The dialectic of Dada and constructivism: Theo van Doesburg and the Dadaists, 1920--1930 (Netherlands, The Netherlands)

This is a study of Theo van Doesburg's interest in Dada and its place in his career during the 1920's. Van Doesburg (1883--1931), the founder of the influential journal De Stijl, is usually acknowledged as the organizer of a group of artists embracing geometric abstraction as the modern tool for transforming the world. This conventional picture of De Stijl is wholly at odds with that of the Dada movement, which employed nonsense, chance, and subversion to revolt against the norms of European culture during and after its embroilment in World War I. Because Constructivist ideas arriving in Central and Western Europe from Russia seem consonant with those promoted in De Stijl, one might expect Van Doesburg's enthusiasm for them in the twenties. Yet alongside his espousal of the Constructivists' utopian faith in abstraction, Van Doesburg experimented with Dada in criticism and practice.; Accounting for this requires examining the context of Van Doesburg's introduction to Dada; analyzing the writings Van Doesburg produced under the pseudonyms I. K. Bonset and Aldo Camini; reconsidering the Dada-Constructivist conference he hosted in Weimar (1922) and the Holland Dada tour he took (1922--23); and reevaluating his theorization of Elementarism and its manifestation at the Cafe Aubette (Strasbourg, 1927--28) in the light of his concurrent but less canonical projects. Rather than a prior and ephemeral phase that merely cleared the ground for his constructive, progressive abstraction, Dada persisted alongside and as a challenge to Van Doesburg's endorsement of Constructivism throughout this period.; This dissertation seeks not only to illuminate this unfamiliar side of Van Doesburg, but also to analyze how his "sides" fit together. Primary and secondary sources employ the notion of the dialectic to account for the relationship between Dada and Constructivism. This dissertation takes note of the weaknesses in this application of a Hegelian scheme, arising both from its theoretical contradictions and from resistance offered by the historical material. The aim here is not to dismiss the idea of the dialectic, but rather to reframe it as a vital myth that has served---and still serves---to define the avant-garde for participants and historians.