Marking Modern Movement: Dance and Gender in the Visual Imagery of the Weimar Republic

Funkenstein, Susan

doi:doi:10.3998/mpub.11406286

Marking Modern Movement: Dance and Gender in the Visual Imagery of the Weimar Republic

Susan Funkenstein 2020

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Imagine yourself in Weimar Germany: you are visually inundated with depictions of dance. Perusing a women's magazine, you find photograph after photograph of leggy revue starlets, clad in sequins and feathers, coquettishly smiling at you. When you attend an art exhibition, you encounter Otto Dix's six-foot-tall triptych Metropolis, featuring Charleston dancers in the latest luxurious fashions, or Emil Nolde's watercolors of Mary Wigman, with their luminous blues and purples evoking her choreographies' mystery and expressivity. Invited to the Bauhaus, you participate in the Metallic Festival, and witness the school's transformation into a humorous, shiny, technological total work of art; you costume yourself by strapping a metal plate to your head, admire your reflection in the tin balls hanging from the ceiling, and dance the Bauhaus' signature step in which you vigorously hop and stomp late into the night.

Yet behind the razzle dazzle of these depictions and experiences was one far more complex involving issues of gender and the body during a tumultuous period in history, Germany's first democracy (1918-1933). Rather than mere titillation, the images copiously illustrated and analyzed in Marking Modern Movement illuminate how visual artists and dancers befriended one another and collaborated together. In many ways because of these bonds, artists and dancers forged a new path in which images revealed artists' deep understanding of dance, their dynamic engagement with popular culture, and out of that, a possibility of representing women dancers as cultural authorities to be respected. Through six case studies, Marking Modern Movement explores how and why these complex dynamics occurred in ways specific to their historical moment.

Extensively illustrated and with color plates, Marking Modern Movement is a clearly written book accessible to general readers and undergraduates. Coming at a time of a growing number of major art museums showcasing large-scale exhibitions on images of dance, the audience exists for a substantial general-public interest in this topic. Conversing across German studies, art history, dance studies, gender studies, and popular culture studies, Marking Modern Movement is intended to engage readers coming from a wide range of perspectives and interests.

Series

Social History, Popular Culture, and Politics in Germany

ISBN(s)

978-0-472-12708-5 (ebook)
978-0-472-07461-7 (hardcover)
978-0-472-05461-9 (paper)

Subject

Citable Link

A magazine page with four elegant dance fashions and blocks of text in German. Three women are illustrated solo; a man and woman are illustrated dancing above them on the page.

There's dancing again ("Man tanzt wieder")

From Introduction

“There’s Dancing Again” (“Man tanzt wieder”), Elegante Welt 8:3 (January 29, 1919): 4. Kunstbibliothek, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany. bpk Bildagentur / Kunstbibliothek, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany / Dietmar Katz / Art Resource, NY

Large photo collage with a dizzying array of people, objects, and German words cut from periodicals. An overview of major events and leaders in 1919–20, particularly of the Dada movement. Objects include simple machines, gears, and wheels. Many of the people are dancing.

Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last Weimar Beer Belly Cultural Epoch of Germany (Schnitt mit dem Küchenmesser Dada durch die letzte Weimarer Bierbauchkulturepoche Deutschlands)

From Chapter 1

Hannah Höch, Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last Weimar Beer Belly Cultural Epoch of Germany (Schnitt mit dem Küchenmesser Dada durch die letzte Weimarer Bierbauchkulturepoche Deutschlands), 1919–20. Photomontage. 114 × 90 cm / 44 7/8 × 35 7/16 in. Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany. bpk Bildagentur / Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany / Jörg P. Anders / Art Resource, NY. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Detail of photo collage featuring Orientalist dancer Sent M’Ahesa in Middle Eastern costume montaged with military leader Friedrich von Hindenburg. The dancer body features a cutout head of a historical figure atop a wheel. Another larger face is imposed behind the scene. Other pieces of magazine cuttings layer into the detail shot, such as other people’s faces and legs.

Cut with the Kitchen Knife, detail of Sent M’Ahesa and Field Marshall Friedrich von Hindenburg

From Chapter 1

Hannah Höch, Cut with the Kitchen Knife, detail of Sent M’Ahesa and Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg. bpk Bildagentur / Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany / Jörg P. Anders / Art Resource, NY. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Detail of photo collage featuring child dancer Niddy Impekoven’s head on a housewife bathing a baby Dadaist and the heads of two male Dadaists montaged on the body of a dancer in pointe shoes. More heads are imposed on bodies of children and babies. Cutouts of German words and “Dada” are also montaged near the top and bottom of the detail.

Cut with the Kitchen Knife, details of Niddy Impekoven bathing John Heartfield; dancer on point, George Grosz, and Wieland Herzfelde

From Chapter 1

Hannah Höch, Cut with the Kitchen Knife, details of Niddy Impekoven bathing John Heartfield; dancer on point, George Grosz, and Wieland Herzfelde. bpk Bildagentur / Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany / Jörg P. Anders / Art Resource, NY. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Detail of photo collage featuring teenage dance star Niddy Impekoven, with the head of visual artist Käthe Kollwitz spiraling like a beach ball above her. Other cuttings such as one of a donkey and some of other people’s heads and bodies are also montaged around this portion of the collage.

Cut with the Kitchen Knife, detail of Niddy Impekoven and Käthe Kollwitz

From Chapter 1

Hannah Höch, Cut with the Kitchen Knife, detail of Niddy Impekoven and Käthe Kollwitz. bpk Bildagentur / Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany / Jörg P. Anders / Art Resource, NY. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Photograph of Hannah Höch sitting on a stool at the First International Dada Fair, holding her two Dada Puppets constructed with thread, cloth, and other media. One puppet rests on her lap, while the other is in her hands, facing her.

Hannah Höch with her Dada Dolls (Dada Puppen)

From Chapter 1

Page 40 →Artist unknown—documentary photo. Hannah Höch with her Dada Dolls (Dada Puppen) in Berlin, 1920. Silver gelatin print from glass negative. 16.8 × 12 cm. Berlinische Galerie, Berlin, Germany. bpk Bildagentur / Berlinische Galerie, Berlin, Germany / Anja Witt / Art Resource, NY

A large photo collage about the political events of 1919 made of magazine cuttings of figures, scenes, and German words. Many figures have their heads on different bodies. Höch mocks two political leaders in the composition’s center by featuring them with flowers coming out of their swim trunks.

Dada Panorama (Dada-Rundschau)

From Chapter 1

Hannah Höch, Dada Panorama (Dada-Rundschau), 1919. Photo, collage, gouache, and watercolor. 43.7 × 34.6 cm. Berlinische Galerie, Berlin, Germany. bpk Bildagentur / Berlinische Galerie, Berlin, Germany / Anja Elisabeth Witte / Art Resource, NY. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Detail of photo collage featuring, in the upper-left corner, women in Greek-inspired chitons dancing. Montaged on their bodies are heads of women who were recently elected to the Reichstag. They are positioned at an angle with cuttings of German words montaged over them.

Dada Panorama, detail of dancers

From Chapter 1

Hannah Höch, Dada Panorama, detail of dancers. bpk Bildagentur / Berlinische Galerie, Berlin, Germany / Anja Elisabeth Witte / Art Resource, NY. © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Photograph of Isadora Duncan dancing among ancient ruins in Athens. She wears a white chiton (a Greek-styled draping dress) and sandals, posing with arms outward and facing upward, mid-step with one leg bent.

Isadora Duncan at the Theater of Dionysus

From Chapter 1

Isadora Duncan at the Theater of Dionysus, Athens, Greece, 1903. Photograph by Raymond Duncan. Jerome Robbins Dance Division Photograph files, The New York Public Library, New York, NY, U.S.A. The New York Public Library / Art Resource, NY

Photograph of Mary Wigman dancing solo in a straw costume, which obscures her body and makes her appear like a spirit with legs in tights. One leg is stepping up with the other lightly on the floor; only one arm is visible within the straw and is positioned away from her body.

Mary Wigman in Idolatry (Götzendienst)

From Chapter 2

Hugo Erfurth, Mary Wigman in Idolatry (Götzendienst), from Ecstatic Dances (Ekstatische Tänze), 1917/19. Photograph. 11.5 × 15.5 cm, 4.53 × 6.10 in. Akademie der Künste, Berlin, Mary-Wigman-Archiv, No. 264.

Abstract watercolor painting in which the Wigman figure stands in a reverse K pose as negative space among a vibrantly painted background in yellows, reds, and other hues. The figure is shown as very faint washes of paint. The right side of the background is more saturated in watercolor than the left, where some light shows through. A small signature lies in the bottom right corner.

Female Dancer (Mary Wigman) (Tänzerin [Mary Wigman])

From Chapter 2

Emil Nolde, Female Dancer (Mary Wigman) (Tänzerin (Mary Wigman)), likely early 1920s. Watercolor. Nolde Stiftung Seebüll © Nolde Stiftung Seebüll

Abstract watercolor painting in which the Wigman figure gestures toward the sky with both arms. The figure has some detail, including defining lines and dark wash to indicate neck, lips, dress, and hair. The defining lines and washes in dark blues and purples allow differentiation from the background, which is made of carefree watercolor strokes.

Female Dancer (with Violet Veil) (Tänzerin [mit violettem Schleier])

From Chapter 2

Emil Nolde, Female Dancer (with Violet Veil) (Tänzerin (mit violettem Schleier)), likely early 1920s. Watercolor. Nolde Stiftung Seebüll © Nolde Stiftung Seebüll

Abstract watercolor painting in which the Wigman figure dances while another figure, Palucca, plays percussive instruments. Wigman dances with arms over her head and faces downward; Palucca’s arms are stretched starkly outward with legs bent in a diamond shape and feet together. Palucca holds instruments in both hands. Both figures are defined by thick lines of watercolor, some washes to indicate shadow, and some white space. Another line shows the floor with background of green washes above and below.

Dance Scene (Two Green Figures) (Tanzszene [Zwei grüne Figuren])

From Chapter 2

Emil Nolde, Dance Scene (Two Green Figures) (Tanzszene (Zwei grüne Figuren)), likely early 1920s. Watercolor. Nolde Stiftung Seebüll © Nolde Stiftung Seebüll

Photograph of “Dance of Death II,” in which the tormenter beast lunges toward Wigman, the tormented martyr, who is supported by six group dancers atop carpet floor and in front of black background. Everyone wears billowing sheer fabric outfits with veils and hard masks. Wigman wears a more narrow dress than the others with dark fabric and lighter color chevron stripes going down the entire garment. She leans back against the group dancers.

Mary Wigman und Gruppe bei der Aufführung von ‘Totentanz II’ ; Mary Wigman and a group at a performance of ‘Totentanz II’

From Chapter 2

August Scherl, Mary Wigman and a group at a performance of “Dance of Death II” (Mary Wigman und Gruppe bei der Aufführung von ‘Totentanz II’), 1926. Photograph. Scherl/Süddeutsche Zeitung Photo.

Marking Modern Movement: Dance and Gender in the Visual Imagery of the Weimar Republic

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There's dancing again ("Man tanzt wieder")

Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last Weimar Beer Belly Cultural Epoch of Germany (Schnitt mit dem Küchenmesser Dada durch die letzte Weimarer Bierbauchkulturepoche Deutschlands)

Cut with the Kitchen Knife, detail of Sent M’Ahesa and Field Marshall Friedrich von Hindenburg

Cut with the Kitchen Knife, details of Niddy Impekoven bathing John Heartfield; dancer on point, George Grosz, and Wieland Herzfelde

Cut with the Kitchen Knife, detail of Niddy Impekoven and Käthe Kollwitz

Hannah Höch with her Dada Dolls (Dada Puppen)

Dada Panorama (Dada-Rundschau)

Dada Panorama, detail of dancers

Isadora Duncan at the Theater of Dionysus

Mary Wigman in Idolatry (Götzendienst)

Female Dancer (Mary Wigman) (Tänzerin [Mary Wigman])

Female Dancer (with Violet Veil) (Tänzerin [mit violettem Schleier])

Dance Scene (Two Green Figures) (Tanzszene [Zwei grüne Figuren])

Mary Wigman und Gruppe bei der Aufführung von ‘Totentanz II’ ; Mary Wigman and a group at a performance of ‘Totentanz II’

Sketchbook 127/DP34

Sketchbook 127/DP43

Sketchbook 133/DP39

Dance Group (Tanzgruppe)

Mary Wigman’s Death Dance (Totentanz der Mary Wigman)

Oppositional Dance (Gegentanz)