Kurt Schwitters: Color and Collage

by Isabel Schulz, Josef Helfenstein (Introduction), Leah Dickerman (Contributor)

Best known for his extraordinary abstract collages, German artist Kurt Schwitters (1887–1948) is one of the most influential figures of the international avant-garde. Emphasizing the significance of color and light in the artist’s work and delving into the relationship between collage and painting, this handsome volume accompanies the first U.S. retrospective of the artist’s oeuvre in twenty-five years. Affiliated with Dada and the Constructivist movement in the years following WWI, he coined the term “merz” to describe his ambition to “make connections, preferably between everything in the world.” Schwitters’s merz gave seemingly worthless objects of urban waste—train tickets, newspaper fragments, bits of wire—new life as compositional elements in his installations, assemblages, sculptures, and collages. Hoping to unify life and art by incorporating everyday objects into his work, this pioneer of installation art came closest to his ideal with Merzbau , a room-size walk-in sculpture constructed entirely of found materials. Alongside images and analysis of a full-scale reconstruction of Merzbau , this book includes an illustrated chronology and 90 color plates of Schwitters’s assemblages, reliefs, sculptures, and collages, with emphasis on merz works from the 1920s and 1940s. The selection not only illuminates the artist’s response to the dominant art movements of his time but also illustrates his unique composition and design. Essays by prominent scholars provide new perspective on the artist who created poetry from the commonplace.

Genres: Art

176 pages, Hardcover

First published October 26, 2010

Reviews

[Eddie Watkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

I do not know when I first became aware of Kurt Schwitters and his art but I do know that when I did I was smitten. Smitten. His vision fit my sensibility like a glove, or a mitten. Not to suggest that Schwitters is all thumbs. Not at all. He has the full-fingered touch. Like Joe Brainard long after him he knows how to (seemingly) effortlessly arrange items on a picture plane in a harmonious manner, without fussiness or sweaty labor, to create an endlessly stimulating visual object that is first and foremost beautiful. He knows how to do it just right. It doesn’t matter if the items are nondescript refuse. His touch imbues with beauty. But be he with mittens, gloves, or a hundred free fingers the Nazis successfully handcuffed him, forcing him into an exile that only ended with his death.

Kurt Schwitters gives the appearance of a radical avant-gardist, with his associations with the Dada movement, his extreme individuality, and his insistence on making art from detritus; but beneath it all his sensibility is very classical, predicated as it is on harmony and beauty; and so is an art that can be enjoyed and fully appreciated by not only scholars of art but untutored children as well. Beauty is for all, and Schwitters shows that even tea bags can make substantive and lasting art.

I was lucky enough to not only find out about this show in a chance manner while in Los Angeles, but to arrange my time such that I was able to drive up to Princeton last weekend to see it. No matter the quality of the reproductions, and the reproductions in this book are top-notch, Schwitters’ is an art that must be seen “in person” and up close for full appreciation. His is a very tactile art, and art not just of composition and colors, but of textures and depth. While gazing at these works I began to wonder how exactly he put them together. They give an improvisational impression, but as there is so much overlap of material within them I wondered not only how they possibly could’ve been pre-planned but even if improvised how they could’ve been technically executed. Well, reading this book answered my questions. From first hand reports I learned that Schwitters would mix up a paste of flour and water and swab it all over his foundation then with both hands start in on arranging his ready-at-hand materials in the sticky liquid base. It sounds so tactile and appealing that I think I’ll try the same thing at home.

But about the essay parts of this book – Dullsville for the most part. One essay on the importance of color in his collages, with multiple emphases on how he never abandoned his painterly training. One essay on how he’s a precursor to Rauschenberg, et al, even though the “establishment” has neglected to give him credit. And a final essay on his Merzbau project, which was his “live-in sculpture” constructed in two different residences, both of which were subsequently destroyed by war. Only the final essay was of any interest to me, as the first two were uninspired generic exercises in art criticism. But as I said, the reproductions are where it’s at in this book, and as always I enjoyed the illustrated artist’s timeline at the back of this well-made art book.

Which brings me to possibly the most interesting aspect of the show – a reconstruction, from period photographs of Schwitter’s German Merzbau. This was a sculptural room which visitors were allowed to walk into and linger in and which replicated to a T the very room that Schwitters worked and lived in and which he considered to be his magnum opus. It was a wonderful space, with twisting slender white “cubistic” pillars ascending all around creating the feel of a non-Euclidean space, and while in it I could feel my mind contracting within itself and then expanding into that inner space where all things of wonder originate.

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Large and lovely book brought to us by the awesome folks at Houston's Menil Foundation. There are over a hundred color pics that make you want to cut out and frame them (though I can't--this is a library book!). The essays and the timeline of his life in back are really interesting and engaging, especially if you're not familiar with every aspect of his unpredictable creativity. It's a shame that he did not make it to America before he died (his first US show of his collages art was eleven days after his death), but it's very fortunate that his work has gained a nice fanbase in the years since. I love how his collage work blends a scrappy chaos and an elegant balance. I hope to see it up close someday.