Reed as always enjoyed your note!
The best book I think re Dada other than the Motherwell edited DADA
PAINTERS AND POETS
is the one by Hans Richter
DADA ART AND ANTI-ART
I'll check out the Caws
(crows outside the window cawing right/write now)
but the best thing is to go the source--
once saw a Dada show at the ICA in Boston and what really was striking
was how small so many of the works are.
Like little bombs!
I think one of the most admirable aspects of Dada was that while
international in scope--it had a unique local characteristic in each
site it became manifest.
It pioneered that sense of think globally act locally!
I made up for a 15 pp. visual poetry book of mine in Roman and Cyrillic
alphabets published in a Russian journal a tribute name: ZA DA-
for Zaum of Russian Futurism and Dada--
Za in Russian means beyond--and Da means yes--
in German, "da" means --there--
so it has doubled meanings--beyond yes, beyond there--
I actually have a stack of those journals you mention--found at a book
sale at
--of course! The local university!
It is odd to read of Dada in academic terms--
Actually in an odd way I find it a kind of Dada joke!
Dada was the most profound expression of a time of destruction--
Gallows humor! A cheerful nihilism--and a deep rage--
Dada is HEALTHY! I think that is part of the gallows humor--
Academic writing on it--can not express this--as you note--
Dada was at once--and still is--explosive in its rejection of all that is
a
sham in the world--and an embrace of all that is joyful.
From the Dada journal Die freie Strasse, Berlin, 1918, by
Johannes Baader, Oberdada:
"A Dadaist is a person who loves life in all its uncountable forms, and
who knows,
and says that "life is not here alone, but there, there, there (da, da,
da)."
--
onwo/ards!
ZA DA!
david baptiste
