Art History

Art History

Further research into Cabaret Voltaire and the origins of Dadaism

20/09/15

The beginnings of World War 1:

June 28, 1914: Francis Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian throne was assassinated by a Serbian Nationalist

July 28, 1914: Austria-Hungary declared was on Serbia

August 1, 1914: Germany declared war on Russia

August 3, 1914: Austria and Germany declared war on France.

Britain declared war on Germany after they drove through neutral Belgium.

The United States and Switzerland remained neutral

Within 1 month of fighting, there were over 1 million deaths.

People realized that it wasn't going to be a dramatic event that was going to solve political and territorial issues.

Switzerland, because of it's proximity, was a popular destination for people that were fleeing the conflict, in particular, the German speaking city of Zurich.

Hugo ball and Emmy Hennings were refugees and were trying to make a living by opening a cabaret. They finally achieved this by persuading the owner of the Cafe Meirerei to rent them a room, while saying that they would bring more sales in sausages and beer. It was a room at the back of the Cafe. 

Cabaret Voltaire was named after the French enlightenment philosopher and author so as to avoid any Germanic associations with the club. The name was chosen partly for this reason but also because og the values he represented.

On the 5th of Febuary, 1916, two weeks before Germany launched their offensive attack, Cabaret Voltaire was opened. 

Hugo Ball was a pianist, and his wife, Emmy Hennings, was a dancer and singer, and was also the star attraction.
The Cabaret started using shock tactics to draw in the customers, and was attacking conventionalism and the Bourgeoisie. However, after some research, they realized that they too, were part of the Bourgeoisie. 

The name, Dada, has many origin stories, the most favoured being that Ball, concerned about finding a name for one of the dancers, opened a dictionary and picked a random word, which juts so happened to be 'Dada'. It sounded irrational and funny.

Dada was French for a childs Hobby Horse, and was a local shampoo product in Zurich. It was a sacred cow's tail in an African tribe, a wet nurse in some parts of Italy and a double affirmative for 'Yes yes' in Russian. None of the meanings were linked together in any way, which meant that the word could include everything and nothing all at once.

The word stood outside the language and the group stood out against the events of the day. This brought on the beginning of a movement. 

In a city of revolutionaries, anarchists, spies and draft dodgers, the Russians were the least suspected by the police, instead, the Dada's were the most suspected. 

Language was precieved as the motherlord of nature, and it determined what could and could not be said, as well as what could ad could not be done. it affected the perception of the world. Cancelling out language meant cancelling out nationalism and behaviourism. 

Language, in the mind of Hugo Ball, had been so misused and corrupted by politicians and the press, that words no longer held any meaning. His solution was to move away from the meaning of words, to the meaning of sounds. He developed a sound poem in order to free words from syntax. The highlight of Cabaret Voltaire being his performance of the sound poem 'Elephant Caravan'. For this performance, he dressed in a cubists version of a witch doctors costume, in which he could barely walk.

6 months after opening, Cabaret Voltaire closed down due to a combination of the accesses of the Cabaret crowd and the fact that the Dada's were lax in collecting entrance fee's, resulating in a lack of rent.