Will the Real Otto Dix Please Stand Up?: Dix, Nietzsche, and Lacan
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Bergt 1 Siena Sofia Bergt Professor Insdorf Analysis of Film Language 26 February 2018 Colored Perspectives: Shading World War II Onscreen Films that deal with World War II—whether their narratives are concerned primarily with the war itself, the aura from which it emerged, or the ethos of its aftermath—have a particularly charged relationship to the presence or abjuration of color. As representations of a period that produced its own black-and-white archival footage, these worKs recKon with color not simply as an aesthetic choice, but also as a tool through which to define their own relationship to perspectival subjectivity and claims of historical authenticity. By examining the role of color in three vastly different World War II films— Andrzej Wajda’s black-and-white 1958 rendition of the war’s last 24 hours in “Ashes and Diamonds,” the Harlequin prewar chaos of Bob Fosse’s 1972 “Cabaret,” and the delicate balance of color and blacK-and-white characterizing the postwar divided Germany of Wim Wenders’ 1987 “Wings of Desire”—we may access a richer understanding, not simply of the films’ stylistic approaches, but also (and perhaps more significantly) of their relationship to both their origins and audience. Color, that is, acts in these three films as a chromatic guide by which to untangle each respective text’s taKe on both subjectivity and objectivity. Bergt 2 The best “entry point” into these stylistically and temporally distinct films’ chromatic motifs is through three strikingly analogous crowd scenes—each of which uses communal participation in a diegetically well-known song to highlight a moment of dramatic urgency or volatility. -
Otto Dix (1891-1969) War Triptych, 1929-32
Otto Dix (1891-1969) War Triptych, 1929-32 Key facts: Date: 1929-32 Size: Middle panel: 204 x 204 cm; Left and right wing each 204 x 102 cm; Predella: 60 x 204 cm Materials: Mixed media (egg tempera and oil) on wood Location: Staatliche Kunstammlungen, Dresden 1. ART HISTORICAL TERMS AND CONCEPTS Subject Matter: The Great War is a history painting within a landscape set out over four panels, a triptych with a predella panel below. The narrative begins in the left panel, the soldiers in their steel helmets depart for war through a thick haze, already doomed in Dix’s view. In the right panel, a wounded soldier is carried from the battlefield, while the destructive results of battle are starkly depicted in the central panel. This is a bleak and desolate landscape, filled with death and ruin, presided over by a corpse. Trees are charred, bodies are battered and torn and lifeless. War has impacted every part of the landscape. (This panel was a reworking on an earlier painting Dix had done entitled The Trench, 1920-3. David Crocket wrote: “many, if not most, of those who saw this painting in Cologne and Berlin during 1923-24 knew nothing about this aspect of the war.” The predella scene shows several soldiers lying next to one another. Perhaps they are sleeping in the trenches, about to go back into the cycle of battle when they awake, or perhaps they have already fallen and will never wake again. Dix repeatedly depicted World War I and its consequences after having fought in it himself as a young man. -
E 13 George Grosz (1893-1959) 'My New Pictures'
272 Rationalization and Transformation this date (1920) have sat in a somewhat strained relationship with the more overtly left-vi elements of the post-war German avant-garde. Originally published in Edschmid, op. cit. ~~g present translation is taken from Miesel, op. cit., pp. 180-1. e Work! Ecstasy! Smash your brains! Chew, stuff your self, gulp it down, mix it around! Th bliss of giving birth! The crack of the brush, best of all as it stabs the canvas. Tubes ~ 0 color squeezed dry. And the body? It doesn't matter. Health? Make yourself healthy! Sickness doesn't exist! Only work and I'll say that again - only blessed work! Paint' Dive into colors, roll around in tones! in the slush of chaos! Chew the broken-off mouthpiece of your pipe, press your naked feet into the earth. Crayon and pen pierce sharply into the brain, they stab into every corner, furiously they press into the whiteness. Black laughs like the devil on paper, grins in bizarre lines, comforts in velvety planes, excites and caresses. The storm roars - sand blows about - the sun shatters to pieces - and nevertheless, the gentle curve of the horizon quietly embraces everything. Beaten down, exhausted, just a worm, collapse into your bed. A deep sleep will make you forget your defeat. A new day! A new struggle! Ecstasy again! One day after the other, a sparkling, constantly changing chain of days. One experience after the other. That damned brain! What is it that churns and twitches and jumps in there? Hah! Tear your head off, or grab it with both hands, turn it around, twist it off. -
Genius Is Nothing but an Extravagant Manifestation of the Body. — Arthur Cravan, 1914
1 ........................................... The Baroness and Neurasthenic Art History Genius is nothing but an extravagant manifestation of the body. — Arthur Cravan, 1914 Some people think the women are the cause of [artistic] modernism, whatever that is. — New York Evening Sun, 1917 I hear “New York” has gone mad about “Dada,” and that the most exotic and worthless review is being concocted by Man Ray and Duchamp. What next! This is worse than The Baroness. By the way I like the way the discovery has suddenly been made that she has all along been, unconsciously, a Dadaist. I cannot figure out just what Dadaism is beyond an insane jumble of the four winds, the six senses, and plum pudding. But if the Baroness is to be a keystone for it,—then I think I can possibly know when it is coming and avoid it. — Hart Crane, c. 1920 Paris has had Dada for five years, and we have had Else von Freytag-Loringhoven for quite two years. But great minds think alike and great natural truths force themselves into cognition at vastly separated spots. In Else von Freytag-Loringhoven Paris is mystically united [with] New York. — John Rodker, 1920 My mind is one rebellion. Permit me, oh permit me to rebel! — Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven, c. 19251 In a 1921 letter from Man Ray, New York artist, to Tristan Tzara, the Romanian poet who had spearheaded the spread of Dada to Paris, the “shit” of Dada being sent across the sea (“merdelamerdelamerdela . .”) is illustrated by the naked body of German expatriate the Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven (see fig. -
Annual Report 1995
19 9 5 ANNUAL REPORT 1995 Annual Report Copyright © 1996, Board of Trustees, Photographic credits: Details illustrated at section openings: National Gallery of Art. All rights p. 16: photo courtesy of PaceWildenstein p. 5: Alexander Archipenko, Woman Combing Her reserved. Works of art in the National Gallery of Art's collec- Hair, 1915, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1971.66.10 tions have been photographed by the department p. 7: Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo, Punchinello's This publication was produced by the of imaging and visual services. Other photographs Farewell to Venice, 1797/1804, Gift of Robert H. and Editors Office, National Gallery of Art, are by: Robert Shelley (pp. 12, 26, 27, 34, 37), Clarice Smith, 1979.76.4 Editor-in-chief, Frances P. Smyth Philip Charles (p. 30), Andrew Krieger (pp. 33, 59, p. 9: Jacques-Louis David, Napoleon in His Study, Editors, Tarn L. Curry, Julie Warnement 107), and William D. Wilson (p. 64). 1812, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1961.9.15 Editorial assistance, Mariah Seagle Cover: Paul Cezanne, Boy in a Red Waistcoat (detail), p. 13: Giovanni Paolo Pannini, The Interior of the 1888-1890, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon Pantheon, c. 1740, Samuel H. Kress Collection, Designed by Susan Lehmann, in Honor of the 50th Anniversary of the National 1939.1.24 Washington, DC Gallery of Art, 1995.47.5 p. 53: Jacob Jordaens, Design for a Wall Decoration (recto), 1640-1645, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, Printed by Schneidereith & Sons, Title page: Jean Dubuffet, Le temps presse (Time Is 1875.13.1.a Baltimore, Maryland Running Out), 1950, The Stephen Hahn Family p. -
Kurt Schwitters's Merzbau: Chaos, Compulsion and Creativity Author[S]: Clare O’Dowd Source: Moveabletype, Vol
Article: Kurt Schwitters's Merzbau: Chaos, Compulsion and Creativity Author[s]: Clare O’Dowd Source: MoveableType, Vol. 5, ‘Mess’ (2009) DOI: 10.14324/111.1755-4527.046 MoveableType is a Graduate, Peer-Reviewed Journal based in the Department of English at UCL. © 2009 Clare O’Dowd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY) 4.0https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Moveable Type Vol. 5 2009: CLARE O’DOWD 1 Kurt Schwitters' Merzbau : Chaos, Compulsion and Creativity For nearly thirty years until his death in 1948, the German artist Kurt Schwitters constructed environments for himself: self-contained worlds, places of safety, nests. Everywhere he went he stockpiled materials and built them into three-dimensional, sculptural edifices. By the time he left Hanover in 1937, heading for exile in England, Schwitters, his wife, his son, his parents, their lodgers, and a large number of guinea pigs had all been living in the midst of an enormous, detritus-filled sculpture that had slowly engulfed large parts of their home for almost twenty years. 1 Schwitters was by no means the only artist to have a cluttered studio, or to collect materials for his work. So the question must be asked, what was it about Schwitters’ activities that was so unusual? How can these and other aspects of his work and behaviour be considered to go beyond what might be regarded as normal for an artist working at that time? And more importantly, what were the reasons for this behaviour? In this paper, I will examine the beginnings of the Merzbau , the architectural sculpture that Schwitters created in his Hanover home. -
The Experience of the German Soldier on the Eastern Front
AUTONOMY IN THE GREAT WAR: THE EXPERIENCE OF THE GERMAN SOLDIER ON THE EASTERN FRONT A THESIS IN History Presented to the Faculty of the University Of Missouri-Kansas City in partial fulfillment of The requirements for the degree MASTER OF ARTS By Kevin Patrick Baker B.A. University of Kansas, 2007 Kansas City, Missouri 2012 ©2012 KEVIN PATRICK BAKER ALL RIGHTS RESERVED AUTONOMY IN THE GREAT WAR: THE EXPERIENCE OF THE GERMAN SOLDIER ON THE EASTERN FRONT Kevin Patrick Baker, Candidate for the Master of Arts Degree University of Missouri-Kansas City, 2012 ABSTRACT From 1914 to 1919, the German military established an occupation zone in the territory of present day Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia. Cultural historians have generally focused on the role of German soldiers as psychological and physical victims trapped in total war that was out of their control. Military historians have maintained that these ordinary German soldiers acted not as victims but as perpetrators causing atrocities in the occupied lands of the Eastern Front. This paper seeks to build on the existing scholarship on the soldier’s experience during the Great War by moving beyond this dichotomy of victim vs. perpetrator in order to describe the everyday existence of soldiers. Through the lens of individual selfhood, this approach will explore the gray areas that saturated the experience of war. In order to gain a better understanding of how ordinary soldiers appropriated individual autonomy in total war, this master’s thesis plans to use an everyday-life approach by looking at individual soldiers’ behaviors underneath the canopy of military hegemony. -
Hannah Höch 15 January – 23 March 2014 Galleries 1, 8 & Victor Petitgas Gallery (Gallery 9)
Hannah Höch 15 January – 23 March 2014 Galleries 1, 8 & Victor Petitgas Gallery (Gallery 9) The Whitechapel Gallery presents the first major UK exhibition of the influential German artist Hannah Höch (1889-1978). Hannah Höch was an important member of the Berlin Dada movement and a pioneer in collage. Splicing together images taken from popular magazines, illustrated journals and fashion publications, she created a humorous and moving commentary on society during a time of tremendous social change. Acerbic, astute and funny, Höch established collage as a key medium for satire whilst being a master of its poetic beauty. Höch created some of the most radical works of the time and was admired by contemporaries such as George Grosz, Theo van Doesburg and Kurt Schwitters, yet she was often overlooked by traditional art history. At a time when her work has never seemed more relevant, the exhibition puts this inspiring figure in the spotlight. Bringing together over 100 works from major international collections, the exhibition includes collages, photomontages, watercolours and woodcuts, spanning six decades from the 1910s to the 1970s. Highlights include major works such as Staatshäupter (Heads of State) (1918-20) and Flucht (Flight) (1931) as well as her innovative post-war collages. This exhibition charts Höch’s career beginning with early works influenced by her time working in the fashion industry to key photomontages from her Dada period, such as Hochfinanz (High Finance) (1923), which sees notable figures collaged together with emblems of industry in a critique of the relationship between financiers and the military at the height of an economic crisis in Europe. -
Dada Surrealism and Expressionism
• Dada was an art movement formed during the First World War in Zurich in 1916 in negative reaction to the horrors and folly of the war. The art, poetry and performance produced by Dada artists is often satirical and nonsensical in nature. Dada artists felt war called into question every aspect of society and their aim was to destroy all traditional values and assumptions. Dada was also anti-bourgeois and aligned with the radical left. The founder of Dada was a writer, Hugo Ball and in 1916 he started a satirical night-club in Zurich, the Cabaret Voltaire. Dada became an international movement and was the basis of Surrealism in Paris after the war. Leading artists associated with it include Jean Arp (1886-1966), Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968), Francis Picabia (1879-1953) and Kurt Schwitters (1887- 1948). Duchamp’s questioning of the fundamentals of Western art had a profound subsequent influence. • Surrealism was founded by French poet André Breton in Paris in 1924 and it became an international movement including British Surrealism which formed in 1936. Surrealists were strongly influenced by Sigmund Freud (the founder of psychoanalysis) and his theories about the unconscious and the aim of the movement was to reveal the unconscious and reconcile it with rational life. Key artists involved in the movement were Salvador Dalí, Max Ernst, René Magritte and Joan Miró. Two broad types of surrealism can be seen: one based on dreamlike imagery and the other on automatism (a process of making which unleashed the unconscious by drawing or writing without conscious thought). Some (such as Max Ernst) used new techniques such as frottage and collage to create unusual imagery. -
Ein Biogra Scher Garten Der Garten Der Familie Dix in Hemmenhofen
Ein biograscher Garten Der Garten der Familie Dix in Hemmenhofen s war ein wildes Gemisch aus kräigen Far- Frau Martha und den Kindern Nelly (13), Ursus (9) und «Eben », so erinnert sich Jan Dix an die Blumen- Jan (8) zog er 1936 auf die Halbinsel Höri nach Hemmen- sträusse, die seine Muer Martha und seine Schwester hofen, gegenüber von Steckborn am deutschen Ufer des Nelly aus dem Garten der Familie des Malers Oo Dix Bodensees. Die Höri war bereits anfangs des 20. Jahrhun- zusammenstellten. « Schwefelgelbe Schafgarbe neben derts als ländlicher Sehnsuchtsort von Lebensreformern nachtschwarzen Malven, vielerlei Formen und komple- und Künstlern entdeckt worden, unter ihnen auch Her- mentäre Farben, dicht gedrängte, starrköpge Zinnien mann Hesse, der sich 1907 im benachbarten Gaienhofen in ihren unwahrscheinlich reichen Farbnuancen waren für fünf Jahre niedergelassen hae. Die Dixens gehörten Motive für Blumenbilder. Kapuzinerkresse, Schwertlilie, zu einer zweiten Generation von Höri-Künstlern, die sich Nelke, alles o in Portraits als Aribut verwendet, wurde in in der Zeit der Nazi-Diktatur wohl oder übel aus dem Hemmenhofen im Garten angepanzt und gepegt. » Vom öentlichen Leben haen zurückziehen müssen. Oo Dix, Garten auf die Leinwand des Vaters waren es nur wenige der « Grossstadtmensch », pegte zeitlebens ein gespalte- Schrie. Und auch wenn Oo Dix weder Blumenmaler nes Verhältnis zu seinem neuen Lebensort, den er bis zu noch Gärtner genannt werden kann, so sind Panzenbeob- seinem Tod 1969 beibehielt. « Zum Kotzen schön », so achtungen aus dem Garten doch vielfach in seine Arbeiten Dix, sei diese Landscha, die er in den Zeiten der inne- eingeossen, wurde der Garten zum geliebten und gestalte- ren Emigration gleichwohl oder gerade deswegen immer ten Zuhause für ihn und seine Familie. -
The Museum of Modern Art 14 West 49Th Street, New York Telephone: Circle 7-7470 for Immediate Release
37917 ~ *- 7 THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART 14 WEST 49TH STREET, NEW YORK TELEPHONE: CIRCLE 7-7470 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Believing that American veterans would be interested in seeing how the World War looked tc a German veteran, the Museum of Modern Art will open Tuesday, September 21, in its tenporary galler ies at 14 West 49 Street, an exhibition of war etchings by Otto Dix. The exhibition has been arranged to coincide with the American Legion Convention the week of September 20 butwill extend for sev eral weeks longer, possibly until November 1st. The Dix etchings are from a folio of »ixty under the title Per Krieg (The War). It was not necessary for the artist totdraw on his imagination to represent war in a grimly realistic light. He needed only to transfer to copper plate the actual scenes etched on his memory by his four years on the Western Front. After the war Otto Dix became the leader of the German movement toward extreme realism. Until 1935 he was a professor of painting at the Dresden Academy. To form a contrast with the actual horrors of war which Dix reveals so realistically in his etchings, a painting, Armored ^rain by Gin© Severini, the Italian Futurist, is exhibited.' The Italian Futurists announced that war was both hygienic and beautiful. Armored Train,painted in 1915, glorifies in a semi-abstract style the exciting dynamics of war. In presenting these two diametrically opposite ideas of the same thing-—in this case, the World War—the Museum is continuing its method begun early in the summer of showing by dramatic contrast the many different points of view expressed in modern art. -
Otto Dix, Letters, Vol.1
8 Letters vol. 1 1904–1927 Translated by Mark Kanak Translation © 2016 Mark Kanak. .—ıst Contra Mundum Press Edition Otto Dix, Briefe © 2014 by 290 pp., 6x 9 in. Wienand Verlag GmbH isbn 9781940625188 First Contra Mundum Press Edition 2016. I. Dix, Otto. II. Title. All Rights Reserved under III. Kanak, Mark. International & Pan-American IV. Translator. Copyright Conventions. V. Ulrike Lorenz, Gudrun No part of this book may be Schmidt. reproduced in any form or by VI. Introduction. any electronic means, including information storage and retrieval 2016943764 systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review. Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data Dix, Otto, 1891–1969 [Briefe. English.] Letters, Vol. 1, 1904–1927 / Otto Dix; translated from the original German by Mark Kanak ToC Introduction 0–xxvii About This Edition xxviii–xlv Letters 0–215 Object Shapes Form 218–220 8 Introduction Ulrike Lorenz An Artist’s Life in Letters “I’ve never written confessions since, as closer inspection will reveal, my paintings are confessions of the sincerest kind you will find, quite a rare thing in these times.” — Otto Dix to Hans Kinkel (March 29, 1948) An Artist without Manifestœs A man of words, this letter writer never was. In re- sponse to art critic Hans Kinkel’s request to contribute to a collection of self-testimonials of German painters, Dix gruffly rebuked him, surly calling such pieces noth- ing but “vanity, subjective chatter.”1 And this in the precarious postwar situation, as the 57-year-old —.