Total Expansion of the Letter: Cubism, Dada, Mallarmé The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Stark, Trevor. 2016. Total Expansion of the Letter: Cubism, Dada, Mallarmé. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:33840640 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Total Expansion of the Letter: Cubism, Dada, Mallarmé A dissertation presented by Trevor Stark to The Department of History of Art and Architecture In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of History of Art and Architecture Harvard University Cambridge, MA May 2016 © 2016 Trevor Stark All rights reserved Dissertation Advisors: Benjamin H.D. Buchloh and Maria Gough Trevor Stark Total Expansion of the Letter: Cubism, Dada, Mallarmé Abstract This dissertation, entitled “Total Expansion of the Letter: Cubism, Dada, Mallarmé,” studies the transformation of the status of language in European avant-garde art of the 1910s and 20s. This occurred both literally, in the Cubist use of newspaper as a radical new material for art and in the Dadaist fragmentation of words, and figuratively, in a broader sense shared by artists and writers of the indeterminacy between visual and linguistic modes of signification. This dissertation addresses the long-standing polarization between social-historical and semiological approaches in the art historical literature on this topic by tracing the genealogy of Cubist and Dadaist uses of language back to the work of the French poet Stéphane Mallarmé. Widely read and debated in artistic circles after his death in 1898, Mallarmé’s critical and poetic writing emphasized the contingent link between the materiality of language and its semantic function in order to demonstrate the centrality of chance in the word and the world. Mallarmé’s skeptical analysis of communication, and his utopian vision of a new social role for poetry, lent his writings a fiercely contested importance for European avant-garde art, which I reconstruct and analyze in four case studies centering on the Cubists Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque, the founder of Dada Tristan Tzara, and the uncategorizable Marcel Duchamp. At a time when optimistic claims for the democratization of communication are pervasive, this dissertation aims to recover Mallarmé’s skeptical emphasis on interpretive opacity. This, I argue, was the contingent basis for the “total expansion of the letter,” as Mallarmé put it, into twentieth-century art. iii Table of Contents List of Illustrations v Bibliographic Note xi Acknowledgements xii Introduction In the Interregnum: Mallarmé and the Avant-Gardes 1 Chapter One Reading Lessons: Picasso’s Crisis in Cadaqués and Kahnweiler’s Semiology 20 Cadaqués and Saint Matorel 28 Mallarmé: Transposition and Structure 42 Representation and Structure Conflict: Cézannisme and Phenomenology 57 La Brisure: Cadaqués and Mallarmé 82 Writing and World History: Kahnweiler contra Mallarmé 99 Chapter Two Anonymity and Doubt: Reading the Papiers Collés with Mallarmé 113 Reading the Paper 119 Mallarmé: Anonymity, Purity and The Science of Language 128 Cubism, Industrial Color and the Rhetoric of Purity 149 Admitting Hesitation 183 Chapter Three Simultaneity and Totality: Tzara’s Scores and Mallarmé’s Livre 187 Two Dada Scores: Froid Lumière and La Fièvre du Mâle 190 Cubism, Syntax, and the Poem as Score 203 Dance-Writing 215 Le Livre and the “Simultaneous Method of Reading” 222 The Deconstruction of the Gesamtkunstwerk 229 Simultaneity against Totality 240 Chapter Four An Idle Chance: Risk, Work and Money in Marcel Duchamp’s Monte Carlo Bond 252 The Bond and the Martingale 258 Language and the Throw of the Dice: Mallarmé, Duchamp, Arensberg 276 Excursus on the Abolition of Work 306 Pricing Risk: Interest, Value, Futurity 328 Conclusion Toute révolution est un coup de dés 352 Bibliography 359 Figures 380 iv List of Illustrations Figure 0.1 Georges Braque, La Mandore, 1909-10, Oil on canvas. The Tate Gallery, London. Figure 0.2 Francis Picabia, Mouvement Dada, January-February 1919. Ink and pencil on paper, Museum of Modern Art, New York. Figure 1.1 Pablo Picasso, The Guitarist, Summer 1910, Oil on canvas, Musée national d’art moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris. Figure 1.2 Pablo Picasso, Drawing on prospectus for Saint Matorel, Summer 1910, Ink and pencil on paper, Musée Picasso—Paris. Figure 1.3 Pablo Picasso, Mademoiselle Léonie (Standing Figure), Summer-Fall 1910, Etching. Max Jacob, Saint Matorel, Paris: Henry Kahnweiler, 1911. Figure 1.4 Pablo Picasso, La Table, Summer-Fall 1910, Etching. Max Jacob, Saint Matorel, Paris: Henry Kahnweiler, 1911 Figure 1.5 Pablo Picasso, Mademoiselle Léonie dans une Chaise Longue, Summer-Fall 1910, Etching. Max Jacob, Saint Matorel, Paris: Henry Kahnweiler, 1911 Figure 1.6 Pablo Picasso, Le couvent, Summer-Fall 1910, Etching. Max Jacob, Saint Matorel, Paris: Henry Kahnweiler, 1911 Figure 1.7 Pablo Picasso, Mlle Léonie dans une chaise longue (States 1 and 2), etching. July 1910. Figure 1.8 Pablo Picasso, Woman in an Armchair, Paris, Spring 1910. Oil on canvas. National Gallery, Prague. Figure 1.9 Pablo Picasso, Portrait of Stéphane Mallarmé, 1943, published in Les Lettres, (3e année): Paris, 1948 Figure 1.10 Pablo Picasso, Portrait of Fernande Olivier, Summer 1909, Oil on canvas. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Figure 1.11 Paul Cézanne, Madame Cézanne in a Red Armchair, 1877, Oil on canvas. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Figure 1.12 Paul Cézanne, Portrait of Gustave Geffroy, 1895, Oil on canvas. Musée d’Orsay, Paris. Figure 1.13 Paul Cézanne, Bouquet of Peonies in a Green Jar, 1898, Oil on canvas. Private collection. v Figure 1.14 Pablo Picasso, Bread and Fruit Dish on a Table, winter 1908-1909, Oil on canvas. Kunstmuseum, Basel. Figure 1.15 Georges Braque, Viaduct at L’Estaque, 1908, Oil on canvas. Musée national d’art moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris. Figure 1.16 Pablo Picasso, Study for a woman resting her head, spring 1910, Charcoal and ink on page from Pan, March-April 1910. Figure 1.17 Pablo Picasso, Guitar, Sheet Music, and Glass, after November 1912, Collage, gouache, and charcoal on paper. McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX. Figure 1.18 Pablo Picasso, Mlle Léonie, spring 1910, oil on canvas. Private collection. Figure 1.19 Pablo Picasso, Mlle Léonie, spring 1910, pencil and ink. Galerie Jan Krugier, Geneva Figure 1.20 Pablo Picasso, The Dressing Table, summer-fall 1910, oil on canvas, private collection Figure 1.21. Pablo Picasso, The Dressing Table (Detail), summer-fall 1910, oil on canvas, private collection Figure 2.1 George Braque, Still Life with Clarinet, Summer-Autumn 1911, Oil on canvas, New York City: Promised gift to the Metropolitan Museum of Art Figure 2.2 Pablo Picasso, Pedestal Table, Glasses, Cups, Mandolin, Spring 1911, Oil on canvas, New York City: Promised gift to the Metropolitan Museum of Art Figure 2.3 Pablo Picasso, Man with a Hat and a Violin, After December 3rd, 1912, Pasted paper and charcoal, New York City: Metropolitan Museum of Art. Figure 2.4 Pablo Picasso, Man with a Hat and a Violin (Detail), After December 3rd, 1912, Pasted paper and charcoal, New York City: Metropolitan Museum of Art Figure 2.5 Pablo Picasso, Man with a Hat and a Violin (Detail), After December 3rd, 1912, Pasted paper and charcoal, New York City: Metropolitan Museum of Art Figure 2.6 Pablo Picasso, Glass and Bottle of Suze, After November 18, 1912, Pasted paper, gouache, and charcoal. 65.4 x 50.2 cm. St. Louis: Kemper Art Museum, Washington University Figure 2.7 Pablo Picasso, Violin, After Dec. 3, 1912, Pasted paper and charcoal. 62 x 47 cm, Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou vi Figure 2.8 Le Journal, December 3, 1912, page 1. Paris: Bibliothèque national de France. (Red and light green outlines are from the Man with Hat and Violin and Orange and yellow from Violin) Figure 2.9 Pablo Picasso, Bottle and Wine Glass on a Table, After Dec. 3, 1912. Charcoal, ink, graphite, and pasted paper, 62.5 x 47.6 cm, New York: Metropolitan Museum Figure 2.10 Pablo Picasso, Bottle and Guitar on a Table, After Dec. 3, 1912. Charcoal, ink, and pasted paper. 62 x 44 cm, Paris: Private collection Figure 2.11 Le Journal, December 3, 1912, p.1 and 2. Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France. (Dark blue outlines are from Bottle and Wine Glass on a Table and dark green outlines are from Bottle and Guitar on a Table) Figure 2.12 Pablo Picasso, Bottle, Glass and Newspaper on a Table, After Dec. 4, 1912. Charcoal and pasted papers, 62 x 48 cm, Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou Figure 2.13 Pablo Picasso, Bottle, Cup and Newspaper, After Dec. 4, 1912. Charcoal, pencil and pasted paper, 63 x 48 cm, Essen: Museum Folkwang Figure 2.14 Pablo Picasso, Note from the Sorgues Sketchbook, June-September 1912, Musée Picasso, Paris. Figure 2.15 Pablo Picasso, Landscape with Posters, Sorgues, Summer (July?) 1912, Oil on canvas, 46x61 cm, National Museum of Art, Osaka Figure 2.16 Pablo Picasso, Landscape in Céret, August 1911, Guggenheim Museum, New York City Figure 2.17 Pablo Picasso, The Scallop Shell: “Notre Avenir est dans l'Air”, May 1912, Enamel and oil on canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City Figure 2.18 Georges Braque, Violin: “Mozart Kubelick”, Spring 1912, Oil on Canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. Figure 2.19 Pablo Picasso, Violin, Wineglass, Pipe and Anchor, spring 1912, oil and Ripolin on canvas, National Gallery, Prague.