Visual Arts Subject Overview
Modernism in the visual arts is a complex term and currently the subject of much academic debate. However, this project demanded that we set boundaries…
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Eggeling, Viking (1880–1925)
Viking Eggeling, born in Lund, Sweden as the son of a music store owner, was an avant-garde painter who worked in Italy, France, Switzerland, and…
Arp, Hans/Jean (1886–1966)
Hans/Jean Arp is an Alsatian poet and artist, who was a founding member of Dada and an active participant in Constructivism and Surrealism. Arp grew…
Arensberg, Walter (1878–1954)
Walter Arensberg (April 4, 1878 to January 29, 1954) and his wife, Louise Stevens Arensberg (1879–1953), were influential patrons of the avant-garde, building a collection…
Scratch Orchestra
The Scratch Orchestra grew out of an Experimental Music class run by Cornelius Cardew at Morley College (1968–73). Though a number of people contributed towards…
Paik, Nam June (1932–2006)
Nam June Paik was a Korean-born American artist who achieved international notoriety for his destructive, neo-dada activities and visionary, esthetic experiments with electronic media. Born…
de Zayas, Marius (1880–1961)
Marius de Zayas was a Mexican caricaturist, writer, collector, dealer, and curator who formed part of the New York avant-garde, and did much to promote…
Dadaism in Film
Members of the Dada cultural and artistic movement began to experiment with film as a means to disseminate their stylistic partialities and cultural values through…
Shkurupii, Geo (1903–1937)
Ukrainian futurist poet and prose writer Shkurupii was a close collaborator of Mykhail Semenko, the founder of Ukrainian Futurism. He penned articles about Marinetti and…
Wood, Beatrice (1893–1998)
An American potter known for luster-glaze chalices and whimsical ceramic figures, Beatrice Wood was once named the “Mama of Dada.” Born on 3 March 1893…
Japanese-Korean Artistic Exchange (20th Century)
Japan was the most active among the East Asian countries in embracing Western civilization during the late 19th century. At the same time, the 500-year-old…
Semenko, Mykhail’ [Семенко, Михайль] (1892–1937)
Mykhail’ Semenko was the founder, theoretician, and major poet of the Ukrainian futurist movement, as well as the editor of the journal Nova generatsiia [New…
Cabaret Voltaire
The Cabaret Voltaire, housed within the Holländische Meierei bar at Spiegelgasse 1, in Zürich’s Niederdorf district, was the original breeding ground for the Zürich Dada…
Tati, Jacques (1907–1982)
Jacques Tati (born Jacques Tatischeff) was a French director and actor. Despite a very small output—only six feature films and three shorts—he is considered one…
Höch, Hannah (1889–1978)
Hannah Höch was a German painter and photomontagist who also worked in modern domestic handicraft, fabric and fashion design. She is primarily known for the…
Cravan, Arthur (1887–1918)
Born Fabian Avernius Lloyd in Lausanne, Switzerland to expatriate English parents, Arthur Cravan was a self-styled ‘poet-pugilist,’ nephew of Oscar Wilde, and husband of British…
Aragon, Louis (1897–1982)
French author Louis Aragon was a member of the surrealist movement until he split with André Breton and began to devote more of his energy…
Loy, Mina (1882–1966)
Mina Loy, born Mina Gertrude Lowry, (1882–1966), was a British artist, designer, model, novelist, nurse, playwright and poet, with ties to the Dadaist, Futurist and…
Cunard, Nancy (1896–1965)
A poet, journalist, publisher, radical intellectual, and political activist, Nancy Cunard operated at or near the centre of multiple modernist discourses. Her early poetry, especially…
Burroughs, William S. (1914–1997)
Born in St. Louis, Missouri, William S. Burroughs was a major figure of the Beat Generation. He is known primarily for his controversial novel Naked…
Segal, Arthur (1875–1944)
Arthur Segal was a Romanian artist born as Aron Sigalu to Jewish parents. He shifted his attention away from post-impressionist modernism around 1900 to focus…
Man Ray (1890-1976)
Born Emmanuel Radnitzky, Man Ray was one of the key innovators in modernist photography, film, and object making. He began his artistic career as a…
Ball, Hugo (1886–1927)
Born in Pirmasens on February 22, 1886, the German writer Hugo Ball is best known as the co-founder, with Tristan Tzara, of the Cabaret Voltaire…
Avant-garde
The term “avant-garde” has a double meaning, denoting first, the historical movements that started in the late nineteenth century and ended in the 1920s and…
Duchamp, Marcel (1887-1968)
Duchamp was one of the most influential and original artists of the 20th century. He rejected the constraints of painting and believed (both as an…