Dada Defined

1. Introduction

Contents

Origin of the dada name

The dada revolt

World War I

Techniques

Dada poetry

Dada manifestos

Post WWI dada

Precursor

Dada was a Western European artistic and literary movement (1916-23) that sought the discovery of authentic reality through the abolition of traditional culture and aesthetic forms.

Dada (French: ‘hobbyhorse’), nihilistic movement in the arts that flourished primarily in Zürich, New York City, Berlin, Cologne, Paris, and Hannover, Germany in the early 20th century.

[‘Nihilism’ is an important concept in understanding dada. It refers to the belief that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated. It is often associated with extreme pessimism and a radical scepticism that condemns existence. A true nihilist would believe in nothing, have no loyalties, and no purpose other than, perhaps, an impulse to destroy. See Internet Encyclopaedia of Philosophy.]

Dada was an avant-garde artistic and literary movement that represented a widespread nihilistic protest against all aspects of bourgeois culture, especially against militarism during and after World War I (1914-1918). According to one version, the Romanian born poet, essayist and editor Tristan Tzara selected the name ‘dada’ at random from a dictionary. The word ‘dada’ is French for ‘hobbyhorse.’ The nonsensical, childish nature of this name appeared to fit the mood of the movement.

Dada was founded in 1916 by Tzara, the German writer Hugo Ball, the Alsatian born artist Jean Arp and other intellectuals living in Zürich, Switzerland. Because of its neutrality during the war, Switzerland was a haven for Europeans seeking refuge from the conflict.

The avant-garde (from French, ‘advance guard’ or ‘vanguard’, literally ‘fore-guard’) refers to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture and politics. The avant-garde pushes the boundaries of what is accepted as the norm or the status quo, primarily in the cultural realm. (Wikipedia)

Hans Arp, Tristan Tzara and Hans Richter in Zurich (1917)

A similar revolt against conventional art, predating Zürich dada, was occurring independently in New York City, led by Marcel Duchamp, Francis Picabia and Man Ray; and in Paris where it became the inspiration for the surrealism movement in the early 1920s. After World War I the movement spread to Germany and many of the Zürich group joined the French dadaists in Paris.

Each of these groups manifested the Dada spirit in different ways and there was no unifying ‘style’ as in, for example, cubism. Dada was an attitude, a state of mind.

The Paris group continued after the other groups disintegrated until dada finally ended in 1922.

Warning! This video has sound.

Consider others in your vicinity.

Video will open in your internet browser.

Dada introduction

If you are connected to the internet click on the picture above to view a YouTube video for a brief introduction to dada presented by some of the dada artists.

Origin of the dada name

The origin of the name ‘dada’ is not certain but various members of the movement have given different versions.

The most widely accepted account is that the name was adopted at Hugo Ball’s Cabaret (Café) Voltaire, in Zürich during one of the meetings held in 1916 by a group of young artists and war resisters that included Jean Arp, Richard Huelsenbeck, Tristan Tzara, Marcel Janco and Emmy Hennings. A paper knife inserted into a French-German dictionary pointed to the word ‘dada’ and this word was seized upon by the group as appropriate for their anti aesthetic creations and protest activities, which were engendered by disgust for bourgeois values and despair over World War I. The word ‘dada’ is French for a child’s rocking horse or hobbyhorse. Ball noted in his diary, ‘For Germans it is a sign of foolish naiveté, joy in procreation, and preoccupation with the baby carriage.'

Another explanation is the repeated use of ‘yes, yes’ by the Romanians (‘da, da’), which became the nickname patrons used for the group. Whatever the source, dada became the mocking symbol for the attack on the establishment art world and the bourgeois culture that spawned it.

The dada revolt

Dada was a revolt against traditional art, literature and the culture of the society that had created the horrors of World War One. Dada can be seen as a set of theories and experimental acts that investigated the fundamental premises of art. Because western civilisation and its products were considered as discredited, invalid or suspect the dadaists attempted to destroy existing cultural practices and undermine public complacency. At the same time they attempted to produce new art forms based on raw, elemental foundations, free of the corrupt historical baggage that underlay existing culture.

The dada spirit of revolt arose independently in two neutral countries. In 1916 Zürich and New York were the centres and from these it spread to other cities as the war wound down. The dadaists used satire, humour and a sacrilegious or irreverent attitude to art, religion, technology and the bourgeoisie. They adopted totally revolutionary and experimental approaches to making art.

Dada was one of the most innovative art movements of modern times. The ideas generated by the dadaists were more important than the art works produced. It was the outcome of negative, nihilistic and pessimistic responses to the values that resulted in the war and of the society that had created it.

The dada movement was a response to the breakdown of western culture and the destruction of faith in all its institutions, even of human endeavour and capacity. Art, language, science, human emotion, religion, etc., were all discredited in the dadaists’ view. Its radical nihilism even turned on itself through self directed attacks and repudiations. Dadaists preached and created art that retaliated against the terrible folly of World War I and western civilisation. They had unconventional public demonstrations and exhibitions of work that made people stand up and take notice. They deliberately provoked a strong emotional response, even outrage. Dada mocked, ranted and railed against conventional societal values, repudiating the status quo and defying authority. Dada was a creative attempt to function in a state of anarchy.

Anarchy: a state of disorder due to absence or nonrecognition of authority or other controlling systems. (Wikipedia)

Nothing was sacred. Everything was grist for the mill for dada questioning and ridicule. Common objects, normally taken for granted, were often praised as artistic triumphs and practically worshipped, before being ripped to shreds and stomped on before a live audience of confused and bewildered people. Artists such as Man Ray, Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp and Hans Arp moulded and shaped dada into something quite perversely erotic. Even the profound human experience of romantic love was reduced to mechanical function.

Sometimes dada artists would create a situation in which they did not themselves make art, but instigated art in the audience. A bonfire of all the art created that night might be an example. Artists, after allegedly slaving over grandiose works of art and presenting them to the audience, would start a large fire and throw their works of art into the fire, just to see the audience reaction, if any. Spontaneity, improvisation and chance were highly regarded. Dada artists would break barriers by acting first and thinking later, taking their audience hostage or threatening to mow them down with farming equipment, for example.

Censorship was forbidden within the tenets of the movement. This produced an uncontrolled expression that spawned a plethora of new art forms and new perspectives on old artistic forms of expression. The dada movement made a profound and lasting impact but lasted only a decade or two until it metamorphosed into the slightly less unpredictable, but still perplexing, surrealist art movement.

World War I

Also referred to as the First World War or the Great War, World War I was at the time described as ‘the war to end all wars.’ The period of the war, 1914 to 1918, is one of the dates that everyone should remember as markers by which to order 20th century historical events. It must be considered an essential context for the genesis of dada.

More than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, were mobilised in one of the largest wars in history (it was the largest up to that time). Over 9 million combatants died. In the past, wars were fought by the military, which produced the overwhelming majority of casualties, but WWI was responsible for the death of 7 million civilians, including the victims of a number of genocides. This trend of militarising civilians has continued into the 21st century. The horrendous casualty rate was exacerbated by technological and industrial sophistication, and the tactical stalemate caused by trench warfare, a gruelling form of warfare in which the defender held the advantage.

WWI casualty

The war revealed the primitive, anarchic forces that underlay the veneer of civilisation. The dada artists highlighted the powerlessness of language, literature and art to represent reality because the world was so dismal and beyond the meagre capacity of culture to adequately express this condition. They found satisfaction in intellectual honesty as a means of balance between chaos and personal integrity. Tzara aimed at cosmic beauty in poetry while others tried to distinguish between a purely destructive energy in nature and a beneficial spiritual force.

The dadaists also suggested that nature only becomes demonic as a result of being repressed and unacknowledged. So the dadaists turned their backs on art as a dangerous mystification. Art came to be seen as promoting a false sense of stability by means of creating an illusion of an anthropocentric universe (anthropocentrism is the belief that human beings are the central or most significant species on the planet or the cosmos in the sense that they are considered to have a moral status or value higher than that of all other organisms – or the assessment of reality through an exclusively human perspective].

World War I was one of the most significant events in human history. It is difficult to overstate its impact on humanity in the horrific effects of suffering, devastation and despair.

Advances in technology outran obsolete military tactics developed before World War I. These technological advances had produced strong defensive systems, which out of date military tactics could not break through for most of the war. Barbed wire was a significant hindrance to massed infantry advances, while artillery, vastly more lethal than in previous conflicts, coupled with machine guns, made crossing open ground extremely difficult. Both sides failed to develop tactics