1916. You’re walking down the busy Limmatquai street in Zurich, Switzerland. Snow-tipped mountains on a cerulean-blue horizon sparkle in your peripheral, a glistening river guides your path, and, amongst the splendour, a small innocuous sign reads “Cabaret Voltaire.” Inside a candle lit back-room, a crowd intently watches a man solemnly recite gibberish in a cubist cardboard costume. The kind of costume a magical shaman would wear but with a very tall pointy hat. The man the crowd watches is Hugo Ball, and this awfully fantastic place would preface one of the most influential art movements in the world: Dadaism.
The original Cabaret Voltaire (not Edinburgh’s much loved one) was created by exiled refugee couple Emmy Hemmings and Hugo Ball who, fleeing World War 2, settled in neutral Switzerland. In search of a home where they could peacefully protest the war’s “senselessness” – which Ball described facetiously as “civilised carnage” – they found refuge in the backrooms of a dark cabaret in Zurich, and there, Dadaism was born. Not simply an art movement, but a philosophy,
Dadaism is a rejection of societal standards, of the Nazi regime, of art itself. The manifesto included three key principles: spontaneity, negation, Absurdity which were expressed not just through art but small theatre productions, spoken poetry and sculpture. Dada wanted to shock. And it did. The Nazi’s despised it, deeming Dada ‘degenerate’ with many of its paintings featuring in the Degenerate Art Exhibition of 1937. Some of the most prolific Dadaists included Hannah Höch, Max Ernst, Kurt Schwitters and Marcel Duchamp.
If you ever happen to visit Switzerland’s largest museum, The Kunsthaus, their Dada exhibition is on permanent display. Included is a projected video, black and white, of cylinders unfolding slowly as flashes of light dance across a dissolving dark background and objects continue to move and contort; sometimes words without meaning slide across your vision. Among the strange paintings are absurd sculptures, and around the corner paintings highly influenced by Dadaism by Salvador Dali and Pablo Picasso.
Dada’s anti-art movement even made art from the destruction of art, and it was this absurd, brilliantly contrarian concept that created ‘The Collage.’ It began from mundane papers when Kurt Schwitters ripped up ‘Kommerz’ (ads), or ticket stubs, and called the practice ‘Merz’ (slang for Kommerz). In Dada philosophy, art wasn’t for the eye, but the mind. It, like collage itself, ripped to pieces what was considered mundane and forced a new perspective on its viewers. As odd as it sounds, Dada is art that doesn’t concern itself with visual appeal. What a paradox, you exclaim, art that doesn’t concern itself with beauty?! Now you understand Dada.
Visit Cabaret today, where the historic bar still stands 110 years later. See the cryptic posters on how to use Taiwanese Romanisation to create messages AI can’t understand. Dada will continue to live as long as corruption does.
Collage created from Dada art photos taken at Kunsthaus and Cabaret Voltaire, Zurich by Isabella Daniels for The Student
