Grotesque Visions: The Science of Berlin Dada

By Thomas O. Haakenson

Book Overview

Grotesque Visions focuses on the radical avant-garde interventions of Salomo Friedl nder (aka Mynona), Til Brugman, and Hannah H ch as they challenged the questionable practices and evidentiary claims of late-19th- and early-20th-century science. Demonstrating the often excessive measures that pathologists, anthropologists, sexologists, and medical professionals went to present their research in a seemingly unambiguous way, this volume shows how Friedl nder/Mynona, Brugman, H ch, and other Berlin-based artists used the artistic grotesque to criticize, satirize, and subvert a variety of forms of supposed scientific objectivity.

The volume concludes by examining the exhibition Grotesk : 130 Jahre Kunst der Frechheit/Comic Grotesque: Wit and Mockery in German Arts, 1870-1940. In contrast to the ahistorical and amorphous concept informing the exhibition, Thomas O. Haakenson reveals a unique deployment of the artistic grotesque that targeted specific established and emerging scientific discourses at the turn of the last fin-de-si cle.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1501369946
• ISBN13: 9781501369940
• Release Date: December 2022
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.71 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.5"