Kurt Schwitters: Merz (2016) – Norman Rosenthal interviews Damien Hirst

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exhibition catalogue. In November 1945, Schwitters writes to Alfred Barr in an attempt to circulate the exhibition to the United States. Unfortunately, Barr had been asked to resign from the Museum of Modern Art the previous autumn. Jan Tschichold organizes a presentation of Schwitters’s work to accompany the exhibition “Der Sturm (Sammlung Nell Walden)” at Kunstmuseum Bern, February—April 1945. After the war ends in June, Ernst Schwitters returns to Norway; he assumes Norwegian citizenship at the end of the year. At the same time, Kurt Schwitters moves with his companion, Edith Thomas, to Ambleside in the Lake District of England. Schwitters remains in poor financial condition until the end of his life. During these years, he earns some money painting portraits, landscapes, and still-lifes. A friend from Hanover, Walter Dux, who is also living in London, provides additional assistance. 1946 Schwitters is unusually prolific in the last two years of his life, producing a large number of collages in 1946 and 1947. Carola Giedion-Welcker publishes thirteen of Schwitters’s poems in her anthology Poètes à l’Ècart—Antholoqie der Abseitigen, Benteli, Bern. In April, Schwitters writes to Oliver M. Kaufmann in Chicago asking him for funds to use to restore the remains of the Merzbau. The following year, on his sixtieth birthday, June 20, 1947, Schwitters is awarded $1,000 by the Museum of Modern Art, New York (funds provided by Kaufmann), for reconstructing or continuing existing Merz constructions, whether in Hanover or Lysaker. Unable to travel outside England, Schwitters chooses to start a new Merz construction, the Merz Barn, on a farm belonging to Harry Pierce near Elterwater in the Lake District. The Merz Barn is never completed. packages of food and vitamins to him in England. Despite increasing frailty, Schwitters is able to stage two Merz evenings at the London Gallery, March 5 and 7. He is unable to convince the BBC to record his “Ursonate.” Schwitter’s work is included in “The White Plain” at the Pinacotheca, New York, March 19—April 12, an influential exhibition of leading European abstract artists such as Mondrian and Kandinsky and the American artist Burgoyne Diller. 1948 On January 8, one day after being granted British citizenship, Kurt Schwitters dies in England of acute pulmonary edema and myocarditis. After an initial burial in Ambleside, his remains are moved to Hanover in 1970. Twenty-six of Schwitters’s works are featured, posthumously, in the artist’s first solo exhibition in the United States, held at the Pinacotheca (later the Rose Fried Gallery), January 19—February 29. Dreier contributes an essay to the exhibition catalogue titled “Kurt Schwitters: The Dadas Have Come to Town”; Naum Gabo and Charmion von Wiegand also write text. Margaret Miller includes nineteen works by Schwitters in ‘Collage,’ the Museum of Modern Art, New York, September 21—December 5. Clare Elliott, „Chronology”, first published in Kurt Schwitters: Color and Collage, edited by Isabel Schulz (Houston: Menil Collection, 2010). © Menil Foundation, Inc., Houston, reprinted with permission. Schwitters begins corresponding with Margaret Miller, a curator at the Museum of Modern Art, who is organizing an exhibition of collages for the museum. Schwitters spends the end of 1946 confined to bed after a hip fracture. Schwitters renews contact with Katherine Dreier. The two discuss the possibility of a Schwitters exhibition in the United States; the result is a solo show, organized by Dreier, held in 1948 at the Pinacotheca in New York. 1947 Dreier remains in touch with Schwitters, sending 166
Catalogue Raisonné Karin Orchard and Isabel Schulz. Kurt Schwitters: Catalogue Raisonné. Published by the Sprengel Museum Hannover, on behalf of the Savings Bank Foundation of Lower Saxony, the NORD/LB Norddeutsche Landesbank, the Sparkasse Hannover, and the Kurt and Ernst Schwitters Foundation. 3 vols. Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz, 2000-2006. Publications by Kurt Schwitters In addition to working as a visual artist, Kurt Schwitters was a prolific writer and poet; a comprehensive bibliography of Schwitters’s writings is in the catalogue raisonné (see above). Listed below are selected writings by Schwitters published during his lifetime; others may be found in the Chronology. Publications and recordings by Kurt Schwitters are listed in chronological order. Selected Writings Published during Schwitters’s Lifetime (excluding Merz magazine) Anna Blume. Dichtungen. Die Silbergäule 39/40. Hanover: Paul Steegemann, 1919; rev. ed. Hanover: Paul Steegemann, 1922. Die Kathedrale. 8 Lithos von Kurt Schwitters. Die Silbergäule 41/42. Hanover: Paul Steegemann, 1920. Kurt Schwitters. Book 4 of Sturm-Bilderbuch. Berlin: Sturm, [ca. 1920]. Elementar. Die Blume Anna. Die neue Anna Blume. Eine Gedichtsammlung aus den Jahren 1918—1922. Berlin: Sturm, 1922. Memoiren Anna Blumes in Bleie. Eine leichtfassliche Methode zur Erlernung des Wahnsinns für Jedermann. Schnitter-Bücher. Die hohe Reihe. Freiburg (Baden): Walter Heinrich, 1922. Auguste Bolte (ein Lebertran). Tran Nr. 30. Berlin: Sturm, 1923. Lithos von Kurt Schwitters. Fifty numbered copies. 1923. Merz 4. Banalitäten. July 1923. Merz 5. 7 Arpaden. Portfolio with seven lithographs by Hans Arp. Fifty numbered copies. 1923. With Hans Arp. Merz 6. lmitatoren watch step! Arp 1. Propaganda [sic] und Arp. Oct. 1923. Merz 7. Subsequently called Tapsheft. Jan. 1924. Merz 8/9. Nasci. Typography by El Lissitzky. July 1924. “Merz 10. Bauhaus-Buch.” Announced in Merz 8/9 but not published. Merz 11. Typoreklame. The so-called Pelikan-Nummer. November 1924. With Kate Steinitz. Hahnepeter (Merz 12), [1924]. Fifty numbered copies, hand colored and signed by the author. Also published as Aposs 1; Aposs-Verlag, 1925. Individual copies with glued-on paper bands titled Merz 12. 1925. With Kate Steinitz and Theo van Doesburg. Die Scheuche (Merz 14/15). 1925. First published as Aposs 3; Aposs- Verlag. Individual copies with glued-on paper bands later called Merz 14/15. 1925. With Kate Steinitz. Die Märchen vom Paradies (Merz 16/17). 1924. First published as Aposs 2; Aposs-Verlag. lndividual copies with glued-on paper bands called Merz 16/17 1925/II. 1925. Ludwig Hilberseimer. Grosstadtbauten (Merz 18/19). Neue Architektur, ed. by Kurt Schwitters and Kate Steinitz, 1), 1925; subsequently called Merz 18/19. Jan.—Apr. 1926. SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY Die neue Gestaltung der Typographie. Brochure. Hanover: K. Schwitters, [1925]. Merz Magazines From 1923 to 1932, Kurt Schwitters published a magazine called Merz, which he wrote by himself or in collaboration and published in Hanover. Merz 1. Holland Dada. Jan. 1923. Merz 2 Nummer i. Apr. 1923. Merz 3 Merz Mappe. Erste Mappe des Merzverlages. 6 Merz 20. Kurt Schwitters. Katalog. 1927. Merz 21 erstes Veilchen-Heft. Eine kleine Sammlung von Merz-Dichtungen aller Art von Kurt Schwitters. 1931 “Merz 22. Entwicklung.” Announced in Merz 21 but never published. “Merz 23. e. E.” Announced in an insert in Merz 21 but never published. Merz 24. Ursonate. 1932. Typography by Jan Tschichold. Fifty of 1,ooo copies numbered and signed. 167
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KURT SCHWIT TERS EXIBITION DESIGN B
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KURT SCHWIT TERS galerie gmurzynska
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“In part spurred by Rauschenberg
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SUMMARY 10 MERZ (Extract from “AR
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One could make up a catechism of me
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Merz House was my first piece of Me
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Almost all the pioneers of modern a
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‘constructivist’ period, which,
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Sonata and after the Dadaists perio
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Ernst Schwitters, Photograph of Kur
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All this changed at a stroke with t
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As the world changed, as the way of
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45! was exactly what he had done, i
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t The consequence of DADA: MERZ ·
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tt65 The consequence of DADA: MERZ
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t 71 t BATTLE CRY WITH VERVE Merz 7
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l by the times themselves.” 31 Bu
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Kurt Schwitters, who knew a lot of
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you liked my sonata. May I introduc
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93 Photograph of Helma Schwitters,
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Postcard Kurt and Helma Schwitters
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the Merzbau in Waldhausenstraße 5
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Kurt Schwitters: Merz (2016) – Norman Rosenthal interviews Damien Hirst

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