Visual Phenomena

Marcel Duchamp was the man of many techniques.  Although he is not he only Dada artist who seemed to move from technique to technique, the pieces he presented in each style were such radical compositions.  So overall he is covered through multiple areas of study.  He did play in different outputs, sometimes even collaborating with other artists.  One of his closest colleagues, Man Ray, who was developing in the world of photography and film, worked with him on his workings of Kinetic art.

Rotative plaques verre, optique de précision

Man Ray and Marcel Duchamp 1920

Kinetic Art is art that contains movement in order to have an effect.  These moving parts are operated in various ways.  The first object of kinetic art is considered the Bicycle Wheel (1913) by Duchamp. (This object was also the first ready-made.)  In this case, the movement was controlled by the viewer.  One could spin the wheel, gazing through.  Currently in its location in the MoMA, touching the piece is forbidden, taking away one of the most important elements Duchamp wanted to create with it.


In 1920, he began working with Man Ray, creating a motorized example of kinetic art titled Rotative plaques verre, optique de précision.  This was a sculpture that involved a rectangular support of glass that was painted the segments of the circle.  The motor spun the glass creating an optical illusion.  Duchamp referred to this illusion as a visual phenomena.  

Wings to the Heavens David Ascalon 2008


This first example of kinetic art went on to influence many movements that followed Dada.  In the 1960's-70's different artists began to experiment with different sculptures that involved movement.  Some of these came in the form of mobiles, like those of Alexander Calder in the late 1950's, and even more recent mobiles being installed in 2008 by David Ascalon.  The mobiles are an example of an evolution in the field of kinetic art.  


Artists also began to play around with light and movement, being called Lumino kinetic art.  Light plays an important role in the way that the movements create different illusions.  This is seen as an example of art that has embraced the technological age that grew in the 20th century.  

Links Between

Dadaism is all about links.  The movement grew through links between various artists.  These artists, all who had by chance assembled in one location initially beginning the moment of Dada, were always moving around.  The distance in which they relocated varied from artists to artist.  Some remained in their home country after Zurich, while others crossed the Atlantic and made their way in to the art world beginning to surface on American soil.  The one thing that each and every one of these artists maintained is contact with multiple artists from around the western world.

Nowadays, most careers come through connections that you have with various people.  This was almost the same in the lives of Dadaists, but it was more in terms of learning rather than getting a high paying job.  They wrote between each other constantly, talking about different ideas they had, and discussing what was going on around them.  Although they varied in location, the artists were all facing chaos in their everyday lives.  They were searching for escape.  

These links that they created led to many collaborative works, like the Francis Picabia piece L'oeil cacodylate, or the later work The Reunion, between John Cage and Marcel Duchamp.  These links were an important aspect to the short-lived movement we call Dada.  

The Dada artists did not limit the communications to simply just Dadaists, but they interacted with multiple other artists that were involved in various movements.  That is why we see an integration of games that the Surrealists used.  

Last week, we played a game that I am going to refer to as a game of links.  The object is to have two nouns, one at the beginning and one at the end.  Between these two nouns on paper is 6 lines.  The point is to start with the first noun, and create 6 levels of connections to link it to the end word.  The links can rhyme, be a synonym, or any link your mind creates.  For example:  I flipped through a biography I was reading on Marcel Duchamp by Calvin Tomkins, and chose two nouns at on two random pages, Draw and Inscription.  Although these two are very similar my links went like this: Draw, Saw, Wood, Forest, Height, Kite, Paper, Inscription.  

To offer an alternate way to see different links, write down 6 different nouns on a sheet of paper, and have another person create the links between them. This way is a little bit harder, causing the mind to have to step even further out of the box in order to find some connection.  Graziano chose to write: Pizza, Pharmacy, Glass, Concept, Farewell, Stone.  And the connections went something like this: Pizza (store) Pharmacy (see) Glass (Duchamp/art) Concept (leave) Farewell (death) Stone.

Now, if someone else was given these set of words, they would see different connections, and the same goes for the first process. 

The purpose of this is that it shows there are always links around us.  Everything is linked in some way.

Now...what exactly does this have to do with Dada and what I was writing about before??? Let's see. 

Dada art was being created by chance, opposition to the world, dissatisfaction with the production of art objects in the early 20th century.  It is the art of randomness, of freedom, and people associate those two things with separation when in reality the world is about links.  The Dadaists created because they were linked to the other movements, and did not necessarily want to follow the guidelines that were set.  And this variation of links that each artist obtained did not just disintegrate when the Cabaret Voltaire began and the artists associated themselves to this "anti-art".  Links are eternal, and never ending.