Kurt schwitters brief biography of james

Kurt Schwitters was born into a splintered age, and everywhere his works, in whatever medium he chose at a particular moment, express that fact.  As materials for his collages, sculptures, and the Merzbauten, he chose to employ fragments rather than new-sawn planks or virgin paper, and in the same way he made use of flitters of ideas and forms from the past to construct new meanings and resonances:  an old rowing-boat becomes an abstract Merz pillar, standing perhaps for a wave breaking on a rock;  a gothic cathedral is shattered, to be reassembled as a Merzbau as convoluted as Gaudi’s forever unfinished Sagrada Familia basilica.  Both artists were building new ideas from the outworn materials of a past world.

At the same time Schwitters was surrounded by the thrust of the new &#; Constructivism, Futurism, Minimalism &#; and in his typographical experiments, in his poetry, in his sound experiments, in his designs for a ‘basic’ theatre setting, he experimented with and subverted these new forms the instant that they came into being, adding where he thought it necessary his own particular form of anti-rationalism, or even whimsy.

So many-sided were Schwitters’ talents, so varied the forms that he experimented with, that the influence his work has exerted on later artists, designers and architects is not particularly easy to discern.

Rather it is that he influenced whole schools of thought, opening minds up to the possibilities opening up when the temples of art were blown into smithereens, allowing artists to incorporate elements from cinema, advertising, folk tale, birdsong, the old masters, into their work, in order to create new meanings for the present age.

Kurt Schwitter is a German  painter, Sculptor, typographer and writer. He studied at the school of Arts in Hanover from to Kurt Schwitter&#;s work is influenced by Cubism and Expressionism, leading him to create his own version of Dada called &#;Merz&#; whixh is part of a word called &#;Commerzbank&#;. This was made from rubbish materials he had found including labels, bus tickets as well as broken wood to make his artwork.  “I could see no reason why used tram tickets, bits of driftwood, buttons and old junk from attics and rubbish heaps should not serve well as materials for paintings; they suited the purpose just as well as factory-made paints… It is possible to cry out using bits of old rubbish, and that’s what I did, gluing and nailing them together.” -From the Bernard Jacobson press release. Schwitters created these collages after the war. In a statement Schwitters said &#;Everything had broken down and new things had to be made out of the fragments; and this is Merz.’

Kurt Schwitters work relates to Applique because his work in collage meant that he was adding elements to his work. Although he doesn&#;t only used textile based materials he uses the same idea as other textile artists as well as more Fine Art Artists.

James Fox  uses a mixture of Machine stitch and reverse applique to create work that challenges our expectations of gender roles in the workplace. By using this method of art he juxtaposes the themes to create incongruous, almost ironic feel to his  work. His work in textiles and the fabric techniques he uses helps to illustrate the contrast of society as it is always changing. Being able to transfer his ideas onto cloth means a lot to James Fox.

I chose to research James Fox because there aren&#;t a lot of male textile artists in the world, as throughout time it has always been perceived as a female job. However being of changing societies it is now easier for men to be able to get into a textiles based job, just as it is for women

Kurt Schwitters (), a key figure in European Dada, originally lived in Hanover, Germany, but after being labelled as ‘degenerate’ by Hitler, fled first to Norway in and then to Ambleside, UK, where he died (unaccountably) unknown and in penury in His art, like his life, was bizarre and epic &#; he did everything and often, it seemed, at the same time: he made deft collages; wrote Dada poetry, ‘anxiety plays’ and bizarre stories; published a periodical; gave exuberant Dada performances; painted bad portraits which he ripped apart to make materials for his collages; and constructed the ‘Schwitters Column’, a huge, interior, fantastical sculptural form that, in its first, Hanover incarnation, eventually took over six rooms of his house. Schwitters is best known for his ‘Merz’, skilful collages made from found and thrown-away materials &#; feathers, tram-tickets, skittles, cut-out words from magazines, shoe-laces, feathers, dish-cloths, stones &#; which he affectionately returned to a place in life through his art. Although Schwitters’s accomplishments weren’t recognised in his lifetime, his collages were subsequently a revered influence on British art from Richard Hamilton to Damien Hirst. Like many Dadaists he saw art as a form of protest: “One can even shout out through refuse, and this is what I did, nailing and gluing it together”.

(Merz from )

Schwitters was often known for his liveliness, uninhibited nature and wit &#; “with his incessant magical gesticulations, he seemed about to break free of the fetters of reason”, as historian of Dada, Hans Richter, observed &#; but some of his art, especially the Column, with its grottoes dedicated, among other things, to his dead child, hint at a darker side to his personality. No one could give Dada performances like him, though, whether he was barking wildly like a dog on stage or loudly declaiming his sound poems like Ursonate or more naturalistic

In , The Armitt displayed an exhibition called “The Armitt Explores…Kurt Schwitters” Kurt Schwitters was a refugee from Nazi Germany who lived the last years of his life virtually unknown in Ambleside and is now a renowned and leading figure in the art world. The display featured 10 portraits completed by Schwitters during his time spent living in the Lake District from

Connected to the exhibition was a schools portrait project, led by local portrait artist Catherine MacDiarmid, celebrating the works of Kurt Schwitters, his history, his subjects, and their links to Ambleside and the Lake District, all within the wider context of portraiture.

The aims of the project were to introduce local schools and students to The Armitt as a resource, using the exhibition of Schwitters portraits, and the wider portrait collection, as a springboard to complete their own artwork. It was also to give students the opportunity to work with a local portrait artist.

The project involved working with four different schools. These were The Lakes School in Windermere, Ruskin School in Coniston, Kirkbie Kendal School in Kendal, and Kendal College. All the students were aged between 14 and 18 – current GCSE, A-level and level three Art and Design students. A total of 71 students were involved.

As a result of two workshops – one onsite at The Armitt and one in the classroom – students were tasked with producing a final work that could go into an online exhibition. Those pieces can now be seen on this page, and we’re delighted with the creativity and diversity shown in the work.

We hope to welcome many more students to The Armitt in future in order to continue to foster interest and inspiration from our collection.