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FeedDada begat Merz begat Art
Friday, May 19, 2006 → by Danieru
Dada is back!
True, 'twas nonsense for art's sake which first cast Dadaism at the fore-front of modern art. Today in its historical absolution from ever arising again Dadaism to me reflects the transcendent nature of 20th Century art. Merely destroying the establishment was not enough for Dada's proponents. Duchamp, perhaps the movement's most infamous liberator of nonsense, will forever reign supreme as the leading protagonist in the saga of art's liberation. In freeing the painting from its visual shackles, in blurring the boundaries between the absurd and the usual, Duchamp managed to recast human perception as the star of creativity in all its mediums.
May nonsense live forever in Dada's wake...
Another, often unhailed, artistic hero of mine is one Kurt Schwitters. Dada was not his only playground, yet within its confines he will forever be remembered. His masterpiece medium, Merz, for me has more relevance to today's ever evolving interplay of creative simulacra than its incestuous Dada cousin. In Merz I see reflected all the implosions of popular culture which have arisen since Schwitters gave birth unto it. I see mere mortal mankind in symbiosis with its omnipotent art. I see you, and me merging through our computers into one conscious hyper-personality.
In Merz and Dada we should entrust our creative sensibilities; for theirs are the liberated worlds through which our creations may soar still...
True, 'twas nonsense for art's sake which first cast Dadaism at the fore-front of modern art. Today in its historical absolution from ever arising again Dadaism to me reflects the transcendent nature of 20th Century art. Merely destroying the establishment was not enough for Dada's proponents. Duchamp, perhaps the movement's most infamous liberator of nonsense, will forever reign supreme as the leading protagonist in the saga of art's liberation. In freeing the painting from its visual shackles, in blurring the boundaries between the absurd and the usual, Duchamp managed to recast human perception as the star of creativity in all its mediums.May nonsense live forever in Dada's wake...
Another, often unhailed, artistic hero of mine is one Kurt Schwitters. Dada was not his only playground, yet within its confines he will forever be remembered. His masterpiece medium, Merz, for me has more relevance to today's ever evolving interplay of creative simulacra than its incestuous Dada cousin. In Merz I see reflected all the implosions of popular culture which have arisen since Schwitters gave birth unto it. I see mere mortal mankind in symbiosis with its omnipotent art. I see you, and me merging through our computers into one conscious hyper-personality.In Merz and Dada we should entrust our creative sensibilities; for theirs are the liberated worlds through which our creations may soar still...
Categories: Art, Weird, History, News, Links, Simulacrum, Culture, Merz, People, Nonsense
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The good: DADA as evolutionary step, forcing Art out of the classic picture-on-canvas paradigm. Opening up new avenues and possibilities. Excitement and conceptual expansion. Humor. Intellectualism.
The bad: The acceptance and absorption of DADA into Art and the eventual "trickle-down" effect into advertising and the generalized pop landscape, rendering it powerless out of Time's context. The continuing devaluation of craft in Art in favor of the purely conceptual i.e. being obliged to read 20 paragraphs to deduce a piece's meaning instead of purely "gut" pleasure. The laxity of standards when "everything" is Art. The spread of the term Art to cover every conceivable undertaking. Intellectualism.
The ugly: A HUGE swath of the Art propped up by the institutions, collectors, auction houses, and publications as "fine" when either the artist him/herself never so much as touched the materials which went into its making or in which "concept" is lauded in the face negligent physical/emotional power. Intellectualism.
May 19, 2006 2:11 PM
I don't know how much I mourn the simulacrisation of art into the 'homogeny' of form we see today. If art is the conscious representation of our inner, human realms then so be its metamorphosis into the entire world we see around us.
I have written about this before, all be it briefly, but I do believe that art as an entire entity in itself is worth much more than the pleaaure it brings its perceiver. Future generations will stare back at our society as the simulacra of itself. Our art is our world is our copy of our world is ourselves... Such is the time we live in. Perhaps conscious recognition of this all encompassing, omnipotent creative form is what will eventually draw our disparate world cultures into one creative, hive-mind equivalent.
I'm warey of being executed up against the wall of global culture for denouncing the coming of that kind of homogeny. Homogeny and simulacra is an inevitable outcome of a global culture.
May 23, 2006 2:19 AM
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