I'm going to tell you two Dada stories and one banjo story.
Dada 1) Jokes on us.
One of the lasting legacies of Dada is the "readymade" or a "found art object" that is re-appropriated to a museum setting. This usually inspires people to be offended and ask this is art? Well, that is the question. Marcel Duchamp's work makes it in all the textbooks, and would probably be on the cover, if it were a little more aesthetically pleasing. But, I don't think "pretty" was Duchamp's intent. He purchased a urinal in 1917, signed it under a false name and put it in an art show. And the rest is history, I suppose, since we're still debating the issue of "is this art?" a century later. Most of Duchamp's readymades were lost, basically because no one cared--it was a urinal, after all. It was a statement (like wearing a cape to junior high). Most of Duchamps readymades were reconstructed in the 1950s (mainly by other people) and that is what we have in museums today. The only readymade that survived--an "original" oooooohhhh--was this perfume bottle. Duchamp put a photo of himself dressed in drag as the spokes...person (couldn't say man there) on a bottle that he bought at a department store.
Because this image was an "original" it sold for $11,000,000. Eleven. Million. Dollars. I think this would have made Duchamp cry with laughter and yell "sucker" at our silly ideas of authorship and "originals." I think he would have probably had a merry cry and then made about a hundred more readymades and guarded them closely. "This urinal is going to be very valuable one day," he could have said. What a trickster.
Dada 2) Barroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven
Other people participated in nonsensical art in the Dada movement, but the poet Barroness lived nonsense, proudly. She got around, marrying a few times. I think she married a German Barron, just for the title. Can't blame her--picture this: Duchess Sarah. She fashioned all her own clothing from things picked up on the street, shop-lifted from department stores or garbage. She once showed up for a portrait wearing a tomato soup can bra and black lipstick. My favorite outfit had a birdcage complete with live canary. She also aggressively pursued Duchamp, writing poetry about his body, etc, to the point that Duchamp was completely frightened of her and declared that it was a relief to leave New York sometimes to get away from her brazen advances. So, here's to you Baroness, for tricking the trickster and walking the walk.
Banjos 3)
Every Friday at noon, about twenty people assemble in an empty classroom down the hall from my office and rock out. It's an all-banjo jam session. I have no idea who these people are, but I'm so happy that this happens. They're not young banjo-ists, so they very well may be professors. I hope so.
"Would you like to have lunch on Friday, Tom."
"Sorry I can't; I know a lot of people who play the banjo and we play together in a random room in the art building every Friday."
This post is a little odd, I know. But so is Dada and banjo club.
1 comment:
Here's to the Barroness! As long as it's not a meat dress I love seeing funky fashion statements.
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