For my final outcomes I have decided to focus on Dadaism and Surrealism. I find these two movements the most interesting and I think that I will be able to create some good final outcomes following these movements. I like the idea of photo montage within Dadaism as it is something that isn’t supposed to make sense, which actually tied into the movement of surrealism as it too isn’t supposed to make sense as it is based on your dreams or creating something that isn’t supposed to be realistic or a reflection on reality. To me, both these movements are a new form of reality.
Surrealism Photography
Surrealism Photography
I find this particular photograph very interesting as it isn’t something you would ever expect to see, especially because it is a human being fished from the ocean. To me this represents how fishing is going too far and that we are taking too much from the ocean. I think that Brian Oldham wanted to send out a message to fisherman and that we shouldn’t be constantly fishing. On the other hand, as it is a surrealist photograph I think that maybe the subject could actually be a mermaid and has been caught by fisherman. This could also be a role reversal with a fish possibly being on the other side of the fishing pole. This image is very simple, with the blue of the ocean being the brightest part of the image. I think what draws you in is the subjects mouth and the hook on a piece of string, which seems to be pulling him out of the ocean.
I think that a lot of Dada is art based and many consists of montaging. This is why I think that Dada is so interesting as it doesn’t really make any sense. I have looked at quite a few different Dada photographs and I have found that most of them us the actual word ‘dada’ within their work, which is interesting. I think that this is stating the obvious and kind of marking the photographs like a painter would mark each of their paintings but in this case the photographers are marking the movement of Dada rather than their own titles.
The actual word ‘dadaism’ is a nonsense word which was made up with no real meaning. The creators wanted to use a word that meant nothing as a sign of protest against the First World War. This new idea was adapted in 1916. This movement can be seen as shocking, surprising and scandalous to most people, although it isn’t as crazy as people make it out to be. Dadaism was created by Hugo Ball in Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich. This is the total rejection of rules and came from utter disgust after the brutality of WWI. Here Ball wanted an audience reaction to try and test their tolerance and to test them and their take on this new art form.
This can be associated with photo montage, this is the layering of different types of images cutting them out and putting them back together in a different way to create an entirely new image. Here many propaganda posters were created as a new movement and to influence citizens. This really interests me as I am able to explore how different countries and different leaders perceived themselves and what message they wanted to bring across to the world.
I like the idea of dadaism and photo montage. I think I am going to experiment with copies of old family photographs and create my own photo montage as well as maybe creating a few more realistic propaganda posters for past and present leaders. This will be interesting for me and I think that I will be able to explore a load of different aspects of this movement. For me I will be taking a chance to see how controversial a lot of what I am going to create will be, as well as it changing and challenging the way society thinks and perceives a certain influential person or period in time.
There weren’t many women involved with the dadaism movement but there was one popular woman called Hannah Hoch. Hoch was a German Dada artist, born in 1889. The reason not many women were a part of this movement because around the time this came about women were seen as secondary to men, that they should stay at home and nurture the children and were unworthy of work. Hoch was actually one of the originators of photomontage. She was the loan woman amount the Dada group as women were seen as lesser than men back then.
