Kurt Schwitters was a major protagonist in the histories of modern art and literature, whose response to the contradictions of modern life rivals that of Marcel Duchamp in its importance for artists working today. His celebrated Merz pictures--collaged and assembled from the scrap materials of popular culture and the debris of the studio, such as newspaper clippings, wood, cardboard, fabric, and paint--reflect a lifelong interest in collection, fragmentation, and abstraction, techniques he also applied to language and graphic design. As the first anthology in English of the critical and theoretical writings of this influential artist, Myself and My Aims makes the case for Schwitters as one of the most creative thinkers of his generation. Including material that has never before been published, this volume presents the full range of his prolific writing on the art and attitudes of his time, joining existing translations of his children's stories, poetry, and fiction to give new readers unprecedented access to his literary imagination. With an accessible introduction by Megan R. Luke and elegant English translations by Timothy Grundy, this book will prove an exceptional resource for artists, scholars, and enthusiasts of his art. &nbsp;

Myself and My Aims: Writings on Art and Criticism

Arts & Photography

Schwitters, Kurt

History & Criticism

University of Chicago Press

Kurt Schwitters revolutionized the art world in the 1920s with his Dadaist Merz collages, theater performances, and poetry. But at the same time he was also writing extraordinary fairy tales that were turning the genre upside down and inside out. Lucky Hans and Other Merz Fairy Tales is the first collection of these subversive, little-known stories in any language and the first time all but a few of them have appeared in English. Translated and introduced by Jack Zipes, one of the world's leading authorities on fairy tales, this book gathers thirty-two stories written between 1925 and Schwitters's death in 1948--including a complete English-language recreation of The Scarecrow, a children's book illustrated with avant-garde typography that Schwitters created with Kate Steinitz and De Stijl founder Theo van Doesburg. Lucky Hans and Other Merz Fairy Tales also includes brilliant new illustrations that evoke the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s.
 Schwitters wrote these darkly humorous, satirical, and surreal tales at a time when traditional German fairy tales were being co-opted by the Nazis. Filled with sharp critiques of German life during the Weimar and early Nazi eras, Schwitters's tales are rich with absurdist events and insist that not everyone--and perhaps not anyone--lives happily ever after. In "Lucky Hans," the starving protagonist tries to catch a rabbit only to have it shed its fur like a coat and run off naked into the forest. In other tales, a sarcastic gypsy stands in for a fairy godmother and an army recruit is arrested for growing to monstrous size.
Lucky Hans and Other Merz Fairy Tales is a delightfully strange and surprising book.

Lucky Hans and Other Merz Fairy Tales (Oddly Modern Fairy Tales)

Princeton University Press

Kurt Schwitters: June 10-October 1, 1985, the Museum of Modern Art, New York

Museum of Modern Art

Kurt Schwitters in exile: The late work, 1937-1948 = Kurt Schwitters im Exil : das Spätwerk, 1937-1948 : 2-31 October 1981

Marlborough Fine Art (London)

I Build My Time

Coracle Pr

Kurt Schwitters, one of the great visual artists of the 20th century, was also one of the major poets and theorists of Modernism. This collection brings the vast range of his writings to an English audience. This book was the winner of the 1994 PEN Center USA West Literary Award for Translation.

Pppppp: Kurt Schwitters Poems, Performance, Pieces, Proses, Plays, Poetics

Literature & Fiction

ROTHENBERG, Jerome

Essays & Correspondence

Temple Univ Pr

The German-born artist Kurt Schwitters (1887-1948) is best known for his "psychological collages" and his large-scale sculptures. He also experimented with sound art, typography, and architecture and wrote poetry and prose. This volume presents three short stories and a poem by Schwitters, all published here in English for the first time. Included with them is an appreciation of Schwitters by his friend, the surrealist pioneer E.L.T. Mesens, commissioned for ARTnews in 1958 and unavailable since then, and a previously unpublished response by the artist's son Ernst Schwitters. Jasia Reichardt's introduction places these remarkable documents in the context of Schwitters's life and career.

Three Stories: Kurt Schwitters

Schwitters, Ernst

Short Stories & Anthologies

Tate

The now classic compilation of writings by Kurt Schwitters, Dada pioneer and the inventor of Merz
Kurt Schwitters' stated goal was to "erase the boundaries between the arts." This collection, culled from the five-volume German edition of Schwitters' writings, introduces the total work of art that is Merz through Schwitters' words. Included is the complete text for the "Ursonate," Schwitters' legendary and lengthy epic of sound poetry, which, as poets, editors and translators Jerome Rothenberg and Pierre Joris comment, "is to sound poetry what Joyce's Ulysses is to the twentieth-century novel.

PPPPPP: Poems Performances Pieces Proses Plays Poetics

Exact Change

Der Merzkünstler Kurt Schwitters (Hannover 1887-1948 Kendal) legte zu Beginn der 1920er Jahre mehrere Sammelkladden an. Darin vereinigte er nahezu sechshundert verschiedenartige Texte und Bilder, darunter Leserbriefe, Künstlerkorrespondenzen, Kommentare von Ausstellungsbesuchern und Zeitungsartikel. Diese einzigartigen, bisher weitgehend unbekannten Notizbücher werden hier erstmals umfassend erschlossen und präsentiert. Sie bezeugen Schwitters' Sammel- und Konstruktionsleidenschaft und ermöglichen vielfältige Einblicke in die Reichhaltigkeit und Komplexität seiner Merzkunst. Die zusammengetragenen Dokumente zeichnen seine Entwicklung als Künstler nach und verorten ihn im Kontext von Produktion und Rezeption, Institutionalisierung und Kommerzialisierung der Kunst und Literatur des frühen 20. Jahrhunderts. Sie zeigen, wie Schwitters nicht zuletzt in Reaktion auf das Publikum und in Auseinandersetzung mit der Kritik eine individuelle künstlerische Haltung entwickelt und die vielfältige Resonanz künstlerisch verwertet hat. Die Textsammlungen offenbaren die Strategien seiner produktiven Rezeption und ermöglichen so durch diesen Band einen neuen, erweiterten Blick auf sein Werk. Durch die beiden Herausgeberinnen Ursula Kocher (Professorin für Allgemeine Literaturwissenschaft an der Bergischen Universität Wuppertal) und Isabel Schulz (Leiterin des Kurt Schwitters Archives im Sprengel Museum Hannover) werden Sachkenntnis und Expertise in Literatur-, Editions- und Kunstwissenschaft erfolgreich zusammengeführt. Die wissenschaftliche Kommentierung und Kontextualisierung von Julia Nantke und Antje Wulff ermöglichen einen fundierten Zugriff auf das Material. Übersichtliche Verzeichnisse und Register erschließen eingehend die relevanten Personen, Publikationen und Werke.

Die Sammelkladden 1919-1923: "Bleichsucht und Blutarmut", "Gästebuch für die Merzausstellung", "Schwarzes Notizbuch VI", "8 uur", "Kritiken. ... Schwitters. Alle Texte) (German Edition)

De Gruyter Akademie Forschung

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