From Anna Blume
Autocenter
Eldenaer Strasse 34 a
10247 Berlin
via James-Hobrecht-Str.
above the supermarket
Opening: Friday - 18.02.2011 8:00 p.m.
Exhibition: 18.02 - 26.02.2011
with:
Nina Beier
Shannon Bool
Sophie Bueno-Boutellier
April Gertler
Hannah Gieseler
Marit Neeb
Laura Piasta
Roseline Rannoch
Annika Rixen
Isabel Schmiga
'An Anna Blume' (1919) is the most successful sound poem from the 'Merz' series of the German Dada artist Kurt Schwitters (1887-1948). It was on the ground of the syllable 'Merz' from the word 'Kommerz' that Schwitters developed an aesthetic both of collage and of phonetic, textual, and graphic segmentation that became one of the key contributions to German Dada. The original poem 'An Anna Blume' comprises shrill and ludicrous exclamations and simultaneously reveals a florid homage. It was received as a hybrid between a parody of a love poem, an emblem of the chaos and madness of the era, as well as a harbinger of a new poetic language.
In the legacy of Schwitters and his 'Merz' concept the exhibition 'From Anna Blume' presents young Berlin-based artists who work in the 'Merz' aesthetic of fragmented sound, text, and visual collage. In today's artistic practice, collage art is omnipresent. Ranging from photo-based to paper collages onto installational assemblages, artists work in this medium and reveal the variety and multiplicity of histories, cultures, and influences that shape our contemporary society. This show presents a selection of female artists who work in this very medium. Similarly to the attempt of Kurt Schwitters to portray the chaos of his times, the artists in this show use the collage as a means of expressing emotional, formal, historical, and political interests and tendencies or aim at distorting and challenging the viewer's perception. Instead of being the passive object of admiration and enabler of Dadaist poetry as the imaginary character of Anna Blume in Schwitters' poem, in this exhibition women artists act as agents through their work.
Curated by Sandra Teitge
