Art100 Assignments Attached

Myths and Misconceptions: Photography and Painting in the Nineteenth Century Author(s): Hans Rooseboom and John Rudge Source: Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art, Vol. 32, No. 4 (2006), pp. 291-313 Published by: Stichting Nederlandse Kunsthistorische Publicaties Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20355339 Accessed: 21-02-2018 22:00 UTC

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide

range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and

facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at

http://about.jstor.org/terms

Stichting Nederlandse Kunsthistorische Publicaties is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

291

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century*

Hans Rooseboom

Since the history of Dutch photography in the nine teenth century became the subject of academic research about 35 years ago, attention has concentrated on indi vidual photographers and their work. Little has been published on more general topics such as their financial position, the status of the profession, the organization of the studios, the clients, prices and the number of pho tographers. Indeed, these aspects have received scant scrutiny. As a result there is no shortage of clich?s and lazy assumptions in the literature on the history of pho tography. One example is the supposedly deadly effect on painting of competition from photography. Modern art-historical literature clings to this notion too. There is also more to be said than is generally acknowledged about photography's lack of artistic status in the nine teenth century. This article takes a critical look at two id?es fixes to see whether there are contemporary sources that confirm, undermine or qualify them.

THE MYTH OF THE SUFFERING ARTIST: THE SUPPOSED competition from photography In the nine teenth century, just as in earlier times, artists were sometimes forced to resort to one or more sidelines to

make a living (fig. i). This was especially true of those not in the first rank. According to the prevailing view, it was photography that prevented many an artist from obtaining enough income from the sale of his work. This supposedly objectionable role did little to improve the status of the profession. It is so established that it also crops up in the kind of popular literature that likes to keep matters uncomplicated. Karin Braamhorst, for example, wrote: "When photography had just been invented, many artists saw it as a threat to their crafts

manship. This new medium was so exact in its representation of reality that established artists were afraid of being made redundant."1 No further explana

i Leonard de Koningh, Self-portrait as a painter, 1864-73, carte-de-visite, albumen print. Amster

dam, Rijksmuseum, Rijksprentenkabinet

* This article, which was translated from the Dutch by John Rudge, is based on two chapters in my 2006 dissertation, De schaduw van defo tograaf, positie en status van een nieuw beroep: fotograf?e in Nederland, i8jg-i88g, which was published in a trade edition in 2008.

1 K. Braamhorst, Nederland in de negentiende eeuw. Lexicon, Arn hem 2006, p. 96: "Toen de fotograf?e net was uitgevonden, zagen veel kunstenaars dat als een bedreiging voor hun vakmanschap. Dit nieuwe medium was zo precies in de weergave van de werkelijkheid dat geves tigde kunstenaars bang waren overbodig te worden."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

2?2 HANS ROOSEBOOM

tion or qualification was deemed necessary. This notion has also long been widespread in the serious literature

?both Dutch and foreign?on the history of photo graphy and art. Painters of portrait miniatures, in par ticular, are said to have suffered severely and often to have been forced to seek work coloring photographs.2

In the literature on portrait miniatures, photography is regularly cited as the cause of the decline of the minia ture in the course of the nineteenth century. A 1910 ex hibition catalogue stated that: "The great majority of the miniatures submitted date from the second half of

the eighteenth and first half of the nineteenth century.

After that, Daguerre's invention gave a formidable blow to the painting of miniatures from which it has not yet recovered. It seems to us, however, that in other ways,

too, photography is an obstacle to a healthy revival of art."3 This last remark was not further explained.

The early history of the portrait miniature?thus from the sixteenth century?is generally treated at length in the literature, whereas the nineteenth century

must make do with considerably less attention. The in famous role supposedly played by photography in the nineteenth century is usually dealt with in a single pas sage, sometimes in just a single sentence: there is evi dently no room for doubt.4 Such brevity makes it easy for a clich? to persist.

Remarks can certainly be found in nineteenth-centu ry Dutch periodicals pointing out that painters faced competition from photography. So the views discussed above were not completely baseless (and while the por trait miniature did not disappear entirely, it was undeni

ably relegated to the sidelines). In the spring of 1839, when the first reports about photography were pub lished, although hardly anyone knew exactly what they implied, the Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode published a letter from a certain C. referring to "an invention...

which could cause some alarm to our Dutch painters. A method has been found whereby sunlight itself is elevat ed to the rank of drawing master, and faithful depictions of nature are made the work of a few minutes."5 But this

was only a prediction, not an observation of a fact. The same applies to a poem of 1840 by J.F. Bosdijk, and to three reports in the Algemene Konst- en Letterbode, Het Leeskabinet (both in 1839) and the Kunstkronijk of 1844 45.6 While this evidence all comes from the early days of photography, one comment is known from a later phase, 1874, in which the recently deceased painter and pho tographer C.H. van Amerom is mourned by Alexander Ver Huell: "The man had a good living as a portrait painter, but two things brought him to the edge of poverty: his marriage, blessed (?) with a pack of chil dren, and secondly photography."7 In i860, when he had just taken up photography, van Amerom himself complained about his financial position in a letter. The new profession offered little consolation and even took him from bad to worse because he was left with hardly any time in which to earn something by painting? but he did not make photography the scapegoat.8 Ver HuelPs comment may perhaps be seen as an early exam ple of an assumption that has since become a persistent clich?.

Perhaps there are other, similar contemporary state

2 See, for example, A. Staring, "Het portretminiatuur in Neder land," Oude Kunst: een Maandschrift voor Verzamelaars en Kunstzinni

gen 4 (1918-19), pp. 204, 225; L.R. Schidlof, The miniature in Europe in the 16th, 17th, 18th and igth centuries, 4 vols., Graz 1964, vol. 1, pp. 3-4;

A. Scharf, Art and photography, Harmondsworth 1986, pp. 42-43, 45 46; M. Thijssen, "De Maatschappij Arti et Amicitiae 1839-1870: over het ontstaan en de betekenis van een kunstenaarsvereniging in de ne gentiende eeuw," Kunst en Be leid in Nederland 2 (1986), pp. 65-66; K. Henninger-Tavcar, Miniatur Portr?ts: die pers?nlichsten Zeugen der Kunstgeschichte, Karlsruhe 1995, p. 24; H. Wierts, Photographie?n & dynastie?n: beroepsfotografie in Groningen 1842-^40, Groningen & Bedum20oo, p. 12.

3 Exhib. cat. Catalogus der tentoonstelling vanportretminiaturen, Rot terdam 1910, p. iv: "De overgroote meerderheid der ingezonden

miniaturen behoort in de tweede helft der achttiende en in de eerste

helft der negentiende eeuw. Daarna heeft Daguerre's uitvinding de beoefening der miniatuur-schilderkunst een gevoeligen knak gegeven, die zij nog niet te boven is gekomen. Het komt ons echter voor, dat de

photograf?e ook op andere wijze een gezonde herleving dier kunst in den weg Staat."

4 See note 2. 5 Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode voor hetjaar i8jg, vol. i, p. 138:

"...eene Uitvinding..., die onzen Nederlandschen Schilders eene soort van schrik zou kunnen aanjagen. Men heeft er het middel gevonden, om het Zonlicht zelf tot den rang van Teekenmeester te verheffen, en de getrouwe afbeeldingen der Natuur tot het werk van weinige minuten te maken."

6 J.F. Bosdijk, De Spiegel der natuur of de Daguerrotype, Utrecht 1840; Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode voor hetjaar 18j?, vol. 1, p. 360;

Het Leeskabinet 1839, vol. 2, p. 93; Kunstkronijk 5 (1844-45), p. 28. 7 A. van Heijningen-de Zoete, Het memorie-boek van C.H. van

Amerom, unpublished thesis, Leiden 1987, p. 31: "De man had als portretschilder goed zijn bestaan?maar twee zaken, bragten hem tot op de grens van armoede?zijn huwelijk, gezegend (?) met een troep kinderen en 2e de photographic"

8 Ibid., p. 29.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 293

ments, but I do not know of any. In the recent studies of

Dutch painters in the first and second half of the nine teenth century by Annemieke Hoogenboom and Chris Stolwijk respectively, in which ample attention is paid to their economic situation, there is no reference at all to

photography as a competitor.9 Nor is photography cited in A.B. Loosjes-Terpstra's Moderne kunst in Nederland, igoo-igi4.

Concrete evidence that photography presented the existing arts with serious competition is evidently sparse and not easily tracked down. There are also other voices signaling the opposite, and they are more numerous. One of the most telling views, especially in the light of the above, was expressed by Dr D. (probably H.M. Du parc) in an article published in the journal Onze Tijd in 1855: "As is the case with all inventions, people have quickly got used to the wonders of photography. In deed, after the initial enthusiasm passed, it was even said that this remarkable discovery would be the death of art; but experience shows that it marks the breaking of a new dawn for art by producing a different, unex pected outcome each day."10 The Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode, from which we have already taken two quo tations pointing to the possibility of photography com peting with painting, sometimes maintained the oppo site view. In the 1856 volume, for instance, we read: "...yet as long as painting and copying continue to be distinct from each other, art need not fear her proud ri val."11

Nor do artists' letters provide much support for the notion that the arts suffered economically because of photography. In 1858, JJ.G. van Wicheren wrote to Christiaan Kramm, author of a biographical dictionary

of artists, that after the death of his father in 1839?tne year in which photography was introduced?he had stayed in Leeuwarden and "had the privilege of always having work in my occupation as a portrait painter be cause there were enough commissions."12 In 1865, when there seems to have been a "boom" in portrait photogra phy, Lou wrens Hanedoes wrote to the artist J.D. Kruseman: "As for my work I can say little more than that I am always very busy, sales are slack, the feeling for

art in this country is stifled firstly by the government and principally by the insane luxury people have these days. Things look dismal, and the number of artists shrinks by the day, many become photographers, draw ing teachers, and so on, while a few move to America or France."13 Interestingly, Hanedoes blames other fac tors, not photography, for the slack market. Photogra phy was at best a refuge, a much needed source of extra income for those who could not live from their art, and

might therefore be equated with giving drawing lessons. There are letters from before 1839, when the inven

tion of photography was announced, in which artists be wail their lot. In 1835 Marinus Jacobus Stucki, who had just been appointed town draftsman in Alkmaar, wrote to his former teacher Kramm that he was doing quite well, but only earning just enough: "There's no one here prepared to pay a guilder for a lesson, at most 8 or 10 stuivers, and that is often still too much, which is

why I decided to establish a private school at home, which is presently used by 12 pupils." The love of art in Alkmaar was "feeble," Stucki also observed: people pre ferred dancing and singing. Well-off burghers did not have their children take drawing lessons, and patrician families, who were more inclined to do that, were few

9 A. Hoogenboom, De stand des kunstenaars: de positie van kunst schilders in Nederland in de eerste helft van de negentiende eeuw, Leiden 1993, and C. Stolwijk, Uit de schilderswereld: Nederlandse kunstschilders in de tweede helft van de negentiende eeuw, Leiden 1998.

10 Onze Tijd 15 (1855), p. 41: "Gelijk bij alle uitvindingen het geval is, zoo heeft men zieh 00k spoedig aan de wonderen der photographie gewend. Ja, nadat het eerste oogenblik van geestdrift voorbij was, heeft men zelfs beweerd, dat deze bewonderenswaardige ontdekking voor de kunst noodlottig zoude zijn; de ondervinding bewijst daarentegen, dat zij voor haar een nieuwen dageraad doet aanbreken, door iederen dag eene andere on ver wachte uitkomst op te leveren."

11 Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode 68 (1856), p. 31: "...zoo lang echter schilderen en nabootsen nog van elkander onderscheiden blij ven, behoeft de kunst hare fiere mededingster niet te vreezen."

12 Rijksprentenkabinet, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, collection of artists' letters, letter from J.J.G. van Wicheren to Christiaan Kramm, 16 May 1858: "...het voorregt [had], om in mijne betrekking als Portretschilder altijd werkzaam te kunnen zijn, door genoegz?me aan vragen."

13 The Hague City Archives, collection of artists' letters, ov 2, let ter from L. Hanedoes to J.D. Kruseman, October 1865: "Over mijn werk kan ik weinig meer mededeelen, dan dat ik altijd druk bezig ben, het verkoopen gaat slap, de kunstzin hier te lande wordt gesmoord eerstens door het Gouvernement en voornamelijk door de dwaze luxe die de menschen tegenwoordig hebben. Het ziet er treurig uit, daarbij krimt het getal artisten dagelijks in, velen worden photograaf, teken meester, enz. terwijl enkele naar Amerika en Frankrijk trekken." See also Stolwijk, op. cit. (note 9), p. 228.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

294 HANS ROOSEBOOM

2 Cornelis Kruseman, The entombment, 1830. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum

and far between. He gave lessons but did not earn much that way.14

In the obituaries of several artists who painted many portraits?Jan Willem Pieneman (d. 1853), Cornelis Kruseman (d. 1859), Nicolaas Pieneman (d. i860), Jan Adam Kruseman (d. 1862), J.L. Jonxis (d. 1867), Jacob Spoel (d. 1868), H.A. de Bloeme (d. 1870) and J.G.

Schwartze (d. 1874)?not a word is said about the ad verse effects of photography on their careers.15 They were not minor figures in their profession, so it may have been that they were particularly well placed to avoid any such effects. That could even be seen as proof of their stature.

Meanwhile the silence on the subject of photography

14 Rijksprentenkabinet, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, collection of artists' letters, letter from M.J. Stucki to Christiaan Kramm, 8 Decem ber 1835: "...hier zijn geen menschen welke een gulden voor de les willen geven, integendeel 8 en 10 stuivers, en dat is dikwijls nog te veel. waarom ik dan 00k besloten heb, een privaatcolege aan huis opterigten, waarvan er tegenwoordig 12 gebruik maken."

15 J. van Lennep, "Hulde aan de nagedachtenis van Jan Willem Pieneman, uitgesproken in de Maatschappij Arti et Amicitiae, den 21 April 1853," in Verslag en naamlijst der leden van de maatschappij: uArti

et Amicitiae," gevestigd te Amsterdam, Amsterdam 1853; Kunstkronijk 20 (1859), pp. 9-16,18-22 (on Cornelis Kruseman); Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 2 (1861), p. 95, and Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 3 (1862), pp. 1 5 (on Nicolaas Pieneman); Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 4 (1863), pp. 47-48 (on J.A. Kruseman); Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 8 (1867), p. 32 (on J.L. Jonxis); Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 11 (1870), pp. 33-36 (on Spoel), Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 10 (1869), pp. 59-62 (on H.A. de Bloeme); Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 17 (1875-76), p. 43 (on Schwartze).

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 295

as the spoilsport deepens. A few in memoriams even give an entirely different impression, namely that por trait painting was flourishing at this time. Admittedly, this growth was observed against the background of a decline around 1800, and consequently may have been overestimated, but that does not alter the general pic ture. L.R. Beijnen wrote in his "Memoir of a deceased friend and artist," Cornelis Kruseman, who died in 1859: "The second and third decades [of the nineteenth century] were peaceful and calm for the fatherland. Gradual development could be detected in all paths of life, and art too had begun to give some signs of awaken

ing" (fig. 2).16 Similar remarks may be found in the in memoriams by Tobias van Westrheene devoted to the same Cornelis Kruseman, and by JJ.L. ten Kate to Nicolaas Pieneman.17

The idea that art was in fact 'arising' again was also to be found in other kinds of publication. Looking back at the nineteenth century (which had almost ended), Abraham Bredius wrote that its first half "had been a

time of deep decline for our art." Portrait painting had perhaps suffered the least, but "all things considered, it looked as if Dutch painting would sink into a lamentable eclecticism. Then came the turning point."18 This point coincided with the rise of photography, which had needed a few years after its introduction in 1839 to get a firm foothold and overcome teething troubles. Appar ently, this did not stand in the way of a resurgence of painting.

Sometimes consideration was given to what factors were obstructing the growth (economic and otherwise) of painting. Jan Adam Kruseman was seen by contem poraries as one of the artists who had brought about the

revival of Dutch painting. In 1846 he gave a speech in which he remarked that throughout Europe, "after a long period of languishing," art was extending and lift ing itself up; after a phase of degeneration "it had awak ened with renewed life and again made great advances," and the visual arts were "flourishing in our land too." Among possible inhibiting factors he included the taste of the public, art criticism and fashion.19 He did not mention photography. Elsewhere we find comments on the adverse effect of amateur artists and the growing number of artists, which led to greater competition and lower incomes.20

Clearest of all is Tobias van Westrheene in his 1854 pamphlet Een woord over kunst en kunstbescherming in

Nederland, in which he cites 13 areas where "the short comings in the position of art in our country" are re vealed. These include a lack of protection and support for art, the excessive number of exhibitions, the limited role played by collectors, too much competition be tween artists, the inadequacies of art education, "the poor or incorrect understanding of the nature and essence of art," and the fact that art tended to be seen as

a "luxury article" rather than as something that is "in dispensable for the moral [and] material welfare of the nation."21 Photography was not blamed. It was men tioned only once, when van Westrheene observed that the mediocre and bad artists "paint prolifically and cheaply, which has a crucially adverse effect on the ma terial interests of the good artists." He considered it de sirable that these "parasites" should not be involved with the "higher realms of art," but should return "to the field where they could still do a great deal of good and which is now generally worked by even less quali

i6 Kunstkronijk 20 (1859), p. 19: "Herinnering aan een ontslapen vriend en kunstenaar.... R?stig en stil was het tweede en derde tiental [van de negentiende eeuw] voor het vaderland. Eene langzame ontwik keling bespeurde men op alle levenswegen en 00k de kunst had aangevangen eenige teekenen van ontwaken te ge ven." Cf. Van Lennep, op. cit. (note 15), pp. 50-53, 57-58, and Hoogenboom, op. cit. (note 9), p. 46.

17 Kunstkronijk 20 (1859), pp. 9-16; Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 3 (1862), pp. 1-5.

18 A. Bredius, "De schilderkunst," in P.H. Ritter (ed.), Eene halve eeuw 1848-18?8: Nederland onder de regeering van Koning Willem den

Derde en het regentenschap van Koningin Emma, door Nederlanders beschreven, 2 vols., Amsterdam 1898, vol. 2, pp. 163-86, esp. p. 164: "...alles wel beschouwd, zag het er uit alsof de Hollandsche schilderkunst zou ondergaan in een bedroevend eclecticisme. Toen

kwam de kentering." 19 Het instituut, of Verslagen en MededeeUngen, uitgegeven door de

Vier Klassen van het Koninklijk Nederlandsch Instituut van Wetenschap pen, Letteren en Schoone K?nsten over den jare 1846, Amsterdam 1846, pp. 122-43, esP- PP- I25: "na eene langdurige kwijning... met een vernieuwd leven is ontwaakt en wederom de grootste vorderingen heeft gemaakt,... de Beeidende K?nsten 00k in ons vaderland bloeijende zijn," 130,134,135. Cf. Hoogenboom, op. cit. (note 9), pp. 30, 32,40 46.

20 For example in Stolwijk, op. cit. (note 9), p. 227. 21 T. van Westrheene Wz, Een woord over kunst en kunstbescherming

in Nederland, The Hague 1854, pp. 6: "...het onvoldoende van den toe stand der kunst ten onzent," 20-22: "Het weinige of onjuiste begrip van den aart en het wezen der kunst... artikel van weelde... onmisbaar voor

de zedelijke [en] stoffelijke welvaart van het volk."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

296 HANS ROOSEBOOM

fied hands." By this he meant "so-called industrial art: that branch of industry which either translates products of art for a wider audience (through lithography, pho tography and similar applications of industry to art), or can incorporate the art element in its products by apply ing and adapting forms recognized as beautiful in the whole or the details."22 In other words, van Westrheene does not present photography as a dangerous rival, but on the contrary as an activity which could purge art by keeping all kinds of less gifted figures away from it.

Portrait painting must have borne some taint in the nineteenth century. In the obituaries of artists like Jacob Spoel, who painted both portraits and history pieces, one senses some reserve in respect of portraiture (fig. 3).23 The idea that the portrait is a distraction from higher aspirations is an old one: it can already be found in Karel van Mander's Schilder-boeck of 1604, where he refers to "this byway of the arts (namely painting por traits from life)."24

The various publications lead to the conclusion that portraiture meant working for money, to a commission and being dependent on the model, without the empha sis on intellect and knowledge that a history piece involved. So it was that painting could also benefit from photography, since the latter could take over the business of making portraits, which had such a doubtful reputation.

There was no question of gratitude, however, and artists did not give up painting portraits. On the con trary, it is noticeable that when photography is identi fied as a rival to painting, the resurgence of portrait painting around 1900 is completely ignored. If it is true that photography created difficulties for portraitists, they certainly got over them very successfully. In 1910 Jan Veth wrote to Pieter Haverkorn van Rijsewijk: "Had I not had 27 portraits, most of them paintings, on my list

3 Jacob Spoel, Portrait of Charles Ferdinand Pahud, 1863-68. Amster dam, Rijksmuseum

of debts owed at the moment, I would have replied more quickly to your letter of the 14th. There are times, how ever, when all this work burdens and oppresses me. Yet I still find it very hard to bring myself to cancel things. But sometimes it's impossible to cram everything into my already packed program."25 Now not everyone

22 Ibid., p. 6: "...veel en goedkoop schilderen, [wat] beslissend nadeelig terugwerkt op de stoffelijke belangen der goede kunstenaars.... [Het ware beter als deze] Parasieten [zieh niet met de] hoogere sfeeren der kunst [inlieten maar terugkeerden] op het terrein, waar zij nog veel goed zouden kunnen voortbrengen, en dat nu meestal door nog on bevoegder handen wordt bearbeid.... De zoogenaamde industr?ele kunst; die nijverheid, welke of de eigenlijke kunstprodueten voor een grooter publiek vertolkt (door lithografie, photografie, en dergelijke toepassingen van de industrie op de kunst), of het kunstelement in hare voortbrengselen kan opnemen door de als schoon erkende vormen daarbij in het geheel of in de d?tails toe te passen en te bewerken."

23 Kunstkronijk [Nieuwe Serie] 11 (1870), p. 34.

24 Karel van Mander, Het schilder-boeck, Haarlem 1604, fol. 28ir: "...desen sijd-wegh der Consten (te weten het conterfeyten nae 't leven)."

25 Rijksprentenkabinet, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, collection of artists' letters, letter from Jan Veth to P. Haverkorn van Rijsewijk, 18 May 1910: "Indien ik op het oogenblik niet zevenentwintig portret ten, waarvan v?r de meeste schilderijen, op mijn schuldlijstje had staan, zou ik U reeds spoediger geantwoord hebben op Uw schrijven van den i4den. Er zijn echter oogenblikken, dat al dat werk mij bezwaart en be nauwt. Toch kan ik er nog zoo moeilijk toe komen dingen af te zeggen. Maar alles weer in mijn reeds overvol programma te schuiven is soms haast ondoenlijk."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 297

would have received as many commissions as Veth, but portrait painting had definitely not been relegated to the sidelines.

In the monograph by Cora Hollema and Pieternel Kouwenhoven on Th?r?se Schwartze, who like Veth was much in demand as a portraitist, we read that around 1880, when Schwartze began to paint portraits, photography was not yet a threat. The authors were evi dently unable to give up the idea that it posed a threat to painting and so, not knowing how to deal with the suc cess of Schwartze's career, they simply pushed photog raphy back to a later date. Around 1910 Schwartze reached "her financial ceiling:" "New ideas about art that made Schwartze's work outdated, and the growing role of photography would have had a hand in this."26 In her book De Nederlandse kunstgeschiedenis in een noten dop, Vera li?s contends that portraiture had been dealt a blow by photography around 1840,27 but according to Hollema and Kouwenhoven this happened some 70 years later. The certainty with which it is assumed that photography dealt a blow contrasts sharply with the evi dent uncertainty as to when and how this took place. Re viewing the evidence cited above, we can only conclude that setbacks and difficulties happen in any age and can not be blamed on photography for the sake of conve nience.

Various statements have been quoted above, but it is not always possible to establish how representative, ac curate or well-considered they are. There are barely any hard figures on the number of portrait painters and their earnings. The comments in Hoogenboom and in Stol wijk apply to the whole profession, not just to portrait painters. But in her study of portrait miniatures Karin Henninger-Tavcar does give the results of some calcu lations.28 She compiled a table showing the number of

miniaturists per city or country and per period (of 25 years). In the Netherlands in 1750-75 she counted 15 artists, in 1775-1800 18, in 1800-25 23, and in 1825-50 only 3. In the succeeding periods (1850-75 and 1875 1900) she found none. The number of miniaturists also

decreased in other countries during the nineteenth cen tury: in France it fell from 212 in 1800-25 to 144 in 1825-50, in England in the same periods from 152 to 140, and in Germany from 111 to 92. The decline in the period 1825-50 as compared with 1800-25 can hardly be blamed entirely on photography, since it was not intro duced until 1839 and was not firmly established until some time later?the third quarter of the century, in fact. The decline must have begun before then and for other reasons. Looking at these same tables, one can equally well draw the conclusion that during the nine teenth century the number of portrait miniaturists re turned to its previous level. The fact is that in most of the cities and countries in the table, the miniature en joyed a certain popularity only in the second half of the eighteenth and the first half of the nineteenth century, while before and after these periods it was relatively marginal, judging by the number of miniaturists. In deed, in the literature on the portrait miniature it is gen erally contended that it flourished during these same periods. This did not prevent Henninger-Tavcar from pointing to photography as the cause of the decline of interest in portrait miniatures.29 Other authors did the same.

In Art and photography (first edition 1968) Aaron Scharf gave some figures to support his assertion that portrait miniaturists were the first to feel the effects of photography: in 1830 there were 300 miniatures to be seen in an exhibition at the Royal Academy, but in i860 the number had dropped to 64 and in 1870 to 33. Later on in his book Scharf remarks that there was a brief re

vival of the miniature at the end of the century: 106 ex amples were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1891, 165 in 1900, and 202 in 1907.3? The figures given by Henninger-Tavcar and Scharf

suggested that it would be worth looking at the numbers of portrait paintings, drawings and miniatures submit ted for the Tentoonstellingen van kumtwerken van levende

meesters (Exhibitions of works of art by living masters) held in Amsterdam and The Hague. So I have examined

26 C. Hollema and P. Kouwenhoven, Th?r?se Schwartze (1851 1Q18): een vorstelijkportrettiste, Zutphen 1998, pp. 30, 45: "...in finan cieel opzicht haar plafond.... Nieuwe opvattingen over kunst die het werk van Schwartze achterhaald maakten en een grotere rol van de fo tograf?e zullen hierbij van invloed geweest zijn."

27 V. Ill?s, De Nederlandse kunstgeschiedenis in een notendop, Amster

dam 2000, p. 91: "De uitvinding van de fotograf?e rond 1840 vormde een sp?ciale uitdaging aan kunstenaars. Portretschilders voelden zieh als eersten bedreigd."

28 Henninger-Tavcar, op. cit. (note 2), pp. 14-15. 29 Ibid., p. 24. 30 Scharf, op. cit. (note 2), pp. 42-43, 46-47.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

298 HANS ROOSEBOOM

the catalogues from various years between 1820 and the end of the century. The table below shows the results.31

Number and percentage of Dutch portrait paintings, drawings and miniatures in the Tentoonstellingen van kunstwerken van levende meesters in Amsterdam and The

Hague, 1820-92

Amsterdam

Year Total Portrait Portrait Portrait % paintings drawings miniatures

1820 382 1830 375 1840 621 1850 455 i860 293 1871 269 1880 347 1892 422

45 38 51 23 18 8 16 12

4 o

8 10

0

0

0

6

10

9 3 6 0

0

0

0

154 12.5 10.0

8.6 6.1 3-0 4.6 4-3

The Hague

Year Total Portrait Portrait Portrait % paintings drawings miniatures

1821 128 1830 297 1841 1851 1861 1872 1881

368 458 337 312 256

1890 359

14 20

33 18+

10

19

o

6+ 4+

1

1

1

0

0

133 9.4+ 11.7+ 6.1 + 3-9 4.2 3-9 5-3

Source: catalogues of the Tentoonstellingen van kunst werken van levende meesters, 1820-92, RKD and Rijksmuseum

N.B. "6+" (see The Hague 1830) means that the num ber of portraits was over six, but the catalogue does not say how many more there were.

The table leads to the conclusion that while the propor tion of portraits indeed decreased in the course of the nineteenth century, the decline began before the inven tion of photography and occurred at a similar pace in both cities.

Strictly speaking, the diminishing share of portraits means only that fewer were submitted, not necessarily that fewer were made. Portraits occupy a special posi tion: they were generally done on commission and so

were not for sale. For the portraitists the exhibitions served mainly as a platform for demonstrating their skills, establishing their reputation and securing new commissions?if they needed and wanted them.

Many of those who submitted portraits also painted other subjects. This may indicate that those other sub jects, which painters sometimes preferred because of their higher status, generated insufficient income. In several of the obituaries already mentioned it is notice able that the deceased artist is lamented for the portraits which he was forced to make and which distracted him

from other, more important work, including, in particu lar, the much more highly esteemed history piece. So in theory a falling number of portraits might also be a sign that artists were less dependent on the proceeds from them.

All in all there is little reason to cling to the idea that photography was a nail in the coffin of portraiture and portrait miniatures. The amount of evidence pointing in that direction is small and is more than matched by the evidence to the contrary. Photography was undoubtedly a rival, but not to the degree so often assumed. There seems to be an id?e fixe: the observation that photogra phy adversely affected the arts is rarely explained. A critical review reveals that, if there is a decline in nine teenth-century art, it cannot possibly be blamed entirely on photography: any decline set in before photography was invented and became established. Moreover, there were other factors that were not beneficial to art.

It is noteworthy that none of the authors quoted ex pressed any surprise at how quickly the portrait minia ture was driven out of favor with the public by a medi um that only gradually overcame significant technical imperfections, that rarely came anywhere near the artis

31 In view of the fairly wide fluctuations in submissions, the key fig ure is the percentage share of portraits. Entries from artists working abroad and works executed in other techniques (sculpture, embroi

dery, etc.) have been deducted from the totals. The "Total" column thus contains only paintings, drawings and miniatures by artists work ing in the Netherlands at the time in question. This means that an artist

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 299

4 Johannes Hari i, Portrait miniature of Pieter de Riemer. Amster dam, Rijksmuseum

5 Anonymous, Portrait of an unknown man, c. 1845-55, daguerreo type. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, Rijksprentenkabinet

tic level of the portrait miniature, and that was certainly not widely seen as an art form (fig. 4). Photographs could not be taken in color (they could only be colored by hand); exposures were so long at first that many sit ters posed awkwardly and stiffly; and daguerreotypes reflected so badly that they could only be viewed at a particular angle (fig. 5). All this suggests that we should not look to photography alone when the question is raised as to why the portrait miniature was marginalized around the middle of the nineteenth century.

As remarked at the beginning, there is no lack of clich?s in the history of art and of photography. One of them is (or was) the suffering artist, who "spends his days in poverty, misunderstood or undervalued." An

nemieke Hoogenboom, who summed up the clich? thus, established in her study of the socioeconomic position of painters that this image is "at the least exaggerated."32 This particular clich? may well have nurtured the idea of photography as competition: after all, the suffering of artists must be caused by something. Photography, a newcomer of a somewhat different character from the

established arts, could easily serve as a scapegoat. A cer tain professional envy could well have combined with disdain for the mechanical (and because of that alone, unartistic) method of making images. The artistic status of photography, or more accurately the lack of it, is con sidered below.

like Charles Howard Hodges, who was born in London but worked in the Netherlands for a long time, is included, while the Dutch-born Ary Scheffer, who worked in Paris, is not. In order to compare the figures before and after Belgian independence, southern Netherlandish artists are regarded as foreigners prior to 1830 (and thus excluded), as are Bel gian artists after 1830. Entries from the Dutch East Indies have like

wise been omitted. Portraits of historical individuals, figure studies, genre scenes and animal portraits have not been counted either, insofar as they can be distinguished from 'ordinary' portraits on the basis of the cursory descriptions and sometimes unclear titles in the catalogues.

32 Hoogenboom, op. cit. (note 9), p. 127: "...onbegrepen of onder gewaardeerd zijn dagen in armoe slijt..., op zijn minst overtrokken is".

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

300 HANS ROOSEBOOM

"A PAINTER IS NOT A COPYING MACHINE": THE DIFFI CULT RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PHOTOGRAPHY AND

art The nineteenth century was less than kind in its judgment of photographers' artistic pretensions. There are innumerable examples of the view that photography did not deserve to be counted among the arts, chiefly from artistic circles. In the 1842-43 volume of Kunstkro nijk, for instance, an anonymous critic observed: "...the painter must... choose the most beautiful moment in na ture; art must rectify the chance defects and deficien cies.... A painter is not a copying machine; unpoetic, slavish imitation is permitted to a daguerreotype."33 Variations on this theme may be found in every suc ceeding decade of the nineteenth century. Thus in 1888 Jan Veth wrote in De Nieuwe Gids: "Most people think that the representation of a form is achieved by drawing it very accurately. Now if that were true, there would be

no better drawn things than photographs. So how is it that a drawing by a great artist has so much more to say than a photograph, which depicts the lines and the mod eling of a body as correctly as possible?... A machine shows, unthinkingly but very accurately, what every body can see. But with any subject an artist sees the true character, the expression it gives.... Do you understand now why a photograph can never give that, what is go ing on inside someone's soul, which comprises a great deal, and must necessarily take a form different from what everyone with good eyesight can also see?... That is why a scratch by his hand means more than all pho tographs."34

It looks very much as if those who expressed a view on this subject in the nineteenth century were com pletely unanimous in their verdict that photography could not be art. It was too mechanical and did not uplift its subjects sufficiently. The role of technology, physics and chemistry in making a photograph was too great, the role of intellect and hand too small. To be works of

art photographs would have to be more than the product of light, a lens, a camera and a light-sensitive plate, and do more than copy visible reality. The way in which a camera represented nature?faithful to reality, right down to the last detail, and without distinguishing be tween important and less important elements of the composition?was not in keeping with how it was sup posed to be done according to the art theory of the day.

These charges were not new. The rejection of so much realism, "low subjects" and the copying of nature dated from before 1839, the year in which photography was introduced.35 In the seventeenth century Rem brandt?only recently deceased?was accused of fol lowing nature all too literally, without idealizing it, and of ignoring the rules of anatomy, proportion and per spective.36 About a century later, in 1785, Cornelis Ploos van Amstel observed that "lower nature ought not to be depicted with those defects, quite singular or chance, which are to be expected in it."37

Thus the disapproval of the uncritical copying of na ture was not prompted by photography, which was

merely a convenient counter-example that apparently everyone could understand. This explains why photog

33 Kunstkronijk 3 (1842-43), p. 78: "...de Schilder moet... het schoonste oogenblik in de natuur kiezen; de kunst moet de toevallige gebreken en misstanden verhelpen.... Een schilder is geen kopieerma chine, aan de daguerreotype is de ondichterlijke, slaafsche navolging geoorloofd."

34 Quoted from S. Hekking, "Dat is weer de gro?te kwestie van voelen en niet voelen: het dilemma van de fotograf?e tussen 1880 en 1900," in P.J.A. Winkels et al., Ten tijde van de Tachtigers: rondom De

Nieuwe Gids i88o-i8g5, The Hague 1985, pp. 103-16, esp. pp. 107-08: "De meeste mensen denken dat het voorstellen van een vorm bereikt

wordt door het heel correcte natekenen ervan. Als dat nu waar was, dan

zouden er geen beter getekende dingen bestaan dan fotografie?n. En waardoor komt het dan dat eene teekening van een groot kunstenaar zoveel meer te zeggen heeft dan eene fotograf?e, die toch zo juist mo gelijk weergeeft de lijnen en het model? van een lichaam?... Zie eene maschine geeft, dorn maar heel juist, wat iedereen zien kan. Maar een kunstenaar ziet, bij elk onderwerp, het juiste karakter, de expressie die het geeft.... Begrijpt ge nu dat een fotograf?e dat nooit geven kan, wat er omgaat in de ziel van iemand, die veel omvat, noodzakelijk een anderen vorm moet krijgen als wat iedereen die goede ogen heeft, 00k zien

kan.... Daarom heeft een krabbel van zijn hand meer te beduiden dan alie fotografieen."

35 For some examples of the aversion to banal subjects in art see L. van Tilborgh and G. Jansen (eds.), exhib. cat. Op zoek naar de Gouden Eeuw: Nederlandse schilderkunst 1800-1850, Haarlem (Frans Halsmuse um) & Zwolle 1986, pp. 15-18, 42-43, 46, 140, and T. Streng, "R?a lisme" in de kunst- en literatuurbeschouwing in Nederland tot 1875: een be gripshistorische studie, Amsterdam 1995, pp. 73, 98, 135, 147, 152-53, 161,183,193,196,199,207,249,265,273,294,399,413,434,456,477, 504,512.

36 J.A. Emmens, Rembrandt en de regels van de kunst, Amsterdam 1979, p. 38; J. Boomgaard and R.W. Serieller, "A delicate balance: a brief survey of Rembrandt criticism," in C. Brown, J. Kelch and P. van Thiel (eds.), exhib. cat. Rembrandt: the master & his workshop. Paint ings, Berlin (Altes Museum), Amsterdam (Rijksmuseum), London (National Gallery) & New Haven 1991, pp. 106-23, esp. p. 107.

37 Quoted from van Tilborgh and Jansen, op. cit. (note 35), p. 15: "...dat men de laagere Natuur niet verbeelden moet met die gebreken, welke men daarin, vry eigenaardig of toevallig, zoude m?gen veronder stellen."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 301

case of enlightened self-interest. Art had status, whereas photography still had to secure a position for itself. Newspapers used similar terms on occasion. In part this can be dismissed as laziness and over-friendliness: until

well into the nineteenth century the press was not renowned for its knowledge of the visual arts.39

In fact the writers and photographers did not get much further than some very general statements. Ex amples include the "extraordinary fineness of handsome colors" ("buitengewone fijnheid van fraaie kleuren," in which by his own account the portraits by the Dor drecht photographer Karel le Grand excelled), "the fineness of tint, vigor and expression" ("de fijnheid van tint, kracht en uitdrukking," which characterized Guyard's daguerreotypes according to the Provinciale Geldersche en Nijmeegsche Courant of 1844), and the "perfect likeness" and "the characteristic element, which is always preserved completely purely" ("spre kende gelijkenis..., het karakteristieke, dat daarin altijd volkomen zuiver is bewaard"), on which the photogra pher Robert Severin of The Hague was congratulated in 1861 by the Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode (fig. 6). Not surprisingly, photographers and their publishers

placed great emphasis on the aspect in which photogra phy excelled: making true-to-life images. Despite all the criticism photography endured, it could always take pride in that. In 1865 the Utrecht publisher J.G. Broese put an advertisement in the Utrechtsch Provinciaal en Stedelijk Dagblad for the portrait made by Henri Pronk of the well-known clergyman and poet Nicolaas Beets. In it he said: "The publisher believes that he may give an assurance that this is the best likeness to date of the

reverend gentleman."40 For that matter, such qualities were also attributed by publishers to portraits that were not photographs, so it is possible that this was a clich?. Although photography was the ideal method of produc ing good likenesses, other kinds of portrait were also ex pected to show the subject's appearance strikingly and accurately. This requirement was not always met, which may have been all the more reason for photographers and publishers to put such stress on the fact that a pho

6 Robert Se v?rin, Portrait of King William III, c. 1860-65, carte-de-visite, albumen print. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, Rijksprentenkabinet

raphy is mentioned in various publications, but other wise plays no part in the many debates waged in the nineteenth century for and against Romanticism, Real ism, Impressionism or whatever movement or style.

Apart from functioning as a scapegoat, photography was completely excluded from these polemics. Its place was not somewhere between, say, idealism and realism; it stood completely to one side, marginalized, and was far removed from "true realism" (which also existed).38

So there was no room at the inn for photography. This did not prevent photographers from discussing their work in the same terms as those used in the arts,

for example in their advertisements. This was often a

38 On "true realism" see Streng, op. cit. (note 35), pp. 105, 207, 286,289.

39 C. Blotkamp, "Art criticism in De Nieuwe Gids," Simiolus 5 (1971), pp. 116-36; C. Blotkamp, "Kunstenaars ais critici: kunstkritiek in Nederland, 1880-1895," in R. Bionda and C. Blotkamp (eds.), exhib. cat. De schilders van Tachtig: Nederlandse schilderkunst 1880-18?5, Am

sterdam (Rijksmuseum Vincent van Gogh) & Zwolle 1991, pp. 75-87; A. Ouwerkerk, Tussen kunst en publiek: een beeld van de kunstkritiek in Nederland in de eerste helft van de negentiende eeuw, Leiden 2003.

40 Utrechtsch Provinciaal en Stedelijk Dagblad, 6 November 1865: "De uitgever gelooft te m?gen verzekeren, dat dit het best gelijkende portret is, dat er tot op heden van ZWEw. bestaat."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

302 HANS ROOSEBOOM

tograph gave a good likeness. Here lay their opportuni ty, for their clients were not indifferent to this argu

ment.

In 1840 a portrait of the poet Jan van Harderwijk Rzn appeared in the Nederlandsche Muzen-almanak (fig. 7). He had asked the editor several times to be honored in

this manner (the annual almanac always contained just one portrait of a poet), although by his own admission it would be mainly his family and acquaintances who would find it "rather nice" if it were now to be his turn.

When van Harderwijk's prayer was finally answered and he received a proof, he showed it to his friends. "Everybody declared unanimously that an entirely different person is depicted in the portrait.... It's a caricature! Old with furrows in the face, not a sign of my good humor, say my relations and friends. A sourpuss, lacking spirit and life. I pray you, don't let it go in like that.... and that mouth, that mouth! Doctors and surgeons tell me that it's the mouth of someone who's had an attack of apoplexy."41 The portrait appeared in the almanac without undergoing any changes. More examples might be given of complaints about the poor likenesses in portraits not made by photography.42

In the early descriptions of photography in advertise ments and articles an attempt was often made to associ ate it with the visual arts, although photography itself could not be considered art (fig. 8). More remarkably still, these advertisements and articles often lack any reference at all to the part played by chemistry and physics in the creation of a photo, although they were a sine qua non. This no doubt had to do with the fact that

the role of these sciences in photography was a major reason for not according it the status of art. Many exam ples of this might be given. Words like "sun," "sun light," "nature," "drawing," and "bring forth" are found in many descriptions, and suggest that it is nature itself that is responsible for recording the images on photographic paper or copper. One of the earliest re ports in the Dutch press about the invention of photog

7 J.P. Lange after W J. Schmidt, Portrait of fan van Harderwijk Rzn, 1840, engraving. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, Rijksprentenkabinet

41 H. Eijssens, "Jan van Harderwijk Rzn, een Rotterdamse dichter uit de negentiende eeuw," Rotterdams faarboekje 1993, pp. 304-07: "Iedereen verklaarde uit eene mond dat het een geheel andere mensch is die in de afbeelding wordt voorgesteld.... Het is een persiflage! Oud

met groeven in het gelaat, niets van mijne opgeruimdheid, zoo zeggen mijne betrekkingen en kennissen is er in. Een zuurmuil, zonder geest en leven. Ik bid u, laat het er z?? niet in komen.... En die mond, die mond! Doktoren en Heelkundigen zeggen mij, dat het een mond is van

iemand die een aan val van apoplexie heeft gehad." 42 Letter from P.G. van Os to an unknown correspondent, 25 No

vember 1838; letter from A.J. Lamme to Christiaan Kramm, 24 April 1859; letter from S.L. Verveer aan Carel Vosmaer, 11 May 1862; letter from Henri J. Zimmerman to Frans Buffa & Zonen, 13 November 1873. All four are in the Rijksprentenkabinet, Rijksmuseum, Amster dam, collection of artists' letters.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 303

360 NEDERLANDSCH MAGAZUN.

den om dc afbceldingen tc vernissen, eene zaak,die xelfs door Daguerre a?s onmogelijk beschouwd werd. Ore dit doel te bereiten, heeft men slechts een deel dextrine in vijf deelen water op te lossen en deze oplossing kokend over de metaalplaat te gicten. Dit erais besch?digt de beeiden weinig of niets ; doch

daardoor wordt het nut van de uitvinding aanmer kelijk vermeerderd, daar de teekenaar en plaatsnijder de afbeeldingcn behandelen kan als gewoon papier, en dezelve met doorschijnend papier kan doortceke nen, het welk voor deze uitvinding het geval niet kon zijn. Behalve dat, kan de plaatsnijder zonder na

deel met de hand over het gevernisde blad strijken, en dus met de radeernaald de omtrekken van het beeld in het metaal trekken, en op die wijze hctzelve verme nigvuldigen. Wei is het zilver geen zeer goed metaal voor het graveerijzer, doch daar Daguerre gevonden heeft, dat eene dun verzilverde kopcrcn plant even ge schikt ?9 tot het opvatten van het lichtbeeld als eene plated plaat, zoo is ook deze zwarigheid gehcel uit den

I weg gcruimd. Welligt ook ontdekt men een middel | om de plaat scheikundig te doen uitbijten. j De prijzen der Daguerreotype-machines zijn te Parijs j als volgt: Ie kwal. met een objectief of voorwerpglas van 37 lignes middellijn 435 francs ;2de kwal. met een

i objectief van 34 lignes 300 francs. Naar wij vernemen I belast zieh de hcer C. J. L. Portman te Amsterdam i met de bezorging van. gemelde toes teilen. ?

8 Illustration from one of the first articles on the

daguerreotype in the Nederlandsch Magazijn ter verspreiding van algemeene en nuttige kennis, November 1839, p. 360. Amsterdam,

Rijksmuseum Library

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

3?4 HANS ROOSEBOOM

raphy was by an anonymous author in the Algemene Konst- en Letterbode of 1839; it referred to "the art of bringing forth drawings by means of sunlight."43 This description is flowery and long-winded, but it should be remembered that at that time news reports could not be

illustrated and clarified with a reproduction. The inven tion had to be explained in words, while it was still new and the details and principles had barely been revealed and, even if they had been, many of the readers probably had little or no knowledge of chemistry and physics.

When chemistry and physics are mentioned, the de scription otherwise follows the same general pattern.

One may wonder how clear the terms used were for the average reader. Moreover, the descriptions were sometimes extremely vague. Even in the fairly factual and technical Boek der uitvindingen of i860, the author evidently struggles at times. When the developing of a daguerreotype plate is described, we read: "If one now looks through [a window in the mercury box], it is as if a

spirit has taken pleasure in painting something for us with an invisible brush, we see the outlines emerging ever more clearly, just as if the image is coming up from the floor." Two pages later it is explained that when print ing on paper the light-sensitive material consists of a sil

ver compound: "these compounds are altered by the light, and the silver is released as extremely finely grained metal; this silver material draws the dark areas

and is as it were the ink for the photographic drawings, just as the mercury draws the light areas and may be thought of as the white chalk for daguerreotypes."44

It is not surprising that people resorted to compar isons with terms from painting, drawing or printmak ing: they were more or less known and evidently served to make the phenomenon of photography imaginable. Terms like "enchanting" and "magic brush"?see for example the "enchanting spectacle" referred to by the Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode in 1839 and the "magical

images" described by Het Leeskabinet in the same year?can be seen as typifying the verbal impotence of the authors, and would only have added to the mystery surrounding the new invention.45

If photography was not an art, what was it? That was not easy to decide. Terms such as craft, applied art and industrial art come to mind, but they are rarely if ever used in connection with photography in contemporary publications. Moreover, they are themselves difficult to define and to differentiate, both from each other and from art: the dividing lines are not always clear and sometimes overlap.46 In addition, these terms were sometimes used pejoratively. Craft and industrial art were considered to be less than art in any case. The only example I know of in which photography is allocated a clear place is in the 1854 pamphlet by Tobias van

Westrheene referred to above. There he expressed the wish to banish mediocre and bad artists, whom he called "parasites," from the "higher realms of art" and to have them return to "so-called industrial art." By that he

meant those branches of industry which either made art objects for a wide audience ("through lithography, pho tography and similar applications of industry to art"), or applied beautiful forms in their products.47 Otherwise we are in the dark as to which "realm" photography should be or was allocated to: we can hardly rely entirely on a single author.

In the foreign literature the status of photography is often gauged by the place it was assigned at exhibitions of fine and applied art. Several important decisions are mentioned, and the organizers (who always divided these exhibitions into a great many sections) turn out to have been more favorably disposed to photography on some occasions than on others. Sometimes it was

grouped with the visual arts, sometimes it was kept well away from them. At the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1855, for instance, part of which was the Salon ofthat

43 Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode voor hetjaar 183Q, vol. 1, p. 360: "...de kunst, om door middel van het Zonlicht Teekeningen voort te brengen."

44 Het boek der uitvindingen, omgewerkt en verkort, Leiden i860, pp. 212: "Ziet men nu daardoor dan is het alsof een geest er een genoegen vond met een onzigtbaar penseel iets voor ons te schilderen; wij zien de trekken hoe langer hoe duidelijker voor den dag komen, even alsof het beeld uit den grond opkomt," and 214: "...deze verbindingen worden door het licht ontleed, en het zilver als metaal uiterst fijn verdeeld vrij gemaakt; deze zilverstof teekent de donkere partijen en is als het ware de

inkt voor de photographische teekeningen, gelijk het kwikzilver de ligte

partijen teekent en als het witte krijt kan beschouwd worden voor de da guerreotypen" (emphases added).

45 Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode voor hetfaar i8jg, vol. i, p. 139: "...betooverend schouwspel"; Het Leeskabinet, 1839, vol. 4, p. 273: "...tooverachtige afbeeldsels."

46 See, for example, T. Eli?ns, Kunst, nijverheid, kunstnijverheid: de nationale nijverheidstentoonstellingen als Spiegel van de Nederlandse kunst

nijverheid in de negentiende eeuw, Zutphen 1990, pp. 92-96, and J.A. Martis, Voor de kunst en voor de nijverheid: het ontstaan van het kunstnijverheidsonderwijs in Nederland, Amsterdam 1990, pp. 102-04.

47 Van Westrheene, op. cit. (note 21), p. 6.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 305

9 Cover of the leporello album published by Frans Buffa & Zonen

with photographs by Pieter Oosterhuis, c. i860. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum,

Rijksprentenkabinet

year, photography was represented in a different class and at a different location from the arts.48 At the Salon

of 1857 photography was again not admitted to the do main of the arts, but two years later the organizers gave in. That was not the end of the matter: from time to time

the clock was turned back. Moreover, it was the Salon of 1859 which inspired Charles Baudelaire's famous tirade against photography.49

If we look at the catalogues of various exhibitions of applied art to see what the situation was in the Nether lands, it is noticeable that photography was usually ranked among the graphic arts. This is the case with the exhibitions held in Arnhem (1852, 1868 and 1879), Haarlem (1861), Amsterdam (1877) and The Hague (1888).50 At the Algemeene tentoonstelling van Nederland sche nijverheid en kunst (General exhibition of Dutch in

dustry and art, Amsterdam 1866) photography was put in a category of its own, the 26th. This meant that it was

part of "Section II," like the 24th category ("Paper, casting, printing, books and binding. Cardboard"), while the "Fine arts" had a place in a different section.

There is some logic to this association with the graph ic arts, and there is much to be said for regarding pho tography as a half-sister of the various manual graphic techniques that existed in the nineteenth century. In any event photography was so closely allied to them that it was sometimes difficult to distinguish between them

with the naked eye. Around 1800 the number of graphic printing techniques was still manageable, but a hundred years later the situation was completely different. Dur ing the nineteenth century, numerous widely varying printing methods were invented and used. The graphic

48 Exposition des produits de F'industrie de toutes les nations 185s: cata logue officiel publi? par ordre de la Commission Imp?riale, Paris 1855, pp. XLVIII-XLIX.

49 C. Baudelaire, Ecrits sur Part, ?d. Y. Florenne, 2 vols., Paris 1971, vol. 2, p. 20.

50 Tentoonstelling van Voortbrengselen der Nationale Nijverheid van Nederland en zijne Overzeesche Bezittingen (Arnhem 1852); Algemeene

Nationale Tentoonstelling (Haarlem 1861); Tentoonstelling van Neder landsche Kunst en Nijverheid (Arnhem 1868); Tentoonstelling van Kunst toegepast op Nijverheid (Amsterdam 1877); Nationale Tentoonstelling van Nederlandsche en Koloniale Nijverheid (Arnhem 1879); and Na tionale Tentoonstelling van Oude en Nieuwe Kunstnijverheid (The Hague 1888).

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

306 HANS ROOSEBOOM

techniques that existed around 1800 remained in use? the most important being the copper and wood engrav ing, etching, mezzotint and woodcut?but in the course of the nineteenth century they faced competition from several new methods, of which photography was only one. Photography had a dual role. It secured a place not only alongside but within the graphic process. It became possible to transfer an image?the original from which a print was to be made?to the printing plate photo graphically instead of by hand. The image could then serve as a model for engraving. Alternatively, after un dergoing several processes, it was suitable for inking and printing on paper without the intervention of an en graver, in the same way as in manual graphics. Several graphic techniques thus acquired a photographic coun terpart: lithography was joined by photolithography, wood engraving by photoxylography, etching by pho togravure. Due in part to photography's double role, a "melting pot" of graphic methods developed in the nineteenth century. Their number increased sharply, and they could not always be distinguished at first sight.

The 'infiltration' of graphic techniques by photogra phy is one reason for seeing it as a printing technique in the same group as, or at least related to, the manual

methods. The image made with a camera was usually a negative, from which positive prints on paper could be made as required. So just like prints, photographs could be reproduced in large numbers. Moreover, broadly speaking, photography served the same market as print making: the subjects and the way they were depicted were similar, as was the method of publication. Several printmakers and publishers went in for photography 'on the side,' among them Rose-Joseph Lemercier, Goupil & Cie (both in Paris), E. Gambart & Co. (London), T. Agnew & Sons (London and Manchester), Franz Hanf staengl (Munich) and?in the Netherlands?Frans Buffa & Zonen (fig. 9).

There is no clear dividing line between photography and the combined graphic techniques. Various new nineteenth-century methods, including photography, joined battle with the older wood engraving, which had a leading role in the illustration of printed matter (espe cially the simpler kind). The graphic methods were not united in an aversion to photography, and competed be tween themselves just as fiercely. What is striking about the introduction of several nineteenth-century tech niques is the preoccupation with lowering costs and ac

io Johan Coenraad Hamburger, Portrait miniature of an unknown man, 1843. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum

curately reproducing the original without the interven tion of an engraver. Whereas with a wood engraving the original drawing was transferred to wood and then cut by an engraver, no such intermediary was required with lithography (invented in 1798), photography (1839), glyphography (1842) and nature-printing (1853). For this reason, despite all the technical differences, these

methods may be regarded as related. The principal difference between photography and

graphic art lay in the size of the edition: the print runs of photographs in the nineteenth century were seldom more than 100. In many cases?particularly the por traits supplied mainly to private individuals and seen only in the family circle?it would have been far fewer. This has to do with the continuing mechanization in the printers' shops (partly thanks to the steam press), whereas in the photographic studios there was little or nothing to mechanize. Virtually all the processes in the studio were carried out by hand, from applying the emulsion to the negative plate and making it light-sensi

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 307

ii Munnich & Ermerins, Arti & Amicitiae, Amsterdam, 1860-62, albumen print.

Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, Rijksprentenkabinet

tive to printing, retouching, trimming and mounting the photographs. While in many businesses various parts of the production process were mechanized in the nineteenth century, the photographic studio remained a small-scale, craft enterprise.

The fact that most organizers of applied art exhibi tions viewed photography as related to graphic art (or at least sufficiently related to be included in the same category) did not mean that it was admitted to art exhibitions. Graphic works might be seen as art to some extent, but photography could not always count on receiving the same treatment. Photographs appear to have been submitted only rarely to the Tentoonstellingen van kunstwerken van levende meesters. Sometimes they were accepted (The Hague 1839 and 1857, Amsterdam i860), and sometimes not (Amsterdam 1848 and 1852).51 The archives of these exhibitions have not been preserved in their entirety, so we do not have a complete overview of the selection committees' reasons for ac

cepting or rejecting photographs.

We can learn more from a somewhat similar question, namely that concerning the miniature painter and photographic retoucher Johan Coenraad Hamburger, whose membership of the Amsterdam artists' society Arti et Amicitiae was called into question in 1858 (figs. 10, 11). Hamburger had heard that there was a plan to refuse him entry to the society's meetings, and he want ed to know who thought this was possible under the rules. They stipulated that anyone who engaged in "an occupation not belonging to the practice of the fine arts" in addition to his work as an artist would lose his voting rights. Hamburger believed that his occupation, re touching photographs, was "as much art as any other."52 Among the members of Arti, meeting in session, there was an immediate commotion over how the question should be formally dealt with. So for the time being nothing happened. Hamburger remained a member and was even appointed to a commission. Not until a year later, when it was again time for any proposals to change the rules, which was always done periodically, do we

51 On these exhibitions see Hoogenboom, op. cit. (note 9), pp. 15 16,147-53, and Stolwijk, op. cit. (note 9), pp. 24-31,131-60.

52 This affair has been reconstructed with the aid of the minute

books in the society's archives: "...niet tot de beoefening der Beeidende K?nsten behoorend beroep" and "...even goed kunst is als ieder an der."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

308 HANS ROOSEBOOM

hear more about the question. As usual, a commission examined the proposals for changes submitted. The commission probably recommended that in individual cases a judgment should be made as to whether the new secondary occupation was artistic or not.

A few weeks later there was a discussion on this point. A number of members still thought that persons who had a secondary occupation that was not artistic should not be admitted: "that is contrary to the dignity of the meeting and could be an impediment to the freedom of members in the meeting."53 Others believed that the rules should be relaxed, or did not have much faith in a commission that would judge individual cases.

Hamburger himself wanted to have the old rule dropped. He maintained that it was originally intended to keep out art dealers. He also argued that it encour aged laziness, because it prevented an artist from engag ing in secondary activities. The commission's proposal was rejected, the rule

stayed in force, and Hamburger remained a member with voting rights. So in the end nothing changed or happened, although the question had led to the expres sion of diverse and very pronounced views. The fact that Hamburger was able to remain a member was prob ably due chiefly to a desire to keep both sides happy.

Meanwhile it is interesting to note that, as we saw above, many believed that photography was a competitor of the art form Hamburger himself practiced, the portrait miniature. In that sense it was mainly his own livelihood that was adversely affected by his secondary occupation, not the livings of the other Arti members who were so vocal.

In 1864, by which time Hamburger had become a photographer, the rules of Arti were again reviewed and every member had an opportunity to submit proposals. The old question was raked up once more. In 1859 S. Altmann had been a member of the commission which

looked at the proposed changes, and of the three mem bers he was the least inclined to accommodate Ham

burger. Now, five years later, he raised the question of whether the time had not come to drop the article con cerned, at least "for those who take up photography in

addition to their artistic occupation" ("...voor hen, die bij hun kunstvak tevens de photographie ter hand ne nien"). The commission which considered all proposals had been unable to reach agreement on this point, and so it had not expressed a view. Those present at the

meeting did have a clear opinion, however. Just as in 1859, they feared the interference of non-artists in a so ciety which above all protected the interests of artists. One of the Greives, P.F. or J.C., remarked that the arti cle could only be scrapped if artists who took up photog raphy remained artists. Experience showed, however, that "the artist always gets lost in the photographer" ("...de kunstenaar steeds in den photograaf verloren ging"). G.A. Roth was even more outspoken, and said that if the rule was dropped there would soon be "deal ers, insurers and photographers in the meeting. It might even come to pass that they would run the society and its core, the artists, would be lost" ("...weldra makelaars, assuradeurs, photografen in de vergadering [zou] krij gen. Het geval zou zieh zelfs kunnen voordoen, dat zij de Maatschappij bestuurden en haar kern, de kunste naars, zoude verloren gaan"). According to the minutes, these words met with approval from many of the other

members present. The admission of photographers would have an otherwise unexplained but damaging in fluence on the society.

Looking back at the arguments used in 1859 and 1864, it is noticeable that the objections to accepting artists with a non-artistic secondary trade were partly

moral in nature. It would undermine the dignity of the meeting; it would make artists less free, less indepen dent and less hard-working. An artist ought to opt ex clusively for the profession of artist or give it up. This last point, in particular, reflects the idea that the true artist lives only for art and only from art. In practice this

was less often the case than was assumed by the lofty theory, and it is generally thought that the founding of

Arti in 1839 was inspired in part by the wish to improve the artists' economic position.54 So it was not just a question of idealistic motives.

Another factor in the exclusion of artists with a sec

ondary trade would have been a concern to maintain the

53 According to F. Molenaar: "...dat is in strijd met de waarde der vergadering en kan een beletsel zijn voor de vrijheid der leden in de vergadering."

54 See, for example, Thijssen, op. cit. (note 2), pp. 27-30; Hoogen boom, op. cit. (note 9), pp. 22-23; and Stolwijk, op. cit. (note 9), p. 99.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 309

high social status of the profession. It is really rather childish that artists looked down on occupations such as that of photographer. Only a few centuries earlier the painters themselves had been through a transition from manual to mental work, and had to answer accusations that they were only copying reality. By the nineteenth century, and the advent of photography, painters had achieved the status of people more cultivated than the average citizen. The artist had become a visionary who made the good and the beautiful visible, and con tributed through his art to the moral standard of the na tion.55 So there was something at stake for the Arti

members who took part in the Hamburger debate. Their standing would not be improved if they mixed with people whose occupation was less highly esteemed than their own, especially since practice among artists was often very different from theory. Ideally, an artist could afford to be motivated solely by the love of art and to attach no value to money; his hand followed what his

mind suggested, and he was independent of the public, critics and patrons. In reality, though, various artists found it difficult to earn enough from their paintings and were forced to produce work of lower status for money. They were far from independent. Moreover, a substantial number did not have enough talent to ensure that they never had to produce uninspired, run-of-the

mill work, repeat themselves or copy others.56

The question whether in the nineteenth century?la beled materialistic by some?photography was what prompted the placing of so much emphasis on the edify ing aspects of art and the artistic profession can immedi ately be answered in the negative.57 At the time of the invention of photography, the rivalry between painting

and other art forms had existed for centuries, and was best known in the form of the paragone debate between

painting and sculpture. It was not only photography that had to fight to secure a status approaching that of painting. Printmaking, for example, has not always been able to count on being taken entirely seriously. It is telling that in his Schilder-boeck, Karel van Mander pays hardly any attention to the graphic work of the artists he

deals with. Where he does do so, he is largely disparag ing.58 Paintings were of more account.

In other words, in the nineteenth century photogra phy could expect to receive the same treatment as that meted out to other techniques earlier. So it did not bring about a completely new way of thinking about art (and its elevated status); at most it breathed new life into the old arguments. Once, centuries earlier, painting had been on the offensive to win itself a place amid the liber al arts, but in the nineteenth century it was on the defen

sive in an effort to retain that position. Exclusivity? here the term can be interpreted literally as closing out?could be a valuable weapon.

Photography could count on being appreciated when its role was limited to that of a study or a means of repro

ducing works of art. Reproductions could obviously be useful to artists. If a painting had been sold and had left the studio, at least a good image would still be left. It is evident from a letter from Jan Veth to Albert Verwey, the poet whose portrait he painted in 1885,tnat works were reproduced for this reason (fig. 12). The painting is now in the Stedelijk Museum, but when Veth wrote the letter, in December 1885,lt was with Verwey him self. At the suggestion of his wife, Veth decided to have it photographed: "It is such a nuisance in our art that

55 Thijssen, op. cit. (note 2), pp. 72-73; Hoogenboom, op. cit. (note 9), PP- 36-37; Stolwijk, op. cit. (note 9), pp. 43-55.

56 Cf. J. Reynaerts,"'De club der woelingen': 1875-1914," in K. Jongbloed et al., Een vereeniging van ernstige kunstenaars: 150 jaar Maatschappij Arti et Amicitiae, i8s?-ig8?, Bussum & Amsterdam

1989, pp. 28-43, esP- P- 31 f?r criticism of an Arti exhibition in 1887: "There are many inconsequential things in every exhibition, but here

more than half of the accepted and lauded pieces are the work of indi viduals who have never experienced passion or depth of feeling, who make a painting the way a bricklayer makes a wall" ("Onbeduidendhe den zijn er vele op elke expositie, maar hier is meer dan de helft der geplaatste en geprezen stukken werk van lieden, die nooit geestdrift of innigheid van gevoel gekend hebben, die een schilderij maken, zooals een metselaar een muur metselt").

57 Examples of objections to the materialistic spirit of the century

can be found in the work of J.A. Alberdingk Thijm, among others. He wrote in the Album der Schoone K?nsten 1851, p. 51, about "the dam which art (if it takes its origin from God as the fountainhead of all that is beautiful, and if, with its powerful language, it succeeds in speaking to man's nobler principle) can erect against the crude egoism and mate rialistic principle of our age" ("...den dam, die de Kunst, (wanneer zij uit God als de brona?r van al 't schoone har?n oorsprong neemt, en wanneer zij met hare machtige taal tot het edeler beginsel in den men sch weet te spreken) kan opwerpen tegen het grof ego?smus en het ma terialistiesch beginsel van onzen tijd").

58 E. de Jongh and G. Luijten, exhib. cat. Mirror of everyday life: genreprints in the Netherlands 1550-1700, Amsterdam (Rijksmuseum) & Ghent 1997, pp. 25-26. On the low standing of graphic art see also D. Landau, "Vasari, prints and prejudice," Oxford Art Journal 6 (1983), pp. 3-10.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

310 HANS ROOSEBOOM

12 Jan Veth, Portrait of Albert Verwey, 1885. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum

once a thing has been delivered you never see it again."59 A reproduction also enabled other people to enjoy a

work of art, not just the maker or the owner. In 1859 the Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode stated: "More and more the principle is gaining ground that it should be made as easy as possible to obtain reproductions of beautiful works of art, and that this is a powerful means of im

proving the knowledge and taste of the public, which now has to make do with poorly made prints and mediocre images, and to whom the works of the great masters are generally as good as unknown. Nothing is better able to do this than photography."60 And last but not least, art dealers and publishers stood to benefit fi nancially from reproductions, not only because they

59 A. Verwey, Briefwisseling i juli 1885 tot is december 1888, ed. M.H. Schenkeveld and R. van der Wiel, Amsterdam 1995, p. 114: tot Is zoo vervelend in onze kunst dat men iets dat eens afgeleverd is nooit meer ziet."

60 Algemeene Konst- en Letterbode 71 (1859), p. 415: "Meer en meer wint het beginsel veld, dat men het algemeen verkrijgen van afbeeldin

gen naar schoone kunstwerken zoo gemakkelijk mogelijk moet maken, en dat dit een krachtig middel is om kennis en smaak te bevorderen bij het publiek, dat zieh nog te zeer met siecht uitgevoerde prenten en middelmatige voorstellingen behelpen moest, en aan hetwelk de werken der gro?te meesters gewoonlijk zoo goed als onbekend waren. Niets is beter in Staat hieraan te voldoen dan de photographie."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 311

could make the original work better known, but because the sale of reproductions could be highly lucrative.61 The reason for reproductive photography being

treated with so much less disdain and so much more

sympathy must no doubt be sought in the fact that photographic reproductions added little or nothing to the original works, and that they were only intended to depict them as accurately as possible. They had no further pretensions and were thus 'harmless.'

Although painters in general were lenient in their judgment, there were exceptions. In the nineteenth cen tury, reproductive photography was regularly accused of not depicting works accurately. It was said that this was inevitable because a camera could not 'understand'

a work of art. In De Gids in 1857 PJ. Veth approvingly quoted the French writer and critic Th?ophile Gautier: an engraving was more "than a copy; it is an interpreta tion; it is a work of patience, of love. The engraver must

cherish, adore and understand his original; he must have absorbed its spirit and penetrated to its innermost essence; for it is not enough to depict accurately the lines of the composition, the contours of the forms, to put light and shadow in the right places, to make the halftones melt away with skill; no, more is demanded of

an engraver!"62 Fear of competition may partly have inspired this ar

gument. It is not very likely that engravers always achieved the skills or followed the method stipulated by Gautier and Veth: "tireless study, care, perseverance, talent, yes even true geniusV ("onvermoeide Studie, zorg, volharding, talent, ja zelfs waarachtig genieV*): they would then have produced far less than they actual ly did. It is possible that reproductive engravers felt that it was their status above all that was threatened. Their

standing was not as high as that of 'free' artists, who were less tied to their subject and less troubled by the criticism that could follow from a comparison between

original and reproduction. Individual creativity was highly valued, and its role in reproductive printmaking was inevitably limited. The value of the work of repro ductive engravers was clear, but now they no doubt saw themselves being overtaken by photography, which

made it possible to make reproductions more quickly and at lower cost. Consequently, they were in danger of falling between two stools: they were not recognized as artists by everyone, and their profession was at the least

facing competition from a new invention. Gau tier's ref erences to "understand," "spirit," and "essence" may have been prompted by the need to defend a position and status. After all, such terms featured in the vocabu lary of 'the true artist:' see, for instance, the quotation from Jan Veth above which refers to "character" and "soul." Meanwhile the artists whose work was to be repro

duced saw it as an advantage that photography made them less dependent on the skills (and the 'understand ing'!) of the reproductive engravers. There were cer tainly complaints about this.63 And here is what the crit ic Carel Vosmaer wrote in 1879, when he gave his support to a number of artists who were protesting against the new copyright law under which the visual arts were not protected while printed works were. The consequence was that reproductive prints were protect ed but not the originals (paintings, drawings, sculp tures, etc.). The reproductive arts enjoyed protection; what was reproduced did not. Vosmaer commented: "The artist must stand idly by while his work is repro duced in extremely ugly or sometimes seriously defec tive prints which do not give the faintest glimmer of his piece. And this happens all too often. Not every en graver or lithographer should be allowed to launch into copying a work of art in his own, sometimes inadequate, fashion."64

Photography not only served art as a reproductive

6i On this see above all R.M. Verhoogt, Kunst in reproductie: de re productie van kunst in de negentiende eeuw en in het bijzonder van Ary Scheffer (iygs-i8s8), Jozef Israels (1824-igii) en Lourens Alma Tadema (1836-1Q12) (diss.), Amsterdam 2004.

62 P.J. Veth, "De schuttersmaaltijd van Van der Heist," De Gids 21 (1857), nr. 1, pp. 537-66, esp. pp. 563-64: "...dan eene kopij; zij is eene vertolking; zij is een werk van geduld, van liefde. De graveur moet zijn origineel liefhebben, bewonderen, begrijpen; hij moet den geest er van in zieh hebben opgenomen en in zijn innigst wezen zijn doorgedrong en; want het is niet genoeg de lijnen der compositie, de omtrekken der vormen naauwkeurig we?r te geven, licht en schaduw op hunne juiste

plaats aan te brengen, de halve tinten met talent te doen wegsmelten; neen van den graveur wordt meer geeischt!"

63 Verhoogt, op. cit. (note 61), pp. 298, 322-23. 64 C.V. [C. Vosmaer], "Het advies der kunstenaars over het eigen

domsrecht van hunne werken," De Nederlandsche Spectator 1879, p. 113: "Thans moet de kunstenaar het lijdelijk aanzien dat zijn werk

worde gereproduceerd in zeer onschoone of soms allergebrekkigste prenten, die van zijn kunststuk niet het flauwste schijnsel weergeven. En dit gebeurt maar al te vaak. Niet iedere graveur of steenteekenaar mag zieh zoo maar op een kunstwerk werpen en dat op zijne, soms ge brekkige wijze, nabeelden."

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

312 HANS ROOSEBOOM

13 George Hendrik Breitner, The Westerdok covered with snow,

gelatin silver print. Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, Rijksprentenkabinet

technique, but also as a means of making studies. It has never replaced studies done by hand, but soon after its introduction in 1839 artists were using photographic images. Sometimes they made them themselves, often they used photographs taken by others that were on sale or had been published in periodicals and books. Among them were such prominent figures as Marius Bauer,

George Hendrik Breitner, Jozef and Isaac Israels, Mat thijs Maris, Hendrik Willem Mesdag, Willem Roelofs,

Th?r?se Schwartze, Jan Veth and Willem Witsen (fig. 13). This list could easily be expanded; it seems as if it had become general practice.

This is not to say that everybody valued photography as an aid. In 1902 the artist W.B. Tholen wrote two let ters to the art critic G.H. Marius. In them he called on

her to write something about the harmful influence of photography: "photography is steering painting in such a wrong direction that it's time this was stated out loud." He added that he had not fallen into the tempta tion to take up photography and thus spare himself the

trouble of making drawn studies. An artist might gain some advantage from this, but he also lost something. "I picture this scene, as one frets because of lack of study and imagination, the devil comes and says: but why go to all that trouble, why tire yourself out with studying and drawing? Look here. And from his pocket he takes a photo of the scene that one is trying to depict. It con tains everything you need, ready-made and absolutely perfect. You can make use of this discovery, it saves you a great deal of time and trouble compared to working and studying from nature. You take your snapshot and then you just copy it. People will be amazed, it will make you rich and respected, you can make what you like without any special knowledge. I will tell you the secret, says the devil, on condition that your heart belongs to me."65

The Faust theme is obvious in this passage, and it is clear how evil Tholen thought it was for an artist to sell his "heart" (soul) and give up the artistic struggle to gain easily obtained status and wealth. He stuck to the

65 A. de Jong, Willem Bastiaan Tholen, 1860-1Q31, Gouda & Assen 1993, pp. 156-57: "...de photografie stuurt de schilderkunst zoo'n ver keerde kant uit, dat het tijd wordt dat dit eens openlijk wordt uit geroepen.... Ik stel me dit geval voor dat, zittende te tobben door gemis aan Studie en voorstellingsvermogen, de duivel komt en zegt: maar wat

doe je een moeite, wat vermoei je je met studeren en teekenen, kijk eens hier, en hij haalt een photo uit zijn zak van het geval dat men bezig is uittebeelden. Hierop staat kant en klaar wat je noodig hebt in de uiter ste perfectie. Je kunt van deze ontdekking gebruik maken, het bespaart je veel tijd en moeite van naar de natuur te werken en te studeeren. Je

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Myths and misconceptions: photography and painting in the nineteenth century 313

old view that an artist did not work for honor or money,

but purely for the love of art. From the studies by Anne mieke Hoogenboom and Chris Stolwijk on the position of painters in the first and second half of the nineteenth

century respectively, by Dieuwertje Dekkers on Jozef Israels and Goupil, and by Robert Verhoogt on the practice of making reproductions of paintings, we know that the ideal was rarely if ever achieved by any artist.66 The official line on art and artistic practice did not match reality in many cases. The finances were indeed carefully watched; works were sometimes made primar ily with an eye to their reproducibility; and there was cooperation with dealers and publishers, for whom artists worked on commission.67

Those who wished to preserve the idealistic image of the artist, and to live up to it themselves, were unlikely to parade the fact that they were working from pho tographs. Not every artist would have wanted to run the risk of having his work less favorably reviewed because of that; after all, the critics' verdict was important for a successful career. Even an artist like Breitner, who was seen as in the front rank, might be severely taken to task for this reason. The year he died saw the publication of Albert Plasschaert's K?rte geschiedenis der Hollandsche schilderkunst, in which he wrote of Breitner: "in addition I believe that here and there I detect the use of a photo graphic apparatus (that danger)."68

One may ask whether there is much point in paying a lot of attention in monographs on artists to their use of photographs, especially since it may have been mainly the critics who were bothered by this. Their criteria have proved more ephemeral than many a work whose measure they took using them. The frequent references to working with photographs in modern monographs or other publications can easily create the impression that this is something special. That is not the case. These were not incidents: getting help from photographic im

ages seems to have been a habit with the majority of artists.

The fact that in many cases artists kept silent about this does not necessarily mean that they were concerned about breaking a taboo, although this is regularly assert ed in the literature on the history of art and photogra

phy.69 It should be remembered that it was quite com mon for artists to be reticent about their working methods and techniques.

The art-historical literature often focuses on the use

of photographs by artists, and this probably has much to do with the idea that photography and art are or were two different things. Now various differences between the two may be pointed out, but working from pho tographs probably should be viewed primarily in the light of the tradition of working from one's own or someone else's drawings and prints?an old practice no one thought twice about. In the twentieth century this tradition was to be continued, because many an artist used illustrations from magazines and newspapers as ex amples.

Meanwhile times have changed and artists and critics now speak openly about the use of photographs. These days photography is counted among the arts without further ado, and this has more to do with changing atti tudes to what constitutes art than with a metamorphosis

of photography, whose fundamental principles have not basically changed. Photography simply could not meet the requirements and criteria imposed on works of art in the nineteenth century. The camera portrayed the sub ject in a way that did not tally with prevailing attitudes. It was not until those demands changed that photogra phy came within the domain of the arts.

RIJKSMUSEUM AMSTERDAM

neemt je kiek je en maakt het gewoon na, de menschen zullen verbaasd staan, je zult erdoor rijk worden en tot aanzien komen, en zult maken wat je wilt, zonder kennis van zaken. Ik wil je dat geheim zeggen, zegt de duivel, onder voorwaarde dat je hart aan mij zal behooren."

66 Hoogenboom, op. cit. (note 9); Stolwijk, op. cit. (note 9); D. Dekkers, Jozef Israels: een succesvol schilder van het vissersgenre (diss.), Amsterdam 1994; D. Dekkers, "Goupil en de internationale versprei ding van Nederlandse eigentijdse kunst," jfong Holland 11 (1995) nr. 4, pp. 22-36; Verhoogt, op. cit. (note 61).

67 Verhoogt, op. cit. (note 61).

68 A. Plasschaert, K?rte geschiedenis der Hollandsche schilderkunst: van af de Haagsche School tot op den tegenwoordigen tijd, Amsterdam 1923, p. 122: "...tevens lijkt mij hier en daar de hulp te erkennen van een photographisch toestel (dat gevaar)."

69 See, for example, LT. Leijerzapf (ed.), Fotografie in Nederland i8j?-i?20, The Hague 1978, p. 72; J.F. Heijbroek, "Werken naar foto's, een terreinverkenning: Nederlandse kunstenaars en de fo tograf?e in het Rijksmuseum," Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 34 (1986), pp. 220-36, esp. p. 222; and Hollema and Kouwenhoven, op. cit. (note 26), p. 39.

This content downloaded from 132.174.250.215 on Wed, 21 Feb 2018 22:00:40 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

ŞTEFAN-SEBASTIAN MAFTEI

BETWEEN “CRITIQUE” AND PROPAGANDA: THE CRITICAL SELF- UNDERSTANDING OF ART IN THE HISTORICAL AVANT-GARDE.

THE CASE OF DADA

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Department of Philosophy, Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. Email: [email protected]

Abstract: The purpose of this study is to analyze the tenets that relate to Dada’s self- understanding of art. The phenomenon Dada is notoriously difficult to describe; some critics hesitate even to use the term “movement.” Focusing on Dadaists’ reflections about the phenomenon itself, we will try to delineate a general image of the Dada in the context of the European avant-gardes of the 20-th century. We will also try to analyze the historical and political context inside which the dada phenomenon occurred. Our main focus will be on two main tenets of Dadaism: the “self-critical” feature of Dada’s self-image as it emerges during the main phases of its history, especially during its early phase, and the political commitment of Dada during its last phases of development.

Key Words: Dada, art, Romania, Hasidism, modernity, mostmodernity, politics, critique, ideology, propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, vol. 9, no. 27 (Winter 2010): 219-245 ISSN: 1583-0039 © SACRI

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 220

The Meaning(s) of Dada

The montage, the collage, the photomontage, the ready-made, or the happening have all developed nowadays into typical artistic techniques, occasionally clichéd to the point of tasteless kitsch. Surely, since the beginnings of XX-th century mass-culture, these techniques have been, in various forms and concentrations, entering the mainstream production lines of consumerist cultural objects. Despite all these, to the usual contemporary reader of art literature, it is relatively unknown that these modes of expression and these techniques were, basically, inventions of groups of artists at the beginning of the XX-century, “revolutionary” artists that rebelled against societal conventions, political structures, and social norms, against bourgeois institutions, narrow habits and mindless ideologies, and finally, against the situation of the “art” itself, which they considered artificial, immoral, false, and depraved.

These artists were later labeled “avant-garde” artists. In its earliest use, “avant-garde” denominated the artistic groups around 1825, commonly associated with Saint-Simonism and Fourierism. The pre- socialist Olinde Rodrigues called upon artists “to serve as an avant-garde” for social change and for a “glorious future.” He considered that art had the power to affect its audience and to produce sensations that would ennoble thought as well as provide the energy for social change towards the common good. Richard Murphy, in his Theorizing the Avant-Garde (2004), produces evidence of a number of texts from the English Romantic writers, such as Wordsworth or Shelley. They echoed the humanitarian ideas of their age and held that the function of the work of art is to generate enlightening and civilizing emotions, which would “bind people together, strengthening and purifying the affections and so enlarging the individual’s capacity to resist early modernity’s negative effects – most notably those of alienation.” In the German-speaking world, the most influential Romantic writer who encouraged this form of utopian aestheticism was Friedrich Schiller. 1 In France, the utopian ideas about art were discussed earlier by Condorcet and Rousseau and put into practice by the French Revolutionaries, especially Gracchus Babeuf and Pierre Sylvain Maréchal (see their famous Manifesto of the Equals, 1796). Different from the German or the English writers, the French intellectuals of the Revolution were more interested in the propagation of real political goals or social policies. Purifying passions through art and seeking virtuous instruction in the artistic oeuvres were not their main concern. Commenting on different meanings of the term „avant-garde,” Richard Murphy differentiates between the “idealist” avant-garde of the XIX-th century, characterized by the “goal of reducing distance from art and life” and by the “elevation of the worldly to the ideal sphere of art,” and the “historical

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 221

avant-garde” of the early XX-th century, delineated by its cynical attack on the once progressive function of “social-based,” utopian art. 2

Of these so-called “avant-garde” artists, the Dadaists were perhaps the most popular group in and outside the world of art. Dada’s popularity inside the artists’ “professional” guild, so to speak, came from the hostility of its unequivocal message directed at the mechanisms, the institutions and the ideology of the world of art, a message which was persuasively summed up in a single catchword: dada. This popularity also transformed the Dada, which originally emerged in Zürich, into an international art phenomenon: artists in Paris, Berlin, Cologne, New York, or the Netherlands soon became supporters of the Dada. In New York, Dada produced one of its iconic symbols: Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain, which was photographed by Alfred Stieglitz in 1917. The Dada also related very strongly to the larger sphere of modern early XX-th century mass culture, not simply because many of their “productions” were already produced by the mass culture (in visual arts, the main “materials” out of which the Dada artworks were created were, generally, used consumer goods), but also because some of their ideas caught the attention of the mass media. For example, the motif of the “mustachioed” artwork, embodied by Marcel Duchamp’s L.H.O.O.Q, was popularized by a Warner Bros cartoon of 1946, Daffy Doodles, directed by Robert McKimson, featuring Daffy Duck as the mustache “artist” or the “mustache fiend,” bent on drawing a mustache on every lip.

Perhaps the epitome of Dada is the cheap postcard representing the Mona Lisa, onto which the same Marcel Duchamp drew in pencil a mustache and a beard, naming his new “work” L.H.O.O.Q. (the title is a pun, the letters pronounced in French giving the sentence Elle a chaud au cul). Duchamp offered his new “version” of Mona Lisa as a jest, deriding not only the Mona Lisa itself, Leonardo’s masterpiece, but also unveiling Mona Lisa as a bourgeois symbol, as a “mustachioed” social icon, an icon essentially produced emblematically by the establishment itself. This provocation created a scandal, of course, but also raised a serious question about the nature of what a “modern” or “classical” artwork represents.

To the current art connoisseur, the name Dada cannot be submitted to a general definition.3 Tristan Tzara himself confirmed much later, in an interview in 1959, that Dada was not a “school,” not a “direction,” but an “adventure,” “against all conventions, theories and dogmas.” Comparing Dada to Surrealism, he also stated that the Dadaists were too individualistic to attach themselves to politics in general or to any political doctrine, such as Marxism. He contended that, in his Dada period, he had no notion of “Marxism” or of “politics” in general. Only the Surrealists were really into politics. In his view, Dada was generally “anarchistic enough” for not being political at all. After Tzara’s death in 1963, these views became typical of the history of the Dada “movement” in Zürich.

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 222

The indefinable character of Dada is perhaps caused by the strong performative nature of the term itself, “dada.” “Dada” could not be referred to anything in particular. Eventually, this did not deterred a historical dispute between the German and the French Dadaists. In his 2009 Posthuman Dada Guide, the Romanian-born American writer Andrei Codrescu summarizes the historical dispute around the paternity of the name Dada between Tzara and Huelsenbeck and suggests that, probably, Tzara must had been the first to suggest the name Dada. This is also confirmed by the importance of Da in Russian and Romanian, meaning “Yes.” Therefore, the name DaDa would probably simply mean a radical No, which is, ironically, the result of a double affirmation “YesYes.” The author also suggests that the name has not been chosen by pure accident and it had been selected especially because of its strong performative character and that its use had been initially a rhetorical one, since it skeptically overemphasized an affirmation. Thus, a double affirmation can mean, ironically, “Yeah, right” or “Sure enough!,” generally suggesting that overagreeing with anything is the mark of the general stupidity of people always willing to give up their freedom. Codrescu’s speculations about dada do not contradict the general opinion of the so-called “founders” (Tzara, Huelsenbeck, Ball), that Dada cannot be used as a manifesto of a movement, since Dada is entirely negative to any affirmation, system or theory and, thus, there cannot be any real manifestos supporting Dada: the manifesto of Dada can be an anti- manifesto only.4

As for the manner it has been invented, the term Dada emerged without having a particular meaning. Also, Dada had no founding father. In the same manner, Dada had no place of origin: Dada emerged, almost simultaneously, in many places: Zürich, Berlin, Cologne, Hanover, Paris, and New York, with support from many significant, but very different artists, such as Marcel Duchamp, Francis Picabia, Tristan Tzara, Max Ernst, Johannes Baargeld, Marcel Janco, Jean Arp, Hugo Ball, Kurt Schwitters, Raoul Hausmann, etc.

Dada’s forms of expression are also very diverse. Literary historians discuss Dada as performed manifestos and recited sound poems (a sequence of syllables without rhyme or meaning), a form of poetry announcing the Surrealist écriture automatique. On the other hand, art historians designate Dada artworks as defying the limits of their visual medium.

Dada “artworks” were usually conceived as all-in-one theatrical performances, art happenings, counting music, dance, poems, theory, costumes, as well as paintings. Jangling keys, gymnastic exercises called noir cacadou, and screaming presentations of sound poetry or other texts accompanied these performances. All of this took place in tight and crowded spaces with almost no distance between the spectators and the performers. The dada music and dance parodied African music, and the

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 223

costumes featured body masks made of painted cardboard, copying a mix of African themes and other motifs based on the machine aesthetics of the Futurists. A large number of Dadaist artworks were ads, posters, manifestos; but, as Tristan Tzara suggests, the Dadaist ads, unlike the Cubist or the Futurist adds, were not intended to boost the social appeal of the artworks themselves: “Dada has also used advertisements, but not as alibi, as allusion, as matter used for suggestive or aesthetic purposes. Dada put the reality of the advertisement itself in the service of its own commercial purposes.”

Recently, more historically focused studies, such as Tom Sandqvist’s Dada East 5 adds up another dimension to the Dada’s puzzling question of “origin”: the local ethnic, religious and cultural dimension of the “Easterners” that took part in the formation of the Dada in Zürich. These “Easterners” were mostly Romanians of Jewish origin. The cultural, religious and ethnic backgrounds of artists such as Tristan Tzara (Samuel Rosenstock, born in Moineşti), Marcel Janco (Marcel Hermann Iancu, born in Bucharest), Jules Janco (Iuliu Iancu, Marcel’s brother), Arthur Segal (Aron Sigalu, born in Botoşani) are of great importance in documenting the early origins of Dada. Sandqvist’s study, for example, describes the Dada “processions” or performances in relation to ancient Romanian Christian and Pre-Christian religious festivals and rituals, such as the Romanian folk dances that celebrated the coming of the New Year’s Eve. He suggests that the ancient ritual masks of the Romanian folk festivals, for instance, inspired the Dada grotesque masks manufactured by Janco for the performances at the Cabaret Voltaire. Also, Dada’s dances and songs, which were performed in front of a noisy audience, allegedly may originate from the ecstatic songs of the Hasidic folklore. Also, the influence of the Jewish folk theater in the Eastern part of Romania may have been a strong cultural incentive for these Eastern exiles. The mixture of Romanian and Jewish folklore that surfaces in the Dada events suggests, in Sandqvist’s opinion, the thesis that the Dada could have been originated from Eastern Europe. Sandqvist goes even further, by delineating a political, social, religious and cultural environment that could have set the scene for the so-called chaotic, senseless, cynical features of the Dadaistic Weltanschauung. Ex oriente Dada, one of the book’s chapter titles, is also the main thesis of his study. He contends that, ultimately, Dada would most probably not have happened as it happened without its essential Eastern European cultural backdrop. To the émigré artists from Romania, the country itself was the main source of inspiration. Romania’s struggle for modernization during the last three decades of the 19-th century generated a peculiar identity crisis in every aspect of life, emerging as a result of the violent clash between newly adopted Western values and a long-established Oriental way of life 6. This phenomenon created a confusing display of Western European political, cultural or religious influences weighed down by deeply rooted Oriental mores. Some of the

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 224

Romanian intellectuals at the end of the 19-th and the beginning of the 20- th century saw the newly born Romanian society not only as an unusual “mixture”, but also as a realm of deep contradictions 7. Romanian literature of the 1900’s, although still for the most part in its early euphoric and nationalistic stage, already had its literary “absurdism” at the end of the 19-th century, represented by satirists such as I. L. Caragiale. Caragiale’s sarcastic comedies were later followed by the absurd and grotesque short stories of Urmuz (pseudonym of Demetru Demetrescu-Buzău).8

It is also worth mentioning that the Romanian-Jewish founders of Dada had a subtle relation to Hasidism. Arthur Segal could be the first example, although his involvement with the Dada has not been particularly long lasting. Segal’s theory of Gleichwertigkeit in painting, expressed in his pseudo-cubist productions, suggests influences from the Hasidic doctrine of the all-penetrating, all-filling God. Thus, a particularly avant-gardist feature of the XX-th century painting suddenly can be traced back to an early modern form of Jewish Mysticism. The basic idea that painting is not autonomous, but a part of reality and, therefore, that the painted surface should not be limited by the frame – an idea which is also fundamental to the XX-th century theory of “collage” and “ready- made” – is not only a common attribute of XX-th century visual aesthetics, but also has a potential ancestry in the 18-th century Jewish Hasidism. Besides the vision of the decentralized image, which is particularly obvious in Segal’s paintings, there is also a possible Hasidic influence, as Sandqvist suggests, in Tzara’s theory of poetic language 9. The Hasidic decentralized vision of God is a potential source for Tzara’s “decentralized” or non-hierarchical view of language. The Hasidic doctrine is also related to Tzara’s idea about the illusion of reference outside the spoken language itself. Tzara’s famous phrase “Thought is made in the mouth” 10 may be interpreted in a Hasidic vein. Another feature of Hasidism that reflects its influence upon Dada is the communitarian view, which is nevertheless common to almost all Dada artists, not only to the Eastern Europeans. Furthermore, there are other religious aspects that could have influenced Dada not merely in an indirect way, but these do not pertain directly to our present study 11.

“Dada is political”

It is probably taken for granted in art criticism today that the function of contemporary art is, primarily, a self-critical one, i.e. the primary task of the artist’s work is, apparently, to question the conditions and the techniques of its own artistic genre. To the critic, it becomes obvious that the self-conscious discourse about art must be interpreted as a discourse that is conscious of its own conditions of emergence. In addition, every analysis of the qualities or the characteristics of a “work of

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 225

art” must take into account, in any of its aspects, be it aesthetical, political, or social, the special conditions of the development of that particular aspect. If one might speak, for example, of the “politicization” of a certain art genre or art movement, the first thought that comes into mind is the idea that “art is, in some sense, always already politicized,” that “the category of art has been constructed differently at different times and places, and within different, social and political systems.” 12 Moreover, this is a virtue of the contemporary artwork itself, deeply embedded into its construction, sometimes evident even to the untrained eye.

The expression “critical self-understanding of art,” present in the title, points to the stage of “self-criticism,” drawing on Peter Bürger’s formula, characteristic to the avant-garde in general, a “self-criticism” to which the Dada was committed. 13 Undoubtedly, the formula “self- criticism” does not refer to a critical function of art in society but, first, to a critical function of art in relation to itself. Considering the advent of the avant-garde in the XX-th century, one can emphasize that Dada’s main contribution to the history of art was to instill an emerging uncertainty about any kind of “universal validity” to be claimed about art in theory, or, to quote Peter Bürger, “the subsequent impossibility of any particular form or movement claiming universal validity.” 14 Of course, the discussion about Dada’s “self-criticism” also reflects the status of contemporary theory, a paradoxical “postmodern” theory, 15 which is bent to produce a discourse, a theory, under the provision of a constant self-awareness of its own conditions of emergence, viz. of a constant awareness of the hidden ideological assumptions behind the “stereotype,” “modernistic,” in essence “bourgeois” artwork.16

Nonetheless, the “self-criticism” present in Dada is, apparently, relentlessly foreclosed by its political commitments. The Zürich Dada, for instance, is generally considered not the “political” phase of Dada, an opinion which is, nevertheless, still open to debate. 17 However, a social criticism and a strong aversion against all that seemed similar to “eternal values,” “universal feelings,” or “sublime art” were common to all Dadaists. The horrors of war shattered their faith in everything that was believed to have an “eternal value.” According to Tzara, the Dada was not simply an “individualistic” phenomenon at all. On the other hand, to put it more clearly, the revolt of the artist could not simply be coined as “individualistic.” Dada was abhorrent of any “-ism.” In protest, the personal revolt fused with a vitriolic social criticism, which announced the ruling out of the modernist idea of “individualism” in art. The expressionists, the cubists, and the futurists were criticized as being “aesthetic” individualists. The artist’s individual “sentiments” were no longer fashionable to a Dadaist. Also, artists who expressed “universal feelings,” even when they were expressing despair or powerlessness, were considered “bourgeois.” As Walter Benjamin states in his famous Work of

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 226

Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, “the Dadaists turned the artwork into a missile,” 18 by essentially transforming its contemplative function into a radical distraction (Ablenkung), the creation of scandal. Benjamin reaches the conclusion that what Dadaists wanted to do with their art was similar to the desired effect of the cinema, which was created with the purpose of reaching an audience by “distraction” and “shock:”

“The Dadaists attached much less importance to the commercial usefulness of their artworks than to the uselessness of those works as objects of contemplative immersion. They sought to achieve this uselessness not least by thorough degradation of their material. Their poems are "wordsalad" containing obscene expressions and every imaginable kind of linguistic refuse. The same is true of their paintings, on which they mounted buttons or train tickets. What they achieved by such means was a ruthless annihilation of the aura in every object they produced, which they branded as a reproduction through the very means of its production. Before a painting by Arp or a poem by August Stramm, it is impossible to take time for concentration and evaluation, as one can before a painting by Derain or a poem by Rilke. Contemplative immersion-which, as the bourgeoisie degenerated, became a breeding ground for asocial behavior- is here opposed by distraction as a variant of social behavior. Dadaist manifestations actually guaranteed a quite vehement distraction by making artworks the center of scandal. One requirement was paramount: to outrage the public.”19

Some of the early Zürich Dadaists, such as Hugo Ball and Richard

Huelsenbeck, who later became an entrepreneur for the fellow artists in Berlin, had been expressing strong political opinions against capitalism, war, nationalism, and imperialism during their Dadaist adventure. 20 Yet, they weren’t committed to any political ideology during those years spent in Zürich. As Tzara contended later in his 1959 interview, the attribute “political” relates generally to a certain degree of commitment to a political program or ideology.21 Still, after 1918, Dada artists supported political programs. Also, in an interview from 1944, the Berliner artist John Heartfield summarized the history of Dada and also its political ambitions:

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 227

“Before the 1917 Revolution, dada was nihilistic. This means: destroying the ‘spiritual’ for being able to infiltrate to the core of basic reality. Out of this emerges a militant agitation in politics and art: not being satisfied with the general considerations on corruption and government incompetence, but ‘Naming names!’ – Who is guilty? With nihilism, this period has also known the consciousness of solitude – a cry in the wilderness of corruption, indifference, and servile submission. Afterward, there came the Revolutions of 1917, 1918, the emergence of the Soviet State despite the counter- revolution and the interventions. Suddenly, awareness: we are not alone. More important than Krupp, Thyssen, Morgan and Rockefeller were the masses who wanted to destroy the roots of the bourgeois lifestyle and wished to rebuild a whole new society in its place. Moreover, these masses are our allies – they are putting into practice what we can only hope for, what we cannot achieve, in spite of our desperate efforts. The nihilism wasn’t helping anymore. There was a positive period of intensive development, of enlargement, of new perspectives and influences: from the Proletkult - passing through Russian experimentalists such as Tatlin and Maïakovski and, above all, the writer Ehrenburg - to a progressive displacement of the center of gravity. The Revolution conveyed the message: We are not alone. The lesson we are learning from the Soviets is: not the ‘how’, but the ‘what’. Not how to express something, it is not the form that counts, but what is said, the content.” 22

One of the most famous moments of Dada’s commitment to politics was the “Kunstlump Debatte,” or the “Art Scoundrel Debate,” that took place in Dresden in the spring of 1919, as a reaction to the bloody clashes between government troops and the workers of Dresden.23 The debate was between George Grosz and John Heartfield, on one hand, which were both founding members of the German Communist Party and, on the other hand, Oskar Kokoschka, the Expressionist painter who had, at the time, asked the public to secure the preservation of the cultural heritage under conditions of political unrest. In April 1919, Grosz and Heartfield published a pamphlet in the Communist journal Der Gegner, entitled Der Kunstlump (The Art Scoundrel), where they replied to Kokoschka’s plea for the preservation of the invaluable artworks in the museums and galleries. Kokoschka’s own appeal was a reaction to an episode in Dresden, where,

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 228

during the fighting, a stray bullet had pierced Rubens’s masterpiece Bathsheba. Kokoschka pleaded for a preservation of the “human culture” that “might come into danger.” Grosz and Heartfield accused Kokoschka of bourgeois indifference towards the tragic loss of human lives 24.

The exact moment of the publication of this manifest is very important in understanding its vehemence. Grosz and Heartfield were Communist artists trying to defend their cause in a historical period when Germany was somewhere between the end of the war and the signing of the Weimar Constitution. Grosz manifesto appeared at the highest point of the Communist revolution in Germany, in the spring of 1919. The success of the 1917 Russian Revolution filled the left-wing German intelligentsia with high expectations for the future of Communism in Germany. One of the German states (Bavaria) had already declared itself a “Soviet” Republic after a Communist putsch in the autumn of 1918. In 1918, revolutionary forces besieged German cities, such as Kiel, Hanover, Munich, and Frankfurt. After violent riots and mass demonstrations, the SPD government stopped the revolutionaries by force. With the signing of the Weimar Constitution in August 1919, the Revolution was officially ended. Nevertheless, the political struggle of the left-wing parties in Germany was not over yet. From 1919 on, during the relatively stable and democratic political climate of the Weimar Republic, numerous German philosophers, writers, and artists have also supported this struggle.

Some of the Dada artworks themselves were conceived as reactions to certain situations. As Carl Einstein wrote about Otto Dix, the Dadaists and the Expressionists of the Weimar period practiced iconoclasm by ruining forms through representation, “aiming the exploding kitsch of the present matter-of-factly in the faces of their contemporaries.” 25 This is the case of a Berlin Dada “masterpiece,” a sculptural montage by Grosz and Heartfield named Der wildgewordene Spieβer Heartfield (The Middle-Class Philistine Heartfield Gone Wild) – created especially for the 1920 International Dada Fair in Berlin. The title, Middle-Class Philistine Heartfield Gone Wild alluded to a phrase Lenin used earlier that year to attack “radicalist” artists or intellectuals (particularly from Germany) who were Communist themselves, but not particularly attached to the party-line drawn by Lenin himself. In a brochure entitled Radicalism, The Infantile Sickness of Communism (Der „Radikalismus,” die Kinderkrankheit des Kommunismus), the leader of the Russian Revolution complained about the “extreme revolutionism (…) incapable of displaying any stability, organization, discipline and firmness” represented by the “petit bourgeois who is beside himself with rage as a consequence of the horrors of capitalism” (der infolge der Schrecken des Kapitalismus ‚auβer sich geratene’ Kleinbürger). Lenin’s attack split the German Communists into followers and contesters of Leninism. Grosz and Heartfield responded by attributing to Lenin a “bureaucratic mentality of an arrogant leader who thinks the revolution is his monopoly.” 26

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 229

Some of Hugo Ball’s texts from this period are, for instance, steady pieces of social and political criticism. On the whole, his attitude about the political future of Germany was very skeptical: although he did not trust democratic parliamentarism in a capitalism form, he considered that Germany’s chances of overcoming its problems with socialism were really irrelevant. In a fragment dated 31.5.1919, during the last days of Communist Revolution in Germany, he added:

“The latest disappointment that Germany was preparing to the world, the revolution ... we thought that our sufferings during the war will bring tranquility, that the nation would get rid of its nightmares, of its heroes and blood suckers through an upheaval. We were wrong. The exhaustion of this people is stunning (...) it is more advanced than is commonly believed.”27 In another fragment, he writes: “The capitalist industrial state of today, just as the socialist state of tomorrow ... (are) based on needs that are identical to nothing. Its fatalistic goal is a self-governing, self-regulating process of economic processes (…) [About capitalism and bolshevism] State capitalism and a future massive bureaucracy on the one hand, on the other hand, a worker’s slavery; these will, by no means, override the class difference between the centralized administration and the national working class (…) The anti-capitalist principle can be expanded and can take on more human forms. This principle ... is a tremendous step in the future. It is a consequence not of Marxism, but of the humanitarian and philanthropist socialist beginnings between 1780 and 1850, a profoundly Christian movement.”28

The period between 1918 and 1920 was very rich in exuberant political and social manifestos written by groups of artists: the November Group Manifesto of 1918, an Expressionist group leaded by Max Pechstein and Rudolf Belling, and the Work Council for Art Manifesto of 1919 both advocated the role of the visual arts in achieving a progressive political order. 29 The Work Council program would later become part of the social program of the German Bauhaus. Besides breaking with traditional art forms, The November Group pleaded for unification of all “revolutionaries of the spirit” (expressionism, cubism, futurism) and hoped for achieving “the closest possible relation between people and art” and “the moral cultivation of a young, free Germany.” They saw themselves not “as a party, or a class,” but more humanistic, as “human beings.” The Work

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 230

Council text was signed by Oskar Kokoschka himself and expressed several demands: a revolutionary liberation of the arts from traditional state domination: the “dissolution of the Academies,” recognition of the public character of all state and private buildings, freedom of art training from state supervision, the depoliticization and the liberation of art education, the just distributing of state revenues for the “old” as well as for the “new” art, etc.

Later, in 1924, a group of Communist artists (among them, Wieland Herzfelde, John Heartfield, George Grosz, Rudolf Schlichter, Otto Schmalhausen, Alois Erbach, Erwin Piscator) formed the “Red Group,” or the Association of Communist Artists, issuing a manifesto in their party newspaper, Der Rote Fahne (The Red Flag). The group was dissatisfied with the too many “anarchistic” productions of their fellow left-wing artists and pleaded for a more “planned” collaboration. By that time, these artists were already producing propaganda art for the German Communist Party.

The German Dadaists of 1919, Grosz and Heartfield, were different in their political radicalism. Their message was nihilistic, violent, and exceedingly utopian: there could be no compromise between the workers and the middle class; therefore, all signs of a bourgeois society and culture should simply disappeared. “Old” art simply could not exist in a workers’ society.

In their anti-art message, the artists demanded the utter transformation of all social and political conditions of the working class. Their point was obvious: the disappearance of all bourgeois remnants in a new society would also include the disappearance of all “bourgeois” artworks that were the living cultural icons of a society once ruled by class domination. Grosz and Heartfield’s message was very similar to Babeuf’s revolutionary slogan form his anarchistic Manifesto of the Equals (1796):

„We need not only that equality of rights written into the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen; we want it in our midst, under the roofs of our houses. We consent to everything for it, to make a clean slate so that we hold to it alone. Let all the arts perish, if need be, as long as real equality remains!”30

Later, in an article entitled Art is in Danger (1925), Grosz highlighted the importance of Dada to the history of art by resuming its main distinctive characteristics: its “anti-art” impetus, its tremendously critical social force, and its essentially “tendentious” nature. The “tendentiousness” is not only related to the overtly political or social commitment of the artist. It is also related to its “critical” task, namely “self-critical,” as long as Grosz does not see a problem in recognizing that every art is created inside a certain milieu and that its purpose is always under the influence of a set of ideological presumptions. Therefore, every

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 231

artist must be aware of the conditions of the emergence of its art. Moreover, this awareness does not contradict with the artist’s social or political message. It completes it31.

The thesis about the self-critical character of art is nowadays common to almost every postmodern art circle. With the occasion of a 1984 New York exhibition, organized by the New Museum of Contemporary Art, entitled Art and Ideology, one of the curators, Lucy Lippard, a leading feminist critic, declared: “now all art is ideological and all art is used politically by the right or the left, with the conscious and unconscious assent of the artist. There is no neutral zone.” She also contended that “artists who remain stubbornly uninformed about the social and emotional effects of their images and their connections to other images outside the art context are most easily manipulated by the prevailing systems of distribution, interpretation, and marketing.” 32

If “ideology” means nothing more than a set of cultural concepts or a manner of thinking, which is characteristic to a certain group, then the statement that “all art is ideological” is entirely acceptable, because “ideology,” seen as a set of values, becomes a question of cultural hermeneutics, which implies the constant awareness of the conditions of emergence of an artwork. In this case, “ideology” does not exclude self- criticism, because “ideology” itself turns into a term of cultural criticism, designating a set of cultural markers for a particular cultural medium.

Deconstructionist critics, such as Lucy Lippard, abandoned the early Marxist view that discussed “ideology” using a “dualist” scheme: ideology vs. non-ideology. To the early Marxist thinkers, ideology initially meant the “false” worldview shaped by the dominant class.33 Later, critics used the term against Marxism itself, by unmasking arguments that lead Marxist thinking to an intellectual monologue.34 Nowadays, critics of deconstruction, such as Peter Zima, fear that “deconstruction” might become more of an “ideological provocation” 35 instead of a sustained mode of criticism. The German Critical Theory understood the concept of “ideology” in a pejorative sense and considered that “critique” can never be “self-critical” if it cannot provide for itself a “meta-critical” function.

In the current state of affairs, the “critique” of ideology cannot differ from ideology itself. This tenet creates a real paradox, since the provision of “self-criticism” is satisfied not by a concept of “critique,” which is in itself meta-critical, but by a “critique” that is aware of its object, but cannot resist it.

However, Marxism and deconstruction are two opposite types of approaches to the question of “critique.” In questioning the “ideological” character of art in society, Marxism relies on a rationalistic method to secure the existence of a relationship between a theory and its object. Thus, the theory becomes the Ideologiekritik, while “ideology” is a rational, well-defined object. The early Marxists never suspected that their Kritik would soon turn into a well established, scientifically based, and politically

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 232

motivated ideology. Deconstruction, on the other hand, never relies on a strong relation between a well-defined theory and a well-established object. On the contrary, deconstruction dismisses the very relationship between a theory and an “object” of theory, since it presupposes a form of theoretical heresy, which questions the very notions of “theory” and “object.” Deconstruction is continually practicing a discourse on indeterminations, which upsets the rationalistic behavior of the early modernistic (including Marxist) theories. For instance, Derrida’s discourse on Kant’s aesthetics in The Truth in Painting unmasks Kant’s indirect venture of undermining his own discourse by explaining conceptually that the understanding of the beautiful cannot be realized by ways of logical judgment. The Marxist and the deconstructionist ways of appropriating the Other (of ideology) are quite different in their nature. Under the influence of Surrealism and Freud, deconstructionist critics see “ideology” as the Other of Reason. The only way to help one not to fall under the “ideological” spell, which is basically a mystique created by Reason, is to speculate upon the unconceivable, indefinite sides of “ideology.”

A highly upsetting issue is related to the prescriptive political Communist influences in art, which produced an ill-fated hybrid named the “propaganda art.” In propaganda art, namely the art that was produced by command to openly support Communist parties or Communist state policies, the contradiction between critique and ideology is fully manifested. During the Stalin era, the “Socialist realism” had been invented in Russia to ensure the power of the state’s propaganda. Many of the Russian “revolutionary” artists of the 1920’s were physically eliminated for speaking against this abuse. By the end of World War II, the “Socialist realism” had become, in various forms, the main policy on arts in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, after the Soviet communization. In communized countries, such as Romania, the “Socialist realism,” combined with autochthonistic motifs, developed into a national enterprise ruled by the state until 1989. In Communist China, Mao’s cult ensured the development of an industry of state propaganda art. However, Western Marxist authors, such as Terry Eagleton, consider that “propaganda art” is not the same thing as art’s political commitment.

Engels and Marx’s opinions were moderate in relation to art’s propagandistic purposes. Engels dismissed the overt political commitment in art, although he still contended that realist art is the best way to inspire the masses. He came up with the theory of the “objective partisanship” in art, which rejected both the photographic transport of sheer reality into art and the “political solution” overtly suggested. Engels considered that “the author needs not foist his own political views on his work because, if he reveals the real and potential forces objectively at work in a situation, he is already in that sense partisan. Partisanship, that is to say, is inherent in reality itself; it emerges in a method of treating social reality rather than in a subjective attitude towards it.” 36

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 233

Another set of Marxist critics writing on the subject of “commitment” attacked the problem from a different angle: production. Their theory could suggest a different kind of answer to the question of Dadaist political commitment. The fact that an artist is committed does not come from the fact that he is committed only to a theory or a program, but essentially from the fact that he is a producer of a work, and that this process of social production itself determines the nature of its art. Art is not only a part of the superstructure, but also a part of the economic base of society. Walter Benjamin’s theory from The Author as Producer, a text he wrote in 1934, addresses the following question: What is the work’s position with respect to the productive relations of its time?37 The originality of Benjamin, Terry Eagleton contends38, lies in his application of the theory of productive relations to art itself. Benjamin considers that the revolutionary artist should work on the emancipation of the forces of artistic production, creating new social relations between artist and audience: thus, the “revolutionary” task would be not the propagation of political ideas, keeping the old modes of artistic production in place, but developing the forces of production themselves, namely the new artistic media: cinema, radio, photography, or musical recording. The newspaper is a new media of production as far as it dismisses conventional separations between literary genres, between writer and poet, scholar and popularizer, between author and reader. Gramophone records, the new media for classical music, have transformed the common concert hall. Cinema and photography alter the conventional modes of perception. The “committed” artists, Benjamin states, are always working on their means of production. Their interests are not primarily in the art object. The commitment to the revolutionary art turns out not to be propaganda, but a commitment to the new forms of production: the artist not only conveys a message, but changes the society by transforming the media and, finally, by transforming its spectators into collaborators. In support of his idea, Benjamin portrays the case of the Dada photomontage. He speaks of the emergence of a “materialist critique,” in place of the old “strategic critique,” because, given the materiality of the artwork that develops into “technique,” the “object” (of critique) in fact becomes object of “experience.” In the case of Dada artworks, a vision about an anti-art is reflected by the technical manipulation of material:

“The revolutionary force of Dadaism lays in the fact that it put the authenticity of art to the test. The Dadaists made still-lives out of tickets, spools, cigarette butts that were integrated into painted elements. Then, they showed it to the public: see, the picture-frame explodes time, the tiniest real fragment of everyday life says more than painting. Just as a bloody fingerprint of a murderer on the page of a book says more than the painting.” 39

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 234

Thus, Benjamin’s contention that Dadaism “turns the artwork into a missile” does not eventually refer to the political message conveyed by the artist through his work, but to the “revolutionary” character of the medium created by the artwork itself. The construction of a traditional artwork has a unique character, due to the uniqueness of its producing. But the reproduction of an artwork using new technologies affects the nature of the work itself. Photography or film-cameras demystify the art object, by bringing it closer to its audience. The process of the transformation into the medium itself, which, in Dada’s case, is the fabrication of collage, the ready-made or the photomontage, conveys a “shock” effect to its audience. “Shock” is an essential category to Benjamin’s aesthetics and it is directly related to the transformations inside the medium of art. Actually, Benjamin suggests that the collage “reproduces” in the artwork the tremendous transformations of the modern urban life experience: the discontinuous perceptions, the tumultuous noise, and the impact of the fragmentary. The moment when the audience experiences this insight about the nature of its own everyday life experience is what Benjamin, the Dada’s aesthetician, characterizes as a new kind of aesthetic experience created by the new media, such as a film: “The function of film is to train human beings in the apperceptions and reactions needed to deal with a vast apparatus whose role in their lives is expanding almost daily.” 40

Commenting on avant-garde’s achievements, Peter Bürger emphasized its anti-modernistic focus on criticizing the aesthetic autonomy of the modern artwork, a provision defined later by Habermas as the “independence of artworks from extra-aesthetic uses.”41 By dismissing art’s autonomy, avant-garde criticized, on one hand, art’s lack of social impact and, on the other hand, the inability of aestheticism to criticize itself. In this context, Dada is considered the most radical gesture of self-criticism in the history of art as a modern institution. Dada’s acts of irreverence against the modern ideals of beauty and sublimity in art attack the problem at its core: it is not necessary only to condemn beauty and sublimity, while still keeping up with the traditional ideology of art institutions and perpetuating their ways of thinking the autonomy of art. If we want to dismiss modernism, then we should also abandon the institutional frameworks through which art is generated, as well as the “dominant social discourses” emerging in relation to art during the XIX-th century. As a result, the avant-gardes of the XX-th century responded first with an attempt to “deconstruct” avant la lettre the mimetic theories of art and its ideological counterpart, aestheticism. Second, artists emphasized art’s “affirmative” function of responding to social and political situations.42 In dada’s case, the “deconstruction” of aesthetic ideologies became a nihilistic critique against modern art. As far as the “affirmative” function is concerned, this paper very well documented Dada’s militant reactions against political ideologies.

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 235

There remains the apparent contradiction between Dada’s initial ideological and epistemological skepticism and its subsequent involvements into political activism. How are we to understand, simultaneously, a revolt against representationalism in all artistic media, a kind of “decomposition” and “disintegration” always demanded by the Dadaists, close to a militant, activist, social message? How can these tendencies be brought together?

This problem can also be addressed to Bürger’s main thesis about the avant-garde, which emphasizes the undermining of aesthetic autonomy and the reintegration of art and reality, “the principle of overcoming art in the realm of life-praxis” (das Prinzip der Aufhebung der Kunst in der Lebenspraxis). In Richard Murphy’s view, Bürger’s thesis about the reintegration of art into life is problematic, as long as the instrumentalization of art for social or political causes might fail distinguishing between a commitment, which still keeps its capacity to criticize, namely a “real” reconciliation, and a “false reconciliation of art and life,” exemplified by the “aestheticized” fascism, by socialist realism, or by consumerist aesthetics.

In Benjamin’s as well as in Grosz’s views, there is no real danger that emancipated art might become instrumentalized for political purposes. On the contrary: instead of constantly fearing the spectrum of ideology, society should benefit from art’s new ways of transforming social reality. Benjamin sees a direct relationship between reproductibility, politicization, and distraction. Real art converges educational value in consumer value: its emancipatory appeal is better released in these conditions:

“Just as the art of the Greeks was geared toward tasting, so the art of the present is geared toward becoming worn out. This may happen in two different ways: through consignment of the artwork to fashion or through the work’s refunctioning [Umfunktionierung] in politics. Reproducibility- distraction- politicization. Educational value and consumer value converge, thus making possible a new kind learning. Art comes into contact with the commodity; the commodity comes into contact with art.” 43

Commenting on Schmitz’s conservative review of Eisenstein’s political oeuvres, Benjamin considers that the new media of film is perfectly fitted to reflect art’s deep seated political tendency:

“Why does [Schmitz] make such a fuss about the political deflowering of art? ... The claim that political tendencies are implicit in every artwork of every epoch-since these are, after all, historical

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 236

creations of consciousness-is a platitude. But just as deeper layers of rock come to light only at points of fracture [Bruchstellen], the deeper formation of a political position [Tendenz] becomes visible only at fracture points in the history of art (and in artworks). The technical revolutions-these are fracture points in artistic development where political positions, exposed bit by bit, come to the surface. In every new technical revolution, the political position is transformed-as if its own-from a deeply hidden element of art into a manifest one. And this brings us ultimately to film. Among the points of fracture in artistic formations, film is one of the most dramatic.” 44

When writing on the condition of Dada in relation to new forms of art, he is seeing the effects of the development of new techniques that defy the traditional ways of representation as a historical opportunity to radically transform social relationships. In Benjamin’s case, there is no confusion between a social emancipatory tendency and a significant transformation of the very nature of “art.” Moreover, he associates “destruction” with “distraction,” assuming that the revolutionary tendency of avant-garde is always associated with a real moment of “critique:”

“The history of every art form has critical periods in which the particular form strains after effects which can be easily achieved only with a changed technical standard- that is to say, in a new art form. The excesses and crudities of art which thus result, particularly in periods of so-called decadence, actually emerge from the core of its richest historical energies. In recent years, Dadaism has amused itself with such barbarisms. Only now is its impulse recognizable: Dadaism attempted to produce with the means of painting (or literature) the effects which the public today seeks in film.”45

In sum, our study has delineated two major tenets of Dada, both contributing to the unique anti-modernistic, “deconstructionist” nature of this rather exceptional avant-garde group.

One tenet is Dada’s “self-critical” tendency, which portrays the unique, individualistic, anarchic, and nihilistic relation of Dada to art institution itself. Promoting the unreserved dismissal of all modern aesthetic ideologies, the sheer rejection of “all conventions, all theories and all dogmas,” Dada, more than Expressionism or Futurism itself, brings art definitively into the XX-th century. The “self-critical,” namely

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 237

nihilistic, anti-rationalistic step in the development of Dada, represents, to my opinion, its authentic feature, the characteristic that transformed Dada into a real “adventure” of the avant-garde, to quote Tzara. Embodying the “incomprehensibility” or the “meaninglessness” in art, emphasizing art’s basically indeterminate character, against all theories on the more or less “formal” qualities of the aesthetic “object,” is the feature that brought not only art itself, but also the theory of art to a groundbreaking point.

The second, notable tenet of Dadaism is its unmistakable, albeit utopian politicization of art, which, under any conditions, must not be ignored. There are, of course, many interpretations relating to this aspect. Benjamin’s theories of “distraction” and “emancipation” offered a good starting point for the discussion of Dada’s political momentum. We have analyzed art’s promotion of political ideas in its special historical context, interpreting this tenet as a result not only of a special political situation, but also mainly as a result of Dada’s anti-modernistic nature. Ultimately, we have also emphasized the apparent contradictions that emerge from this surprising association between anti-modernistic nihilism and utopian politics.

Appendix 1

John Heartfield & George Grosz, Der Kunstlump, from: Der Gegner, 1. Jahrg.1919, Heft 10-12. The English translation is from: Kaes, Anton; Jay, Martin; Dimendberg, Edward (Eds.), The Weimar Republic Sourcebook. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994

“Yes, what is the worker supposed to do with art? Have painters

given their works the appropriate content for the working people’s struggle for liberation, the content that would teach them to free themselves from the yoke of a thousand years of oppression? (…) What is the worker supposed to do with art, which, despite all these disturbing facts, wants to lead him into a pristine world of ideas, tries to stop him from the revolutionary action, makes him forget the crimes of the wealthy, and deceives him with the bourgeois idea of a world of peace and order? (...) What is the worker supposed to do with the spirit of poets and philosophers who, in the face of everything that constricts his life breath, feel no duty to take up battle against the exploiters? Yes, what is the worker to do with art? (…) Workers! By presenting you the ideas of the Christian churches, they wish to disarm you, in order to deliver you more conveniently to the murderous machinery of state. Workers! By representing things in their paintings that the bourgeois can cling to, things that give you a reflection of beauty and happiness, they sabotage your class-consciousness, your will to power. By directing you to Art with the cry ‘Art to the people!’ they wish to seduce you into believing in a

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 238

common possession that you share with your oppressors, for the love of which you should cease the most just struggle the world has ever known (…) They once again wish to use the ‘spiritual’ to make you submissive and instill in you the awareness of your own smallness in relation to the wonders of the human spirit. (...) Workers, you, who continually create the surplus value that allows the exploiters to hang their walls with this ‘aesthetic’ luxury, you who thereby guarantee the livelihood of artists, which is nearly always more affluent than you own; workers, now listen how such an artist regards you and your struggle. (…) He who wishes his business with the brush to be regarded as a divine mission is a scoundrel. Today the gleaning of a gun by a Red soldier is of greater significance than the entire metaphysical output of all the painters. The concepts of art and artist are an invention of the bourgeoisie and their position in the state can only be on the side of those who rule, i.e. the bourgeois caste.

The title ‘artist’ is an insult. The designation ‘art’ is a cancellation of human equality (die

Bezeichnung ‚Kunst’ ist eine Annullierung der menschlichen Gleichwertigkeit) The deification of the artist is equivalent to self-deification. The artist does not stand above his milieu and the society of those

who approve of him. For his little head does not produce the content of his creation, but processes (as a sausagemaker does meat) the worldview of his public. (…) Kokoschka's statements are a typical expression of the attitude of the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie places a culture and its art higher than the life of the working class. This, too, leads to the conclusion that there can be no reconciliation between the bourgeoisie, its approach to life, and the proletariat (…) With joy we welcome the news that bullets whiz into the galleries and palaces, into the masterpieces of Rubens, instead of into the homes of the poor in the workers’ districts. (…) There is only one task: With all possible means to speed with all the intelligence and consistency to the decay of these exploiters culture. Any indifference is counterrevolutionary! (...) We urge everyone to take a position towards the masochistic reverence for historical values, culture and for Art! (...) Of you, workers, we know that you will create your working class culture alone, as you created your own class organizations through your own efforts.”

Appendix 2

Tristan Tzara, Dada Manifesto 1918 “DADA DOES NOT MEAN ANYTHING - If we consider it futile, and if

we don't waste our time over a word that doesn't mean anything... The first thought that comes to these minds is of a bacteriological order: at least to discover its etymological, historical or psychological meaning. We read in the papers that the negroes of the Kroo race call the tail of a sacred

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 239

cow: DADA. A cube, and a mother, in a certain region of Italy, are called: DADA. The word for a hobby horse, a children's nurse, a double affirmative in Russian and Romanian, is also: DADA. Some learned journalists see it as an art for babies, other Jesuscallingthelittlechildrenuntohim saints see it as a return to an unemotional and noisy primitivism - noise and monotonous. A sensitivity cannot be built on the basis of a word; every sort of construction converges into a boring sort of perfection, a stagnant idea of a golden swamp, a relative human product. A work of art shouldn't be beauty per se, because it is dead; neither gay nor sad, neither light nor dark; it is to rejoice or maltreat individualities to serve them up the cakes of sainted haloes or the sweat of a meandering chase through the atmosphere. A work of art is never beautiful, by decree, objectively, for everyone. Criticism is, therefore, useless; it only exists subjectively, for every individual, and without the slightest general characteristic (…) Thus DADA was born, out of a need for independence, out of mistrust for the community. People who join us keep their freedom. We do not accept any theories. We have had enough of the cubist and futurist academies: laboratories of formal ideas. Do we make art in order to earn money and keep the dear bourgeoisie happy?” 46

Appendix 3

George Grosz/Wieland Herzfelde, Die Kunst ist in Gefahr (Art is in Danger), 1925

“Dada was the first significant art movement in Germany in decades.

(...) Dada was not a ‘made’ movement, but an organic product, originating in reaction to the head-in-the-clouds tendency of so-called holy art, whose disciples brooded over cubes and Gothic art while the generals were painting in blood. Dada forced the devotees of art to show their colors. (…) Today I know, together with all the other founders of Dada, that our only mistake was to have been seriously engaged at all with so-called art. Dada was the breakthrough, taking place with bawling and scornful laughter; it came out of a narrow, overbearing, and overrated milieu, and floating in the air between the classes, knew no responsibility to the general public. We saw then the insane end products of the ruling order of society and burst into laughter. We had not yet seen the system behind this insanity. (…) The demand for tendency irritates the art world, today perhaps more than ever, to enraged and disdainful opposition. Admittedly all times have had important works of tendentious character, although such works are not appreciated for their tendentiousness, but rather for their formal, ‘purely artistic’ qualities. These circles completely fail to recognize that at all times all art has a tendency that only the character and clarity of this tendency have changed. (…) NO ANSWER IS ALSO AN ANSWER. (…) The artist, whether he likes it or not, lives in continual correlation to the

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 240

public, to society, and he cannot withdraw from its laws of evolution, even when, as today, they include class conflict. Anyone maintaining a sophisticated stance above or outside of things is also taking sides, for such indifference and aloofness is automatically a support of the class currently in power—in Germany, the bourgeoisie. Moreover, a great number of artists quite consciously support the bourgeois system, since it is within that system that their work sells…Yes, art is in danger: Today's artist, if he does not want to run down and become an antiquated dud, has the choice between technology and class warfare propaganda. In both eases he must give up ‘pure art.’ Either he enrolls as an architect, engineer, or advertising artist in the army (...) or, as a reporter and critic reflecting the face of our times, a propagandist and defender of the revolutionary idea and its partisans, he finds a place in the army of the suppressed who fight for their just share of the world, for a significant social organization of life.”

* Acknowledgments: This work was supported by CNCSIS–UEFISCSU, project

number PNII – IDEI code 2469/2008 “Culture and creativity in the age of globalization: A study on the interactions between the cultural policy and artistic creativity”.

Notes:

1 See my reading of Schiller’s aesthetic utopia in: Mihaela Pop, Dan-Eugen Raţiu (Eds.), Estetica şi artele astăzi, (Bucureşti: Editura Universităţii din Bucureşti, 2010), 91-112. 2 See: Richard Murphy, Theorizing the Avant-Garde. Modernism, Expressionism and the Problem of Postmodernity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 33 sqq. 3 For a helpful historical introduction to Dada, see: David Hopkins, Dada and Surrealism, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004). The critic Georges Hugnet defined Dada as a self-destructive form of nihilism: “Dada is ageless, it has no parents, but stands alone, making no distinction between what is and what is not. It approves while denying, it contradicts itself, and acquires new force by its very contradiction. Its frontal attack is that of a traitor stealing up from behind. It undermines established authority. It turns against itself, it indulges in self- destruction, it sees red, its despair is its genius. There is no hope, all values are levelled to a universal monotony, there is no longer a difference between good and evil - there is only an awareness. Dada is a taking stock, and as such it is irreparable as it is ridiculous. It knows only itself” (Georges Hugnet, Dada, in: The Bulletin of the Museum of Modern Art, vol. 4, no. 2/3, (1936): 3. 4 See Andrei Codrescu, The Posthuman Dada Guide. Tzara and Lenin Play Chess, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009), 142-146. See also Appendix 2. 5 See Tom Sandqvist, Dada East. The Romanians of Cabaret Voltaire, (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2006).

6The identity crisis generated by Romania’s backwardness on the road to modernization was more nuanced in the case of the Jewish community. The first

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 241

Romanian Constitution of 1866 created a special statute for the Jewish community by denying them the usual political and civil rights that were attributed to ethnic Romanians. According to the sociologist Victor Karady, the identity of the Jews in Central and South-East Europe formed as an in between between the ethnic identity and the “assimilated” identity. Karady contends that, for example, the identity of the Romanian-Jewish elites contained a strong intellectual element, generated by the perpetual attempts of the Jewish person to be recognized by Romanian society. During its struggle for recognition, the identity of the aspiring Jewish intellectual acquired a special social competence, supporting and supported by its multilingual skills and its cultural mobility. The „assimilation”, Karady contends, was never fulfilled, but the cultural competence determined by the tendency to being assimilated increased the person’s cultural productivity. Therefore, creating an in between identity that pendulated between two identities initiated a social model characterized by a larger degree of modernity than that of the socially accepted model. In other words, the aspiring identity of the Romanian-Jewish intellectuals was perceived as being more „modern” than that of the regular Romanian elite. In practice, this sociological phenomenon transformed the Jewish intellectual into a vigorous critic of autochtonist or nationalist cultural tendencies and a supporter of social emancipation and progressive cultural movements. In this context, it is not an unusual fact that a major part of the Romanian avant-garde after 1920 has been created and supported by Jewish elites. For further details, see Victor Karady, The Jews of Europe in the Modern Era. A Socio-Historical Outline, (Budapest: CEU Press, 2004). 7 See Sandqvist commentary on Romania’s début de siècle stage of modernization, just before the beginning of World War I: “What is not possible in a country where the government does everything possible to imitate the Belgian one, where the royal palace looks like a French town hall surrounded by a pompous small garden, and where every intellectual claims that the country is the true heir of the great Roman Empire, a country where a new political party is born every hour of the day in the nearest coffee shop and where all the daily newspapers are owned by the party leaders, of whom the richest of all is said to be so far in favor of everything French that he sends his laundry to Paris, while others are trimming their sails according to the mistress in vogue? (…) What is not possible in a country whose capital appears mostly like a confusing piling up of overlapping events with neither consequences nor logic, where every fragment expresses the city’s disrupted identity? (…) What is not possible in a country characterized by its mahala mentality, a kind of Oriental petit bourgeois attitude focused only on business, power, and political plots? The country which claims to be Latin but which has an Orthodox religion and an Orthodox church paradoxically paying respect to the pope in Rome? A country where the Oriental influence is reflected in the incompetence of the road builders and the skillfulness of the violinists and where the monasteries and the churches are meeting places of Byzantium and the Italian Renaissance, Cistercian monks and Russian holy fools? A country that is a conglomerate of influences coming from all four points of the compass, a melting pot of different cultures and civilizations complementing each other, a crossroads for peoples, experiences, and events, a focal point of cultural compromises and violent confrontations?” Sandqvist, 24 sqq. 8 Sandqvist, 208 sqq.

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 242

9 Sandqvist, 294 sqq. 10 Tristan Tzara, Sept manifestes Dada (1924), Dada Manifesto on Feeble Love and Bitter Love. 11 Hugo Ball was deeply involved in theosophy, mysticism and religious speculations. These aspects are well documented in: Cornelius Zehetner, Hugo Ball. Portrait einer Philosophie, (Wien: Turia + Kant, 2000). Marcel Duchamp’s passion for occultism is described at large in: John F. Moffitt, Alchemist of the Avant-Garde The Case of Marcel Duchamp, (Albany: SUNY Press, 2003). 12 Will Bradley, Introduction, in: Charles Esche & Will Bradley, Art and Social Change. A Critical Reader (Tate Publishing, 2008), 9. 13 See Peter Bürger, Theory of the Avant-Garde, (Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 1984), 22 sqq. 14 In: Richard Murphy, Theorizing the Avant-Garde. Modernism, Expressionism and the Problem of Postmodernity, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 8. 15 See Richard Murphy’s own discussion about the conditions of a “post-modern” theory in Chapter 7 of his Theorizing the Avant-Garde. 16 See Richard Murphy, Theorizing the Avant-Garde, 255 sqq. Murphy’s views will be discussed in more detail later. 17 There is an ongoing debate about the political commitment of the Dadaists to Marxism in the early 20’s. Marxist critics still consider Dada extensively “Marxist” in its achievements. See Lieven Soete, “Les photomontages de John Heartfield L'art comme projectile politique,” Études Marxistes 30/1996. 18 Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility and Other Writings on Media, Eds. M. Jennings, B. Doherty, T.Y. Levin, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2008), 39. 19 Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility and Other Writings on Media, 39. 20 Cf. Richard Huelsenbeck, En Avant Dada: A History of Dadaism, in: Charles Esche, Will Bradley, Art and Social Change. A Critical Reader, (Tate Publishing, 2008), 61-66. Later in this study I will refer to Ball’s political ideas during the Dada period. For a clearer understanding of Ball’s artistic, political and philosophical thinking, see the comprehensive study of Cornelius Zehetner, Hugo Ball. Portrait einer Philosophie, (Wien:Turia + Kant, 2000). 21 This is also what is usually considered to be the difference between the Zürich Dadaism and the “political” Communist wing of the Dada which emerged in Berlin, roughly around 1918-1919. Also in Petrograd, Russia, in the early 1915, Velimir Khlebnikov, David and Vladimir Burliuk, Vladimir Maïakovski and the “cubofuturists” organized political soirées where they experimented with a kind of art which was very close to the Dada. For a review of the political Dada around 1920, see my “Art as Unfulfilled Utopia: The Experience of The Political in Dada’s Redefining of Art,” Studia Universitatis Babes-Bolyai, Philosophia, LIV, 2, (2009): 119- 138. 22 Francis D. Klingender, Diskussion mit John Heartfield über Dadaismus und Surrealismus, 1944, quoted by Soete. 23 See Ştefan Maftei, “Art as Unfulfilled Utopia”, 125. 24 See Appendix 1. 25 Carl Einstein, Otto Dix, in: Kaes, Anton et al. (Eds.), The Weimar Republic Sourcebook, 490 sqq. 26 For further references, see Ştefan Maftei, “Art as Unfulfilled Utopia”, 126.

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 243

27 Quoted by Zehetner, 20. 28 Zehetner, 21. 29 These texts appear in: Kaes, Anton et al. (Eds.), The Weimar Republic Sourcebook, 477 sqq. 30 Babeuf & Maréchal, Manifesto of the Equals, 1796. 31See Appendix 3. 32 Art & Ideology. Texts by Tucker, Marcia; Buchloh, Benjamin H.D.; Kuspit, Donald B.; Lippard, Lucy R.; Peraza, Nilda et al., (New York: The Museum of Contemporary Art, 1984). 33 In relation to ideology, Marxists have considered art either as a pure product of “false consciousness,” or as an anti-ideological product. The French critics Louis Althusser and Pierre Macherey have expressed more moderate views about art and ideology. For further details, see Terry Eagleton, Marxism and Literary Criticism, (Routledge, 2006). 34 See Peter Zima’s excellent introduction to the major tenets of deconstruction, in his Deconstruction and Critical Theory, transl. Rainer Emig, (London: Continuum, 2002). 35 Zima, vi. 36 Terry Eagleton, 22. 37 Walter Benjamin, “The Author as Producer”, in: New Left Review, 1970, I/62, 83- 96. 38 Terry Eagleton, 29. 39 Walter Benjamin, The Author as Producer, 90. 40 Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, 317. 41 Murphy, Theorizing the Avant-Garde, 6. 42 Murphy, Theorizing the Avant-Garde, 10. 43 Benjamin, Theory of Distraction, in: Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility and Other Writings on Media, Eds. M. Jennings, B. Doherty, T.Y. Levin, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2008), 56-57. 44 Benjamin, Reply to Oscar A. H. Schmitz, in: Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art, 316- 317. 45 Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility and Other Writings on Media, Eds. M. Jennings, B. Doherty, T.Y. Levin, 38.

References:

*** Art & Ideology. Texts by Tucker, Marcia; Buchloh, Benjamin H.D.; Kuspit, Donald B.; Lippard, Lucy R.; Peraza, Nilda et al.. New York: The Museum of Contemporary Art, 1984.

Babeuf, Gracchus & Maréchal, Pierre Sylvain. Manifesto of the Equals. 1796

(www.marxists.org), accessed 5.06.2010 Benjamin, Walter. “The Author as Producer”. In: New Left Review. I/62, 1970,

83-96.

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 244

Benjamin, Walter. The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproductibility

and Other Writings on Media. Eds. M. Jennings, B. Doherty, T.Y. Levin. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2008.

Bürger, Peter. Theory of the Avant-Garde. Minneapolis: University Of

Minnesota Press, 1984. Codrescu, Andrei. The Posthuman Dada Guide. Tzara and Lenin Play Chess.

Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009. Eagleton, Terry. Marxism and Literary Criticism. Routledge, 2006 Grosz, George/ Herzfelde, Wieland,.Art is in Danger. 1925 (http://www.mariabuszek.com/kcai/DadaSurrealism/DadaSurrReadings),

accessed 1.07.2010 Heartfield, John & Grosz, George. Der Kunstlump. (1919), In: Der Gegner. Heft

10-12 (http://scriptorium.hfg-karlsruhe.de/pdfs/kunstlump.pdf), accessed 1.07.2010

Hopkins, David. Dada and Surrealism. A Very Short Introduction. New York:

Oxford University Press, 2004. Hugnet, Georges. Dada. In: The Bulletin of the Museum of Modern Art. vol. 4, no.

2/3, (1936): 3-18. Kaes, Anton; Jay, Martin; Dimendberg, Edward (Eds.). The Weimar Republic

Sourcebook. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994. Karady, Victor. The Jews of Europe in the Modern Era. A Socio-Historical Outline.

Budapest: CEU Press, 2004. Maftei, Ştefan. “Art as Unfulfilled Utopia: The Experience of The Political in

Dada’s Redefining of Art”. In: Studia Universitatis Babes-Bolyai. Philosophia. LIV, 2, 2009, 119-138.

Maftei, Ştefan. „De la utopia estetică la arta politizată. Lecturi contemporane

ale relaţiei dintre artă şi politică”. In: Mihaela Pop, Dan-Eugen Raţiu (Eds.). Estetica şi artele astăzi. Bucureşti: Editura Universităţii din Bucureşti, 2010, 91-112

Moffitt, John F. Alchemist of the Avant-Garde. The Case of Marcel Duchamp. SUNY

Press, Albany, 2003. Murphy, Richard. Theorizing the Avant-Garde. Modernism, Expressionism and the

Problem of Postmodernity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Sandqvist, Tom. Dada East. The Romanians of Cabaret Voltaire. Cambridge,

Mass.: MIT Press, 2006.

Ştefan-Sebastian Maftei Between “Critique” and Propaganda

Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 9, 27 (Winter 2010) 245

Soete, Lieven. “Les photomontages de John Heartfield. L'art comme projectile

politique”. Études Marxistes. 30/1996 (http://www.marx.be/FR/em_index.htm), accessed 3.06.2010

Tzara, Tristan. Dada Manifesto 1918. (singlenesia.com), accessed 5.06.2010 Tzara, Tristan. Interview. 1959, recording (http://www.ubu.com/sound/tzara.html), accessed 5.06.2010 Tzara, Tristan. Sept manifestes Dada. 1924 (http://dadamanifesto.blogspot.com) accessed 5.06.2010 Zima, Peter V. Deconstruction and Critical Theory. transl. Rainer Emig. London:

Continuum, 2002.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.