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Compressed Utterances

Collage in a Germanic Context after 1912

by Cole Collins (Volume editor)
©2022 Edited Collection XVIII, 316 Pages
Series: German Visual Culture, Volume 12

Summary

«Compressed Utterances brings focused attention to collage in a Germanic context, whose contours and impact are still so little appreciated. As this stunning volume shows, collage serves as a key medium not only for understanding art historical developments but social and political transformations as well, often embodying the dynamic forces of avant-garde criticality.»
(Thomas O. Haakenson, Associate Professor, History of Art and
Visual Culture, California College of the Arts)
 
«A deep dive into the paradigmatic medium of the twentieth century, Compressed Utterances is the foundational text of the growing field of collage studies. The book’s established and emerging authors investigate an astonishing range of previously unknown collage work to explore German artists’ and writers’ deployment of this medium as appropriative, intertextual, alienating, and temporally slippery.»
(Elizabeth Otto, Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art,
The University at Buffalo, State University of New York)
 
Composite pictures create narratives and images from many fragments. They turn often disparate and juxtaposing images and text into a singular image or message. Collage makes from the broken and, arguably, no other country has reflected the fractious nature of its history more than Germany.
 
The collage form is one of the best expressive forms to be taken up and experimented with by German artists since 1912. Compressed Utterances: Collage in a Germanic Context after 1912 brings together essays by scholars, students and curators to examine the use of collage by German-speaking artists, making in their homeland and abroad, whose works are closely connected to the tumultuous histories of Germany and neighbouring German-speaking nations since 1912 to the late 2000s.

Table Of Contents

  • Cover
  • Title
  • Copyright
  • About the editor
  • About the book
  • This eBook can be cited
  • Contents
  • List of Illustrations
  • Acknowledgements
  • Introduction
  • Part I Collage’s Interrelations: Text, Geography and Materiality
  • City of Paper: The Materiality of Montage in Alfred Döblin’s Berlin Alexanderplatz (1929) (David Ragnar Nelson)
  • 2 ‘I Was Haunted by the Idea of Doing Something Absolute’: Hans Arp, Pioneer of Non-Objective Collage (Astrid von Asten)
  • Part II Collage and Appropriation
  • 3 Colonial Botany and the Collages of Max Ernst (Brett M. van Hoesen)
  • 4 Fossils and Clippings as Odds and Ends: Johannes Weigelt’s Elusive Photomontages in Nazi Germany (Ana María Gómez López)
  • Part III Defining and Re-Defining Collage in a Postwar Context
  • Collage as Symbolic Form: Margaret Miller, Collage and the ‘Dislocations of War’ (Adrian Sudhalter)
  • Montage Reassembled: Dada in the Postwar Archive (Michael White)
  • Part IV Collage and Corporeality
  • Cutting Across Lines: Lil Picard and the Reorienting Effects of Collage (Oona Lochner)
  • Thomas Hirschhorn and the Incommensurable Gesture (Lisa Lee)
  • Bibliography
  • Notes on Contributors
  • Index
  • Series index

←viii | ix→

Illustrations

‘“I Was Haunted by the Idea of Doing Something Absolute”: Hans Arp, Pioneer of Non-Objective Collage’ by Astrid von Asten

Figure 2.1. Hans/Jean Arp, Weiblicher Akt /Female Nude, 1911. Papier découpé, paper, graphite, 37 × 24.6 cm. Inventar-Nr.: 1976–132. © bpk / Hamburger Kunsthalle. Photo: Christoph Irrgang. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

Figure 2.2. Hans/Jean Arp, Composition abstraite / Abstract composition, 1915. Collage, paper, glued pieces of cardboard, material on card, 24 × 20 cm. Kunstmuseum Basel, Kupferstichkabinett, Schenkung Marguerite Arp-Hagenbach. Inv. 1968.481. Photo: Kunstmuseum Basel, Martin P. Bühler. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

Figure 2.3. Hans/Jean Arp, Construction élémentaire ‘selon les lois du hasard’ / Elemental Composition ‘after the laws of chance’, 1916. Collage, 40.5 × 32.5 cm. Kunstmuseum Basel, Kupferstichkabinett, Schenkung Marguerite Arp-Hagenbach 1968. Photo: Kunstmuseum Basel, Martin P. Bühler. Inv. 1968.443. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

Figure 2.4. Hans/Jean Arp, (Rectangles) Selon les lois du hasard, 1916. Collage, 25 × 12.5 cm. Kunstmuseum Basel, Kupferstichkabinett, Schenkung Marguerite Arp-Hagenbach. Photo: Kunstmuseum Basel, Martin P. Bühler. Inv. 1968.488. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

←ix | x→Figure 2.5. Hans/Jean Arp, Construction élémentaire, 1916. Collage 24.6 × 21.2 cm. Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck. Inv.-Nr. LS 233. Photo: Mick Vincenz. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

Figure 2.6. Hans/Jean Arp und Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Duo-Collage, 1918. Collage / Paper, cardboard and silver foil on card, 82 × 62 cm. Photo: Jörg P. Anders. © bpk / Nationalgalerie, SMB © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

Figure 2.7. Hans/Jean Arp, Untitled, 1933. Collage, Papiers déchirés, 30.5 × 25 cm. Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck. Inv.-Nr. LS 62. Photo: Mick Vincenz. © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

Figure 2.8. Marcel Jean, Oscar Dominguez, Hans Arp, Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Cadavre exquis, 1937. Collage, 30.6 × 23.6 cm. Stiftung Arp e.V., Berlin/Rolandswerth. Inv. – Nr. 003.525. Photo: Wolfgang Morell © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

Figure 2.9. Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Composition à cercles et demi-cercles / Composition of circles and semi-circles, 1938. Collage on cardboard, 48.5 × 65 cm. Schmidt / Weber 1938 / 18. Inv.-Nr. LS 344. Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck. Photo: Mick Vincenz.

Figure 2.10. Max Ernst, Arp (links) Pfeife rauchend, (rechts) Sophie Henriette Gertrude Taeuber mit Cape / Arp (left) smoking a pipe, (right) Sophie Henriette Gertrude Taeuber with cape, 1920. Collage mounted on cardboard, 12.0 × 11.0 auf 16.8 × 16.0 cm. © bpk / Nationalgalerie, SMB, Sammlung Scharf-Gerstenberg, Inventar-Nr.: SSG 78. Photo: Jörg P. Anders © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2022.

←x | xi→‘Colonial Botany and the Collages of Max Ernst’ by Brett M. Van Hoesen

Figure 3.1. Max Ernst, Passage aux feuilles (Leaf Landscape), 1920. Collage with gouache and ink, 21.5 × 26 cm. Private Collection. © 2022 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris.

Figure 3.2. Karl Blossfeldt, Sage, plate 48, from Working Collages, 1928. Karl Blossfeldt Archiv, Zülpich. © Karl Blossfeldt Archiv / Ann and Jürgen Wilde / Cologne, Germany / Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY.

Figure 3.3. Max Ernst, le bicyclette graminée … (The Gramineous Bicycle …), c. 1921. Gouache and ink on botanical chart with ink inscription, 74.3 × 99.7 cm. Museum of Modern Art, New York. © 2022 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris.

Figure 3.4. Illustration page from the Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon, p. 113, 1920. Collection of the author.

Figure 3.5. Max Ernst, Loplop Presenté (Loplop Presents), c. 1930. Collage, pencil and ink on paper, 63 × 49 cm. Private Collection. © 2022 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris.

Figure 3.6. Stamp page from Die Welt in Bildern (The World in Pictures), Reklame-Sammelbilder, Album 3, page 5, 1928. Collection of the author.

‘Fossils and Clippings as Odds and Ends: Johannes Weigelt’s Elusive Photomontages in Nazi Germany’ by Ana María Gómez López

←xi | xii→Figure 4.1. Photo-collage attributed to Johannes Weigelt (untitled, n.d.). Courtesy of Zentralmagazin Naturwissenschaftlicher Sammlungen at the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (henceforth ZNS, MLU-HW).

Figure 4.2. Photo-collage attributed to Johannes Weigelt (untitled, n.d.). Courtesy of ZNS, MLU-HW.

Figure 4.3. Photo-collage attributed to Johannes Weigelt (untitled, n.d.). Courtesy of ZNS, MLU-HW.

Figure 4.4. Photo-collage attributed to Johannes Weigelt (untitled, n.d.). Courtesy of ZNS, MLU-HW.

Figure 4.5. Photo-collage attributed to Johannes Weigelt (untitled, n.d.). Courtesy of ZNS, MLU-HW.

Figure 4.6. Photo-collage attributed to Johannes Weigelt (untitled, n.d.). Courtesy of ZNS, MLU-HW.

‘Collage as Symbolic Form: Margaret Miller, Collage and the “Dislocations of War”’ by Adrian Sudhalter

Figure 5.1. Soichi Sunami, photographer, Entrance to the exhibition Collage, The Museum of Modern Art, New York (21 September–5 December 1948). Photographic Archive. The Museum of Modern Art Archives, New York (IN385.1).

Figure 5.2. Soichi Sunami, photographer, Portrait of Margaret Miller, 1947 (likely taken between January and June). Gelatin silver (bromide) print, 16 × 11″ (40.5 × 28 cm). Margaret Miller Papers (Box 1), Archives and Special Collections Library, Vassar College Libraries.

Figure 5.3. Kurt Schwitters, Untitled (Inscribed: ‘For Margaret Miller’), October 1946. Cut-and-pasted papers and printed papers, 4 5/8 × 3 5/8″ (11.7 × 9.2 cm). Private collection. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn.

←xii | xiii→Figure 5.4. Raoul Hausmann, Untitled (ABCD), [1923–1924]. Cut-and-pasted printed papers and ink on paper, 16 × 11″ (40.4 × 28.2 cm). Musée National d’Art Modern, Centre Georges Pompidou. Achat 1974 (AM 1974–9). © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris.

Figure 5.5. Hannah Höch, Resignation, [1934–1938]. Cut-and-pasted printed paper on paper, 10 ¼ × 8 ¼″ (26 × 21 cm). Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn.

Figure 5.6. Hannah Höch, Grausamkeit (Cruelty), c. 1934. Dimensions unknown. Whereabouts unknown. Reproduced in: Hannah Höch. Exhibition catalogue (Berlin: Galerie Franz, 1949), [15]. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn.

Figure 5.7. Albrecht Heubner, Attention, c. 1930–1933. Cut-and-pasted printed paper on paper 15 1/8 × 13 3/4″ (38.4 × 34.9 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Acquired through Walter Gropius (SC55.1977.2).

Figure 5.8. George Grosz, The Lighthouse of Bornholm and the Floating Boatsman (or Pasted Poem), 1932 (probably summer). Cut-and-pasted printed paper, ink and graphite on paper, 23 1/8 × 17 ½″ (58.7 × 43.1 cm). Private Collection, Denver. © 2019 Estate of George Grosz / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY.

←xiii | xiv→Figure 5.9. Elizabeth Bishop, likely photographer, Margaret Miller at the Quai d’Orléans, Paris, 1937 (late September). Gelatin silver print, 2 1/2 × 3 1/2″ (6.3 × 8.8 cm). Elizabeth Bishop Papers (series XIII, f. 100.14), Archives and Special Collections Library, Vassar College Libraries.

Figure 5.10. ‘Picasso Photographed by Brassai’, in Harper’s Bazaar (February 1946), 134–5. As reproduced on the page on the right, Brassaï’s photograph of Picasso before his Women at their Toilet in his Grands-Augustins studio in 1939, was cropped and reversed.

Figure 5.11. Pablo Picasso, Women at their Toilet, tapestry design for Mme Cuttoli, 1937–1938. Gouache and printed wallpaper pasted on canvas-mounted paper, 9′ 8″ × 16′ (299 × 488 cm). Musée Picasso, Paris. © 2019 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

‘Montage Reassembled: Dada in the Postwar Archive’ by Michael White

Figure 6.1. Cover of The Sunday Times Magazine, 4 November 1973, featuring George Grosz, Self Portrait as Clown and Variety Girl, 1957. Collection of the author. © Estate of George Grosz, Princeton, NJ / DACS 2022.

Figure 6.2. Cover of Im Kampf vereint!, exhibition catalogue, Deutsche Akademie der Künste zu Berlin, 1961, featuring John Heartfield, Ob weiss, ob schwarz, im Kampf vereint gegen des Friedens Feind! Collection of the author. © The Heartfield Community of Heirs / DACS 2022.

Figure 6.3. Raoul Hausmann, Pinaltries, 1965, collage, 31 × 24 cm, Musée departmental d’art contemporain de Rochechouart. © ADAGP, Paris and DACS, London 2022.

←xiv | xv→Figure 6.4. Hannah Höch, Lebensbild, 1972–1973, collage with original photographs by Armin and Liselotte Orgel-Köhne, 130 × 150 cm, Private Collection. Courtesy Kicken Berlin. © DACS 2022.

‘Cutting Across Lines: Lil Picard and the Reorienting Effects of Collage’ by Oona Lochner

Figure 7.1. Lil Picard (with Kathy Acker), Tasting and Spitting, 1975. Performance at Mercer Street Store, 29 November 1975. Photo: Robert Parent. Lil Picard Papers, University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa City.

Figure 7.2. Lil Picard arrives in Manhattan, 1937. Photo: Henry O’Dell. Lil Picard Papers, University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa City.

Figure 7.3. Lil Picard, Hat Designs, 1940s. Magazine clippings. Lil Picard Papers, University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa City.

Figure 7.4. Lil Picard, Assemblage with announcement for opening of ‘Custom Hat Box (directed by Lil Picard)’ at Bloomingdale’s, New York, 1942. Lil Picard Collection, University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City.

Figure 7.5. Lil Picard, Vin Ordinaire Chatel du Roy, 1957. Collage and oil on canvas. Lil Picard Collection, University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City.

Figure 7.6. Lil Picard, Supermag Dance, 1963. Assemblage on board. Lil Picard Collection, University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City.

Figure 7.7. Lil Picard, Performance gown for Messages, 1971. Front and back. Paint and collage on fabric. Lil Picard Collection, University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City.

←xv | xvi→‘Thomas Hirschhorn and the Incommensurable Gesture’ by Lisa Lee

Figure 8.1. Thomas Hirschhorn, Ur-Collage B XIV, 2008. Cardboard, prints, clear tape, 30 × 45.5 cm. Courtesy of the artist.

Figure 8.2. Attributed to Baccio Baldini, Judith with the Head of Holofernes, c. 1436–1487. Engraving in blue-gray on ivory laid paper, laid down on cream laid paper, 132 × 132 mm (image/inner border); 137 × 137 mm (sheet). The Art Institute of Chicago.

Figure 8.3. The Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne; left half with dancing maenads and satyrs, c. 1480–1490. Engraving. The British Museum.

Figure 8.4. Thomas Hirschhorn, Ur-Collage A 7, 2008. Cardboard, prints, clear tape, 28 × 42 cm. Courtesy of the artist.

Figure 8.5. Thomas Hirschhorn, Ur-Collage A 8, 2008. Cardboard, prints, clear tape. 27.5 × 45.5 cm. Private Collection.

Figure 8.6. Thomas Hirschhorn, Pixel-Collage N°40, 2016. Prints, clear tape, transparent sheet, 30 × 51.5 cm. Private Collection.

Figure 8.7. Thomas Hirschhorn, Pixel-Collage N°42, 2016.Prints, clear tape, transparent sheet, 362 × 730 cm. Private Collection.

Figure 8.8. Studio view, Aubervilliers, France, May 2016.

Details

Pages
XVIII, 316
Year
2022
ISBN (PDF)
9781789971736
ISBN (ePUB)
9781789971743
ISBN (MOBI)
9781789971750
ISBN (Hardcover)
9781789971729
DOI
10.3726/b15017
Language
English
Publication date
2022 (July)
Keywords
Germanic Studies art and material histories Compressed Utterances Cole Collins Collage
Published
Oxford, Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, New York, Wien, 2022. XVIII, 316 pp., 20 fig. col., 32 fig. b/w.

Biographical notes

Cole Collins (Volume editor)

Cole Collins is a researcher and lecturer at the Technische Universität München at the Chair of History and Theory of Architecture, Art and Design. He has written and researched on Kurt Schwitters, collage and gender. He is Assistant Editor for the Kurt Schwitters Society and co-convenor of the Collage Research Network. He has taught on collage, gender and queer studies in modern and contemporary art and architecture, Bauhaus, Dada, artistic manifestos, as well as on performance art, installation and dance. He has held guest lectureships at Akademie der Bildenden Künste München, Leuphana University Lüneburg, Passau University and California College of the Arts.

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