall Soby Fund, 1966
23. Man Ray
• photographed the model Kiki
wearing nothing but a turban,
painted f-holes on the print and
re-photographed it, and gave it
the title Le Violon d’Ingres.
• used various techniques which
created a personal style of
surrealism.
• manipulated photographs and the
outcomes were unique.
Ray’s style can be compared to a to
an early version of the Photoshop.
Man Ray, Le Violon d'Ingres,
1924, Gelatin silver print.
THe J. Paul Getty Museum.
24. Cabaret Voltaire
• opened its doors in Zurich, attracting a diverse group of artists
credited with launching the art movement known as Dada.
• was opened by Hugo Ball, a German philosopher, writer, poet, and
composer, and his parter Emmy Hennings, a poet, dancer, and
performance artist.
A few days before the opening, Ball put out a notice inviting artists to
come to their cabaret and share their works.
The founding members of the Cabaret Voltaire were carrying out a
revolution in art.
“Art Is dead”: Dada in Germany
25. • created artworks reflecting a
personality interested in
experimentation.
• was never a purist and often
combined media, using paint
extensively in some of his best
works.
His artworks remained "montages"
as a result of the philosophical
approach that he took to the making
of art: We regarded ourselves as
engineers and our work as
construction...all the arts and their
techniques needed a fundamental
and revolutionary change, in order to
remain in touch with the life of their
epoch.“ (Hausmann 1919)
Raoul Hausmann. The Spirit of Our
Time (Mechanical Head), 1919.
Wood, leather, aluminum, brass,
and cardboard, 12-5⁄8 × 9”. Musée
National d’Art Moderne, Centre
d’Art et de Culture Georges
Pompidou, Paris
Raoul Hausmann
26. Hannah Höch
• practiced making collages from words
and images she took from the
established press to make new and
subversive statements.
• Cut with a Kitchen Knife Dada through
the Last Weimar
• reflects the eclecticism of
Dadaism.
• makes a political statement
against the establishment
• acknowledges anarchistic
opposition.
Hannah Höch. Cut with the Kitchen
Knife Dada Through the Last
Weimar Beer Belly Cultural Epoch
of Germany. 1919–20.
Photomontage. 44-7⁄8 × 35-1⁄2”
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin,
Preussischer Kulturbesitz,
Nationalgalerie
27. Kurt Schwitters
• is acknowledged as the twentieth
century's greatest master of
collage.
• In the spring of 1919 began to make
assemblages from scraps of refuse.
One piece of scrap contained the
four letters MERZ – cut from an
dvertisement for the Kommerz- und
Privatbank.
• revealed later, Merz became the
brand name for almost all his
activities and, from 1922, he
included in his name, Kurt Merz
Schwitters or simply Merz.
Kurt Schwitters. A View of the
Hanover Merzbau With Gold
Grotto. c. 1930
Schwitters
28. Ernst
German-born Max Ernst
• was an innovative artist
• used dreamlike imagery that mocked
social conventions.
• served in World War I,
• experimented broadly in both subject and
technique
• was highly critical of western culture
which fed into his vision of the modern
world as irrational, an idea that informed
his artwork.
• had an artistic vision and humor that
were apparent in his Dada and Surrealists
works.
Max Ernst. Celebes. 1921
Oil on canvas. 51-1⁄8 × 43-
1⁄4”. he Tate, London.
30. Max Ernst
1 Copper Plate
1 Zinc Plate
1 Rubber Cloth
2 Calipers
1 Drainpipe Telescope
1 Pipe Man
1920.
Gouache, ink, and pencil on
printed reproduction
9-1⁄2 × 6-1⁄2”
Whereabouts unknown
31. Max Ernst.
Woman, Old Man and
Flower/Femme, viellard
et fleur. 1923-24. Oil on
canvas. The Museum of
Modern Art, New York.
32. Die Neue Sachlichkeit (The New Objectivity)
• was a pseudo-Expressionist movement founded in Germany in the
aftermath of World War I by Otto Dix and George Grosz.
• is characterized by a realistic style combined with a cynical, socially
critical philosophical stance.
• Static pictorial structure, often suggesting a positively airless, glassy
space, and a general preference for the static over the dynamic
• a second term, Magic Realists, has been applied to diverse artists,
including Heinrich Maria Davringhausen, Alexander Kanoldt, Christian
Schad, and Georg Schrimpf, whose works counteract in a positive
fashion the aggression and subjectivity of German Expressionist art.
• Other artists associated with the movement included Max Beckmann and
Christian Schad.
Idealism and Disgust: The “New Objectivity”
in Germany
33. Käthe Kollwitz
• was instrumental in increasing the
visibility and professional validity of
women artists in the interwar years.
• in 1916, she was voted to become the first
woman juror of the Berlin New Secession,
• 1919, she became the first woman elected
to the Prussian Academy of the Arts
• helped found the Society for Women
Artists and Friends of Art in 1926
• was appointed the first female department
head at the Prussian Academy of Arts in
1928.
Käthe Kollwitz. Female Nude
with Green Shawl Seen From
Behind. 1903. Color lithograph.
34. The November Group
• formed on 3 December 1918, t
• was a group of German
expressionist artists and
architects.
• took its name from the month of
the German Revolution.
• The artists of the November group
described themselves as radical
and revolutionary.
• Käthe Kollwitz was a member
Käthe Kollwitz. Lamentation: In
Memory of Ernst Barlach Grief)
1938. Bronze, height 10-1⁄4”
Hirshhorn Museum and
Sculpture Garden,
Smithsonian Institution,
Washington, D.C.
35. Grosz
Grosz
• was a prolific artist.
• created about 450 paintings and
more than 15,000 works on paper.
• created paintings and drawings
• of fat speculators,
• cynical military officials
• extravagant prostitutes,
• of the maimed victims of war
• and the emaciated poor.
• the Nazis confiscated 285 of Grosz's
works in museums,
• They sold some
• Most were burned
George Grosz. Dedication to
Oskar Panizza. 1917–18. Oil
on canvas 55-1⁄8 × 43-1⁄4”.
Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart,
36. George Grosz
Fit for Active Service
(The Faith Healers)
1916–17
Pen, brush, and India
ink, sheet
20 × 14-3⁄8”
The Museum of
Modern Art, New York.
Art
37. George Grosz
Pillars of Society
1926
Oil on Canvas
78 3/8 ” × 42 ½”
The Museum of Modern
Art, New York
38. Otto Dix
Corpse in Barbed Wire
(Flanders)
(Leiche im Drahtverhau
[Flandern])
from The War
(Der Krieg)
1924
Etching and aquatint from a
portfolio of fifty etchings,
aquatints, and drypoints
plate: 11-3⁄4 × 9-5⁄8”;
sheet: 18-9⁄16 × 13-3⁄4”
Publisher: Karl Nierendorf,
Berlin. Printer: Otto Felsing,
Berlin. Edition: 70
39. Dix
Otto Dix
• his painting was influential in shaping
the popular image of the Weimar
Republic of the 1920s.
• a veteran haunted of WWI, his first
subjects were crippled soldiers
• his work became in the early 1930s,
and he became a target of the Nazis.
Otto Dix. The Skat Players—Card
Playing War Invalids. 1920. Oil and collage
on canvas. 43-5⁄16 × 34-1⁄4”. Staatliche
Museen zu Berlin, Preussischer
Kulturbesitz,Nationalgalerie
41. Otto Dix. Prague Street ,
1920. Oil on canvas.
Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart,
Germany.
Dix balanced his inclination toward realism
with a tendency toward the fantastic and the
allegorical.
Otto Dix. Seven Deadly
Sins, 1933. Oil on canvas.
Staatliche Kunsthalle,
Karlsruhe, Germany
This is an allegorical
painting representing the
political situation in
Germany immediately
after the Nazis had Dix
removed from his teaching
position at the Dresden
Art Academy.
42. Max Beckmann
• began his studies in 1900-03 at the Art
Academy in Weimar.
• In 1904, he moved to Berlin where he
joined the Berlin Secession in 1907.
• In 1926 had his first exhibition in America.
• Within months of Natzis rise to power in
1933, Beckmann lost his teaching position
at the Stadelschule in Frankfurt.
• in 1940, he was invited to teach a summer
semester at the School of the Art Institute
of Chicago. The American Consulate
refused his visa. He had to spend the War
years in Amsterdam.
Beckmann
Max Beckmann. Self-
Portrait with Red Scarf.
1917. Oil on canvas.
Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart,
Germany.
43. Max Beckmann
Self-Portrait in Tuxedo
1927
Oil on canvas
55-1⁄2 × 37-3⁄4”
Busch-Reisinger Museum,
Harvard University Art
Museums, Cambridge, MA
44. Max Beckman. The Night,
1918-19. Oil on canvas.
Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart,
Germany.
• His early works tend to be in an
Expressionist style but his works
from the 1920s reflect the Neue
Sachlichkeit movement
• Like the Germans of his generation,
Beckmann was deeply affected by
World War I.
• He was marked by the horrors he
witnessed while serving as a member
of the German army field hospital
corps in 1914-1915.
• 1932-1933 were times of personal
crisis for him when his career was set
back by the rising Nazi.
46. • The threat on Beckmann’s personal welfare and security have been
sufficient to reactivate the nervous anxieties and fantasies that had
overtaken him on the occasion of the earlier breakdown.
• His retreat into the realm of mythology, as well as his return to an
imagery of horror - both of which tendencies are found in Departure -
appear to be related to both the national political crisis and to the
personal crisis that accompanied it.
• Based on Beckmann’s comments, Departure is the expression more of
anxiety and foreboding than of protest.
• The Gothic influence in Departure is evident in the contrast between the
serene scene of the center section and the violence of the wings.
• The side panels depict scenes of brutality and degradation.
47. • In strong contrast to the violence and oppressiveness of these scenes,
the central panel, dominated by broad expanses of clear primary colors,
shows a group of heroic figures standing calmly in a small boat upon
the open sea.
• A family of three - a sort of Holy Family - appears between two majestic
figures, one draped in red, the other in blue.
• The figure in red is a savage hooded being who grasps a huge fish with
both hands. His companion is a crowned Christ-like personage , who
holds a fully laden net in his left hand and makes a blessing with his
right.
• Some critics have interpreted the side panels as a reference to the
sinister course of events at the beginning of the Hitler era.
• Beckmann denied that the painting made any direct political comment.
He painted Departure with an universal meaning in mind.
48. • It would nevertheless be misleading to assume no connection
between the nightmare elements in the triptych and the civil chaos
and violence that erupted as the Weimar Republic was crumbling.
• As an expression of brutality and demonic force versus paralysis
and impotence, Departure is profoundly true to the emotional climate
of Germany in the early 1930's.
49. Max Beckman’s The Night is one of the more disturbing images
in the history of art, an expressionist masterpiece
Given the horrors of his own time, domestic and foreign, state-
sponsored and otherwise, war and crime, government
surveillance, torture, and the like -- given its universal theme, a
representation of the violence of the human condition -- Night
remains a work of astonishing relevance.
