WEBVTT 00:00:02.719 --> 00:00:05.120 Dada... 00:00:05.120 --> 00:00:06.960 Dada. 00:00:06.960 --> 00:00:10.560 Some words seize the imagination and draw you in, 00:00:10.560 --> 00:00:12.640 inviting you to delve deeper. 00:00:13.920 --> 00:00:17.800 For me, Dada is just one of those words. 00:00:17.800 --> 00:00:21.880 An idea, a call to arms and a way of thinking. 00:00:24.160 --> 00:00:26.480 OK, ready, here we go. 00:00:26.480 --> 00:00:28.400 We're going to embark on a journey. 00:00:28.400 --> 00:00:30.680 I'm going to take you, dear viewer, to a place where 00:00:30.680 --> 00:00:33.120 no television programme has ever been before, but... 00:00:33.120 --> 00:00:37.120 No, what I am going to do is try and persuade you that Dada is 00:00:37.120 --> 00:00:40.960 much, much more than an obscure art movement with a funny name. 00:00:40.960 --> 00:00:42.360 Oh, yes. 00:00:43.360 --> 00:00:47.080 100 years ago, in the midst of a nonsensical war, 00:00:47.080 --> 00:00:49.960 Dada made an art out of the absurd. 00:00:51.840 --> 00:00:54.520 Mocking politicians, 00:00:54.520 --> 00:00:56.800 satirising the media, 00:00:56.800 --> 00:00:59.480 and ridiculing centuries of culture, 00:00:59.480 --> 00:01:03.360 Dada created a new way of looking at the world. 00:01:03.360 --> 00:01:06.120 Sometimes shocking, often anarchic, 00:01:06.120 --> 00:01:11.080 and always difficult to define, its legacy would span a century. 00:01:11.080 --> 00:01:14.920 Dada's tentacles have spread right across our culture, 00:01:14.920 --> 00:01:17.120 from punk 00:01:17.120 --> 00:01:18.760 to the Pythons 00:01:18.760 --> 00:01:20.400 and from Damien Hirst 00:01:20.400 --> 00:01:22.400 to David Bowie. 00:01:22.400 --> 00:01:26.120 The world has gone gaga for Dada. 00:01:26.120 --> 00:01:28.000 Do you want me to shout "Dada" now? 00:01:28.000 --> 00:01:29.280 No. 00:01:29.280 --> 00:01:30.560 Everybody's heard of Dada, 00:01:30.560 --> 00:01:33.320 but no-one seems to know exactly what it is. 00:01:33.320 --> 00:01:35.920 Dada takes delight in contradiction. 00:01:35.920 --> 00:01:40.120 So, to help me pin it down, I've enlisted the help of a few friends. 00:01:40.120 --> 00:01:41.280 Dada! 00:01:41.280 --> 00:01:43.280 Daaaaaaaa-daaaaaaa! 00:01:43.280 --> 00:01:45.800 Da-da, Da-da, Da-da-da. 00:01:45.800 --> 00:01:48.120 Da! Da! 00:01:48.120 --> 00:01:53.960 And, with their assistance, I'll be recreating some Dada performances, 00:01:53.960 --> 00:01:56.080 destroying some artworks, 00:01:56.080 --> 00:01:59.120 and pulling some mischievous stunts. 00:01:59.120 --> 00:02:01.520 There's my Dadaist act for the day. 00:02:01.520 --> 00:02:06.440 And all of this to establish why, out of all the isms, movements and 00:02:06.440 --> 00:02:08.639 manifestos of the 20th century, 00:02:08.639 --> 00:02:12.320 it was the Dadaists who proved the most important, 00:02:12.320 --> 00:02:14.760 giving birth not only to a lot of modern art, 00:02:14.760 --> 00:02:19.840 but also shaping comedy, music and political protest. 00:02:19.840 --> 00:02:24.240 MUSIC: Da Da Da by Trio 00:02:28.520 --> 00:02:30.760 LAIDBACK RUSTIC MUSIC PLAYS 00:02:34.840 --> 00:02:38.760 I first came across Dada at art school in the early '80s. 00:02:38.760 --> 00:02:41.560 It was funnier and more anarchic than anything else I'd 00:02:41.560 --> 00:02:45.320 discovered and it didn't always have to make sense. 00:02:45.320 --> 00:02:49.320 I soon embarked on nonsensical performances of my own. 00:02:52.000 --> 00:02:54.560 I did a performance called I, Kestrel, 00:02:54.560 --> 00:02:59.320 where I dropped potatoes from out of a cardboard box. 00:02:59.320 --> 00:03:03.360 I was in a band that had no name, but we smelt of curry. 00:03:03.360 --> 00:03:06.840 It emerged from flasks at the side of the stage. 00:03:08.320 --> 00:03:11.920 Some people have called some of my performances Dada-esque, and they've 00:03:11.920 --> 00:03:15.840 certainly always flown in the face of logic, leading me to think... 00:03:15.840 --> 00:03:20.040 have I've been subconsciously influenced? Hmmm. 00:03:20.040 --> 00:03:21.680 Maybe. 00:03:26.880 --> 00:03:29.320 - Hmmm. - Hmmmmm. 00:03:32.880 --> 00:03:35.840 But where did all this Dadaism begin? 00:03:39.160 --> 00:03:41.240 Que es Dada? 00:03:43.960 --> 00:03:48.320 Dada - a word chosen at random from a French-German dictionary. 00:03:48.320 --> 00:03:50.760 "Yes, yes," in Romanian. 00:03:53.160 --> 00:03:55.400 A hobby horse in French. 00:03:57.560 --> 00:04:03.440 Whatever the case, it all began 100 years ago in an unlikely place. 00:04:03.440 --> 00:04:05.280 CUCKOO! 00:04:05.280 --> 00:04:07.080 It wasn't in Berlin 00:04:07.080 --> 00:04:08.720 or Paris, 00:04:08.720 --> 00:04:13.440 or any of your usual hotbeds of Bohemian outrage. No. 00:04:13.440 --> 00:04:16.839 The first artists to scare the hell out of the Establishment 00:04:16.839 --> 00:04:20.959 launched their revolution here in, of all places, Zurich. 00:04:22.040 --> 00:04:23.920 SWISS YODELLING SONG PLAYS 00:04:27.640 --> 00:04:29.400 When you think of Zurich, 00:04:29.400 --> 00:04:32.680 the last thing you think about is a radical, anarchic art movement. 00:04:32.680 --> 00:04:35.680 What you might think about is cheese, clocks, 00:04:35.680 --> 00:04:37.480 or Swiss Army knives. 00:04:37.480 --> 00:04:39.240 But radical art movements? No. 00:04:39.240 --> 00:04:41.840 But it was exactly that "There's nothing to see here" 00:04:41.840 --> 00:04:46.400 reputation, that staying in neutral whilst their neighbours were all 00:04:46.400 --> 00:04:51.880 fighting to the death that made Zurich the breeding ground for Dada. 00:04:57.520 --> 00:05:03.680 In 1916, Europe was tearing itself apart, and some wanted 00:05:03.680 --> 00:05:07.640 no further part in the madness and destruction they saw around them. 00:05:10.320 --> 00:05:14.240 Amidst the violence and upheaval of the First World War, artists, poets 00:05:14.240 --> 00:05:17.840 and freethinkers from both sides of the conflict gathered here in 00:05:17.840 --> 00:05:21.040 Zurich to avoid the horrors of the battlefront. 00:05:21.040 --> 00:05:23.200 MUSIC: Boogie Stop Shuffle by Charles Mingus 00:05:23.200 --> 00:05:25.880 It was a city of exiles, and among them a group of unlikely 00:05:25.880 --> 00:05:30.520 revolutionaries formed a bizarre protest movement - Dada. 00:05:30.520 --> 00:05:33.800 In a world where governments created carnage and the normal order 00:05:33.800 --> 00:05:37.320 had become nonsensical, the Dadaists felt the only appropriate 00:05:37.320 --> 00:05:41.520 artistic response was to be truly and deliberately absurd. 00:05:43.800 --> 00:05:46.760 And like all the best world-changing movements, 00:05:46.760 --> 00:05:50.400 Dada began here in a dirty, dingy underground drinking hole. 00:05:55.480 --> 00:05:58.880 With nothing more than the humble dream of selling extra 00:05:58.880 --> 00:06:03.680 sausages and beer, the proprietor of this place sanctioned a cabaret. 00:06:03.680 --> 00:06:07.080 Little did he know what he was letting himself in for. 00:06:08.160 --> 00:06:12.760 The Cabaret Voltaire, still here 100 years on, kick-started 00:06:12.760 --> 00:06:16.640 a movement that would wreak havoc across Europe and beyond. 00:06:17.720 --> 00:06:20.720 - So, welcome, Jim, to Cabaret Voltaire... - Thank you, Adrian. 00:06:20.720 --> 00:06:23.760 - ..the birthplace of Dada. - Cheers. 00:06:23.760 --> 00:06:27.440 So, how did the Cabaret Voltaire start here, then? 00:06:27.440 --> 00:06:31.360 Hugo Ball, who was a writer and a director in the theatre in Munich, 00:06:31.360 --> 00:06:35.240 and Emmy Hennings who was a singer in cafes and bars, 00:06:35.240 --> 00:06:38.640 they came here in 1915 and they were hired in 00:06:38.640 --> 00:06:42.120 a cabaret just down the street, and after a while they thought, 00:06:42.120 --> 00:06:44.960 "We should have our own cabaret." 00:06:44.960 --> 00:06:47.560 They send out an invitation to artists. 00:06:47.560 --> 00:06:49.640 Was there any kind of direction, 00:06:49.640 --> 00:06:51.720 or it was just "Do whatever you want to do?" 00:06:51.720 --> 00:06:53.680 Today, one would say it was an open stage. 00:06:53.680 --> 00:06:55.880 - A free-for-all. - Yeah, free-for-all. - Yeah. 00:06:55.880 --> 00:06:58.440 So, the Dadaists mobilised themselves for war, 00:06:58.440 --> 00:07:01.360 but theirs was a battle against reason itself. 00:07:01.360 --> 00:07:03.040 BRAIN WHIMPERS LIKE A DOG 00:07:03.040 --> 00:07:05.840 Hugo Ball appeared in a bizarre bishop's outfit. 00:07:08.920 --> 00:07:13.120 Romanian poet Tristan Tzara cast a Maori tribal spell. 00:07:15.280 --> 00:07:18.520 Swiss artist Sophie Taeuber improvised a dance, wearing 00:07:18.520 --> 00:07:20.920 a cardboard mask. 00:07:20.920 --> 00:07:24.240 And a dozen balalaika players turned up. 00:07:24.240 --> 00:07:29.240 The German poet Richard Huelsenbeck snapped a riding whip, shouting... 00:07:33.320 --> 00:07:36.360 ..and was joined by Tristan Tzara and Marcel Janco to perform 00:07:36.360 --> 00:07:39.280 in German, English and French all at the same time. 00:07:43.240 --> 00:07:44.880 Sounds like a great show. 00:07:44.880 --> 00:07:47.640 But a bit of a shock for the locals. 00:07:47.640 --> 00:07:50.280 What sort of people did they attract in here, then? 00:07:50.280 --> 00:07:54.000 - People who come to drink beer and eat sausages and... - And absinthe. 00:07:54.000 --> 00:07:55.880 - ..and absinthe, yeah. - Yeah. 00:07:55.880 --> 00:07:59.840 And they didn't come to see somebody talking about art or reciting poems. 00:07:59.840 --> 00:08:03.320 - Yeah. - Basically they had to be better than the absinthe 00:08:03.320 --> 00:08:05.520 or better than beer and sausages. 00:08:05.520 --> 00:08:08.080 This really reminds me of where I started off. 00:08:08.080 --> 00:08:11.920 - I started off in a pub in Southeast London... - Yeah. 00:08:11.920 --> 00:08:14.720 ..which was about the same size as this, the same layout, 00:08:14.720 --> 00:08:16.560 and it was the same kind of thing. 00:08:16.560 --> 00:08:20.400 - I used to get people out of the audience... - Yeah. - ..and say, "Do you want to do something?" 00:08:20.400 --> 00:08:23.200 And it'd be a different show every week, and it was just, like, 00:08:23.200 --> 00:08:25.560 strangely so similar. 00:08:25.560 --> 00:08:28.840 So, did you have some absinthe at that time, maybe, and that's why...? 00:08:28.840 --> 00:08:31.640 - Didn't have absinth, no. We just had lager. - Lager. 00:08:31.640 --> 00:08:33.520 THEY LAUGH 00:08:33.520 --> 00:08:37.000 For Hugo Ball, language had been hijacked by the warmongers 00:08:37.000 --> 00:08:40.120 who twisted words to justify their violent acts, 00:08:40.120 --> 00:08:44.200 so out went words and in came some unusual poetry. 00:08:44.200 --> 00:08:47.640 A lot of these words, they're made up, aren't they? 00:08:47.640 --> 00:08:51.680 - Bloiko - I could say that in my accent. Bloiko. - Bloiko. 00:08:51.680 --> 00:08:53.360 That's nice, yeah. 00:08:53.360 --> 00:08:58.240 - Ogrogoooo. What is it, the umlaut? There's an umlaut. - Ogrogoooo. 00:08:58.240 --> 00:08:59.960 - Ogrogoooo. - Ogrogoooo. 00:08:59.960 --> 00:09:01.760 What's this? Bulomen. 00:09:01.760 --> 00:09:04.040 I think you can probably get that in a face cream. 00:09:04.040 --> 00:09:06.080 ADRIAN LAUGHS 00:09:06.080 --> 00:09:08.680 Some of those words may feel a bit familiar. 00:09:08.680 --> 00:09:10.640 Uvavu. 00:09:10.640 --> 00:09:13.920 Well, look, the audience is in and we're ruining it for them, 00:09:13.920 --> 00:09:17.000 really, by still being here, so we should make a dramatic entrance... 00:09:17.000 --> 00:09:19.560 - Yes. - ..very soon. 00:09:19.560 --> 00:09:23.160 'Tonight I'm going to be re-staging one of the founding moments 00:09:23.160 --> 00:09:27.120 'in the history of Dada, here at its birthplace. 00:09:27.120 --> 00:09:29.560 'For Hugo ball's most iconic performance, 00:09:29.560 --> 00:09:32.360 'he wore his most outlandish outfit.' 00:09:33.360 --> 00:09:37.520 So we'll try and fit Jim into Hugo's costume. 00:09:37.520 --> 00:09:39.520 JIM LAUGHS 00:09:39.520 --> 00:09:42.360 - Pull it off. - OK. 00:09:42.360 --> 00:09:44.720 You misjudged my bulk. 00:09:47.160 --> 00:09:49.920 'There's a few serious faces in the audience. 00:09:49.920 --> 00:09:53.480 'God knows what they're going to make of my transformation into Hugo Ball.' 00:09:53.480 --> 00:09:55.800 How's that? 00:09:55.800 --> 00:09:58.040 - The words don't make any sense. - I know. 00:09:58.040 --> 00:10:00.720 - LAUGHTER - There's only one word. 00:10:00.720 --> 00:10:02.880 - Don't try and understand, just... - I'm not going to. 00:10:02.880 --> 00:10:07.000 - ..go with the flow. - Right, start, because my specs are falling off my nose with the sweat. 00:10:07.000 --> 00:10:09.680 Thanks. LAUGHTER 00:10:09.680 --> 00:10:16.400 Gadji beri bimba glandridi laula lonni cadori. 00:10:16.400 --> 00:10:22.400 Gadjama tuffm i zimzalla binban gligla wowolimai bin beri ban. 00:10:24.440 --> 00:10:30.000 Elifantolim brussala bulomen brussala bulomen tromtata. 00:10:31.040 --> 00:10:35.960 Velo da bang band affalo purzamai affalo purzamai lengado tor. 00:10:37.000 --> 00:10:38.960 LAUGHTER 00:10:38.960 --> 00:10:40.680 I'm getting lost. 00:10:40.680 --> 00:10:43.240 Gaga di bumbalo bumbalo gadjamen. 00:10:43.240 --> 00:10:45.640 Gaga di bling blong. 00:10:45.640 --> 00:10:47.960 Gaga blung. 00:10:47.960 --> 00:10:51.360 APPLAUSE 00:10:53.880 --> 00:10:55.680 I'm collapsing. 00:10:56.760 --> 00:10:59.920 Take this off. LAUGHTER 00:10:59.920 --> 00:11:02.480 Thank you. And there we are. 00:11:02.480 --> 00:11:03.840 Um... 00:11:03.840 --> 00:11:06.480 What was that? LAUGHTER 00:11:06.480 --> 00:11:09.200 APPLAUSE 00:11:13.560 --> 00:11:15.560 - His outfit was ridiculous. - Yeah. 00:11:15.560 --> 00:11:17.440 JIM LAUGHS 00:11:17.440 --> 00:11:19.400 - I'm not knocking it at all. - OK. 00:11:19.400 --> 00:11:20.600 Oh, I'm right on it. 00:11:20.600 --> 00:11:24.280 If he's there, doing his poetry in his magic bishop's costume, 00:11:24.280 --> 00:11:29.000 he's already got a congregation, so he's begun a religion. 00:11:29.000 --> 00:11:32.960 Yeah. And so that's why all these people come here, like a pilgrimage. 00:11:32.960 --> 00:11:35.600 - And what a great shrine. - Yeah. - What a fantastic place. 00:11:35.600 --> 00:11:41.160 - If you've got to have a religion, I'm going to be in here. - Yeah. 00:11:41.160 --> 00:11:46.880 'Hugo Ball wrote that, "Everyone has been seized by an indefinable intoxication. 00:11:46.880 --> 00:11:50.080 ' "The little cabaret is about to come apart at the seams and is 00:11:50.080 --> 00:11:53.800 ' "getting to be a playground for crazy emotions." ' 00:11:53.800 --> 00:11:56.520 Are you following me? 00:11:56.520 --> 00:11:59.840 Just five months after it opened, the cabaret closed, 00:11:59.840 --> 00:12:03.560 but Dada was just beginning. 00:12:03.560 --> 00:12:07.040 In July 1916, Hugo Ball delivered the first in 00:12:07.040 --> 00:12:12.160 a series of speeches announcing the Dada Manifestos. 00:12:12.160 --> 00:12:15.720 These speeches parodied the more grandiose written manifestos 00:12:15.720 --> 00:12:17.600 of the time. 00:12:17.600 --> 00:12:23.560 Dada is a new tendency in art. How does one achieve eternal bliss? 00:12:23.560 --> 00:12:25.560 By saying Dada. 00:12:25.560 --> 00:12:29.520 How does one become famous? By saying Dada. 00:12:29.520 --> 00:12:34.000 A line of poetry is a chance to get rid of all the filth that 00:12:34.000 --> 00:12:37.600 clings to this accursed language, 00:12:37.600 --> 00:12:41.280 as if put there by a stockbroker's hands, 00:12:41.280 --> 00:12:44.960 hands wrought smooth by coins. 00:12:44.960 --> 00:12:47.560 Dada is the heart of words. 00:12:48.680 --> 00:12:50.640 So, what were they doing? 00:12:50.640 --> 00:12:53.400 Let's say, with the poetry, the meaningless, pointless, 00:12:53.400 --> 00:12:55.680 senseless words within the poetry, 00:12:55.680 --> 00:12:58.720 was it a reaction against the meaningless, senseless, 00:12:58.720 --> 00:13:01.280 pointless war that was surrounding them? 00:13:01.280 --> 00:13:04.560 Or were they just trying out something new and having fun with it? 00:13:04.560 --> 00:13:06.240 I don't know. 00:13:06.240 --> 00:13:09.040 Do you know? 00:13:10.320 --> 00:13:13.160 In neighbouring Germany, life was becoming increasingly 00:13:13.160 --> 00:13:15.560 desperate as the war drew to a close, 00:13:15.560 --> 00:13:19.160 and nowhere was this more so than in Berlin. 00:13:19.160 --> 00:13:22.680 This devastated city would provide the setting for Dada's new 00:13:22.680 --> 00:13:27.920 incarnation as the German poet Richard Huelsenbeck returned home from Zurich. 00:13:31.480 --> 00:13:34.560 Richard Huelsenbeck wound up the crowd, 00:13:34.560 --> 00:13:37.680 claiming the Zurich Dadaists were pro-war. 00:13:37.680 --> 00:13:41.000 "And Dadaism is still pro-war today. 00:13:41.000 --> 00:13:44.160 "Things are still not cruel enough." 00:13:44.160 --> 00:13:49.920 In Berlin, Club Dada would unleash a fiercely political rage. 00:13:49.920 --> 00:13:53.240 The First International Dada Fair shook Berlin with its 00:13:53.240 --> 00:13:56.600 shocking satire of the German Establishment. 00:13:56.600 --> 00:13:59.440 And it didn't just tease the Establishment - 00:13:59.440 --> 00:14:02.120 it mercilessly mocked the powers that be. 00:14:02.120 --> 00:14:05.320 John Heartfield hung a dummy from the ceiling dressed in German 00:14:05.320 --> 00:14:08.960 military uniform and with a pig's snout for a face. 00:14:08.960 --> 00:14:12.760 And Otto Dix showed veterans disabled by war injuries. 00:14:12.760 --> 00:14:15.360 These artists took genuine risks, 00:14:15.360 --> 00:14:18.480 and many were arrested for their actions. 00:14:18.480 --> 00:14:22.760 But in the male-dominated world of Berlin Dada, Huelsenbeck, Heartfield 00:14:22.760 --> 00:14:25.800 and Dix met their match in Hannah Hoch. 00:14:27.800 --> 00:14:31.240 MALE VOICES SCREAM More than holding her own at the art fair, 00:14:31.240 --> 00:14:34.080 Hoch satirised the entire German Establishment with her 00:14:34.080 --> 00:14:36.880 masterpiece, Cut With The Kitchen Knife, 00:14:36.880 --> 00:14:40.920 pioneering a radically subversive new artform - photomontage. 00:14:43.840 --> 00:14:46.840 Dada's ground-breaking visual techniques would have a huge 00:14:46.840 --> 00:14:50.960 impact on Neville Brody, one of the pioneers of modern graphic design. 00:14:52.560 --> 00:14:55.880 His interest in Dada has seeped into his cutting edge art 00:14:55.880 --> 00:14:59.760 direction for The Face magazine and his iconic post-punk sleeve 00:14:59.760 --> 00:15:02.640 designs for bands like, you guessed it... 00:15:02.640 --> 00:15:04.600 Cabaret Voltaire. 00:15:06.840 --> 00:15:12.000 Neville, here we've got an early bit of photomontage by Hannah Hoch. 00:15:12.000 --> 00:15:14.080 That's the Kaiser, isn't it? 00:15:14.080 --> 00:15:16.360 So, this is his moustache here. 00:15:16.360 --> 00:15:19.480 Well, this is what I like about it, yeah. Oh, it's two wrestlers. 00:15:19.480 --> 00:15:22.760 Well, you've got little Hannah Hoch down here, 00:15:22.760 --> 00:15:25.480 this tiny head is a kind of signature. 00:15:25.480 --> 00:15:29.640 And then these are the countries where women had the right to 00:15:29.640 --> 00:15:31.160 vote at the time. 00:15:31.160 --> 00:15:35.240 This is the first real kind of powerful use of photomontage 00:15:35.240 --> 00:15:37.320 as a real tool of subversion. 00:15:37.320 --> 00:15:40.720 Why was it? Was it because you'd got photos in newspapers? 00:15:40.720 --> 00:15:42.880 The free access of, like, 00:15:42.880 --> 00:15:45.600 printed photographs meant that someone like Hannah Hoch could come 00:15:45.600 --> 00:15:49.000 in, cut it out, combine it all and create a completely new narrative. 00:15:49.000 --> 00:15:51.440 So this is a whole new way of looking. 00:15:51.440 --> 00:15:54.160 - Like a big political cartoon as well, isn't it? - Yeah. 00:15:54.160 --> 00:15:56.000 This was shocking to the bourgeoisie. 00:15:56.000 --> 00:15:59.840 It was deliberately non-aesthetic. It's not pretty. 00:15:59.840 --> 00:16:03.200 And this is something that we've seen a lot since. 00:16:03.200 --> 00:16:06.680 You know, punk, Jamie Reid, the Sex Pistols covers. 00:16:11.640 --> 00:16:14.520 Punk hijacked Dada's use of photomontage as 00:16:14.520 --> 00:16:16.320 a weapon of subversion, 00:16:16.320 --> 00:16:19.840 from Jamie Reid's Sex Pistols covers to Linder sterling's feminist 00:16:19.840 --> 00:16:23.120 artworks and sleeve designs for bands like the Buzzcocks. 00:16:24.400 --> 00:16:27.600 But punk is only the most obvious child of Dada. 00:16:29.400 --> 00:16:34.720 'Club Dada's striking visuals extended to magazines and journals. 00:16:34.720 --> 00:16:38.880 'I've brought along a copy of the first Dada publication, 00:16:38.880 --> 00:16:41.680 'and I've got a feeling this is going to be right up Neville's street.' 00:16:41.680 --> 00:16:43.200 What is this? 00:16:43.200 --> 00:16:47.000 This is coming directly out of the photomontage approach, 00:16:47.000 --> 00:16:49.200 but now it's typomontage. 00:16:49.200 --> 00:16:52.160 - Yeah, so it's using everything. - This is really stunning. 00:16:52.160 --> 00:16:56.160 It's an amazing piece of freeform typography. 00:16:56.160 --> 00:16:58.600 This really was ahead of its time. 00:16:58.600 --> 00:16:59.960 Just looks incredibly modern. 00:16:59.960 --> 00:17:02.760 There was a lot of punk stuff that was done that looked like this. 00:17:02.760 --> 00:17:06.560 - A lot of art in the '60s and 70s had this feel, and the '50s. - Yeah. 00:17:06.560 --> 00:17:10.240 And this had a big influence on my work, directly - the idea of going 00:17:10.240 --> 00:17:14.560 off-grid, nothing lines up, it's all at an angle, 00:17:14.560 --> 00:17:16.839 yet it has so much energy. 00:17:16.839 --> 00:17:18.920 - It is completely haphazard. - Yeah. 00:17:18.920 --> 00:17:21.640 I actually remember I did a whole record cover where all the type was 00:17:21.640 --> 00:17:26.000 at angles and the printer helped me by straightening them all up again. 00:17:26.000 --> 00:17:28.720 He said, "I've fixed it for you now, young man." 00:17:28.720 --> 00:17:30.560 This is beautiful, though, isn't it? 00:17:30.560 --> 00:17:33.240 It's gorgeous, just an extraordinary piece. 00:17:33.240 --> 00:17:36.080 Makes me want to give it up - it's all been done, really, hasn't it? 00:17:36.080 --> 00:17:38.400 JIM LAUGHS 00:17:38.400 --> 00:17:41.000 'A lot of today's generation of graphic designers think 00:17:41.000 --> 00:17:44.440 'they're nicking ideas from Neville Brody, but what they don't realise 00:17:44.440 --> 00:17:48.680 'is that some of the freshest looking magazine layouts date back to Dada.' 00:17:50.840 --> 00:17:53.680 While Hannah Hoch and others were busy setting the agenda 00:17:53.680 --> 00:17:55.520 for 20th century culture, 00:17:55.520 --> 00:17:59.920 one lone wolf managed to grab all of the world's media attention. 00:18:01.200 --> 00:18:05.520 Architect Johannes Baader was in his own Dada universe. 00:18:05.520 --> 00:18:09.880 He called himself Super Dada, or Dada Chief, 00:18:09.880 --> 00:18:13.800 and announced himself as President Of The Earth. 00:18:13.800 --> 00:18:15.480 No ego problems there, then. 00:18:15.480 --> 00:18:16.720 On April Fools' Day, 00:18:16.720 --> 00:18:20.240 he warned the district of Berlin that Dada forces were on 00:18:20.240 --> 00:18:25.040 their way, and 2,000 people were there to fend off the Dada invasion. 00:18:25.040 --> 00:18:28.480 When the time came, he wrote his own obituary but announced his 00:18:28.480 --> 00:18:31.160 resurrection the following day. 00:18:31.160 --> 00:18:33.080 Richard Huelsenbeck warned, 00:18:33.080 --> 00:18:37.040 "Watch out for Baader, who has nothing to do with our thoughts. 00:18:37.040 --> 00:18:42.720 "He has compromised Dada in Berlin to such an extent with his 00:18:42.720 --> 00:18:47.240 "idiocies that I can't even get a small item into the press." 00:18:47.240 --> 00:18:49.480 MUSIC: Let's Dance by David Bowie 00:18:49.480 --> 00:18:53.560 According to one of the Dada gang, "Dada was a dancing epidemic 00:18:53.560 --> 00:18:58.320 "with simultaneous beginnings in different parts of the world." 00:18:59.320 --> 00:19:02.880 In Zurich, Dada had taken a hammer to language. 00:19:02.880 --> 00:19:06.480 In Berlin, it attacked the political Establishment. 00:19:06.480 --> 00:19:11.560 And now, in New York, Dada took aim at art itself. 00:19:12.760 --> 00:19:14.320 JAZZ PIANO MUSIC PLAYS 00:19:16.920 --> 00:19:20.920 Marcel Duchamp, the king of conceptual art, 00:19:20.920 --> 00:19:24.200 forced the grand old guardians of the art world to ask 00:19:24.200 --> 00:19:27.920 themselves a question they hadn't had to think about before. 00:19:27.920 --> 00:19:32.040 "If you put a toilet in art gallery, does that make it art?" 00:19:32.040 --> 00:19:35.120 And, "Should I start stroking my beard yet?" 00:19:37.360 --> 00:19:41.880 Duchamp caused scandal by presenting a urinal signed "R Mutt" 00:19:41.880 --> 00:19:45.080 to the board of the Society For Independent Artists. 00:19:45.080 --> 00:19:50.800 It was rejected and the story went in Dada journals like The Blind Man. 00:19:50.800 --> 00:19:54.880 It was just one in a series of ready-mades - 00:19:54.880 --> 00:19:58.480 everyday objects exhibited as art - 00:19:58.480 --> 00:20:00.880 a closed window, 00:20:00.880 --> 00:20:03.400 a snow shovel, 00:20:03.400 --> 00:20:05.400 a bottle rack, 00:20:05.400 --> 00:20:07.440 and a bicycle wheel. 00:20:08.760 --> 00:20:12.240 And Duchamp provoked the rage of the art establishment still 00:20:12.240 --> 00:20:16.600 further by defacing an old master. 00:20:16.600 --> 00:20:19.280 A copy at least. 00:20:19.280 --> 00:20:21.920 He called the work Elle A Chaud Au Cul, 00:20:21.920 --> 00:20:24.200 which in French sounds just like, 00:20:24.200 --> 00:20:26.320 "She's got a hot ass." 00:20:26.320 --> 00:20:29.640 For the Dadaists, this series of provocations was enough for 00:20:29.640 --> 00:20:34.000 Duchamp to gain entry into their club, whether he liked it or not. 00:20:37.240 --> 00:20:41.600 Artist Cornelia Parker has made art out of everyday objects herself, 00:20:41.600 --> 00:20:45.160 but not without flattening them first with a steam roller. 00:20:45.160 --> 00:20:47.000 She's my kind of artist. 00:20:50.080 --> 00:20:52.720 And, for Cornelia, Duchamp, the reluctant Dadaist, 00:20:52.720 --> 00:20:54.840 has been a lifelong inspiration. 00:20:56.400 --> 00:20:59.760 Was Marcel Duchamp a Dadaist? 00:20:59.760 --> 00:21:02.600 He was a Dadaist by default, I think. 00:21:02.600 --> 00:21:05.320 The toilet...R Mutt's toilet, that's the thing that everyone knows, 00:21:05.320 --> 00:21:08.520 - isn't it? - R Mutt's toilet, yeah, I suppose you introduce the idea of 00:21:08.520 --> 00:21:11.040 anything you just go and buy in the shop becoming an art object. 00:21:11.040 --> 00:21:13.680 - And he did, and he caused a big stink. - He did. 00:21:13.680 --> 00:21:16.880 The idea of putting that into a salon where you're supposed 00:21:16.880 --> 00:21:20.960 to put accepted work seemed to be what it was all about, 00:21:20.960 --> 00:21:23.520 really, more than the object itself. 00:21:23.520 --> 00:21:25.480 A lot of things just started with him, 00:21:25.480 --> 00:21:27.800 because he was just up for anything. 00:21:27.800 --> 00:21:30.520 Duchamp sort of opened up this seam, you know, 00:21:30.520 --> 00:21:34.720 in kind of art that was kind of...everything was quite 00:21:34.720 --> 00:21:37.440 stable and quite...progressing nicely, 00:21:37.440 --> 00:21:40.680 but he'd just kind of create this big fissure, you know, this 00:21:40.680 --> 00:21:45.240 fault-line that allowed other people just to be completely maverick. 00:21:47.240 --> 00:21:50.200 Duchamp's idea for the readymade has inspired generations of 00:21:50.200 --> 00:21:52.360 artists since, 00:21:52.360 --> 00:21:55.160 and at the time inspired a collaboration with artist and 00:21:55.160 --> 00:21:57.400 photographer Man Ray. 00:21:57.400 --> 00:22:01.440 This is a fantastic photograph by Man Ray of Duchamp's 00:22:01.440 --> 00:22:05.640 half-finished sculpture which was called The Large Glass. 00:22:05.640 --> 00:22:09.200 He was allowing dust to accumulate on it, 00:22:09.200 --> 00:22:11.560 because he wanted to incorporate the dust into the piece, 00:22:11.560 --> 00:22:13.880 and I think he left a note for the cleaner, cos 00:22:13.880 --> 00:22:17.760 he had a cleaning lady, saying, you know, "Don't touch, dust breeding." 00:22:17.760 --> 00:22:23.840 - Did Man Ray come round to his house and then...? - Spot it and like it? - And Marcel said, 00:22:23.840 --> 00:22:26.720 "Here, have a look at this, look at all this dust I'm breeding here." 00:22:26.720 --> 00:22:29.120 And he says, "We'll just take a picture of it, shall we?" 00:22:29.120 --> 00:22:31.320 - I'm sure it went something like that. - I bet it is, yeah. 00:22:31.320 --> 00:22:33.840 I think some of the best art is serendipitous. 00:22:33.840 --> 00:22:38.480 - I quite like the idea of, you know, negligence becoming art. - CORNELIA LAUGHS 00:22:38.480 --> 00:22:41.720 Yeah. And have you been influenced by Dada? 00:22:41.720 --> 00:22:44.720 I'm very influenced by Duchamp. I think he's, most probably, if 00:22:44.720 --> 00:22:48.560 I had to pick one artist to say that he's had the most influence on me. 00:22:48.560 --> 00:22:50.520 Yeah. 00:22:50.520 --> 00:22:54.600 Dada managed to be really infantile and outrageous but at the 00:22:54.600 --> 00:22:57.920 same time made people think about things afresh. 00:22:59.080 --> 00:23:02.480 I'm off with Cornelia to stage our own Dada intervention. 00:23:02.480 --> 00:23:04.600 MUSIC: Da Funk by Daft Punk 00:23:04.600 --> 00:23:07.560 It'll pay tribute to both the politics of Club Dada in Berlin 00:23:07.560 --> 00:23:09.680 and the irreverence of New York Dada. 00:23:13.880 --> 00:23:17.120 It's taking us to Bond Street, where war leaders 00:23:17.120 --> 00:23:19.960 Churchill and Roosevelt hold court. 00:23:25.680 --> 00:23:28.400 Let's see who gets arrested first. 00:23:28.400 --> 00:23:31.880 Do you think I'll get arrested... I'm more likely to get arrested with balaclavas? 00:23:31.880 --> 00:23:35.000 I think you'll get more arrested than me. THEY LAUGH 00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:38.400 - Here are the boys. - Right, so, are you ready? - Yeah. 00:23:46.840 --> 00:23:49.200 There's my Dadaist act for the day. 00:23:49.200 --> 00:23:51.320 - That's great, don't you think? - Yeah. 00:23:51.320 --> 00:23:53.720 It looks really menacing. 00:23:53.720 --> 00:23:56.920 Shall we leave them on for a couple of minutes to see what people think? 00:23:58.040 --> 00:24:00.680 'I think Cornelia's gone for political Dada - 00:24:00.680 --> 00:24:02.680 'she's made them into terrorists.' 00:24:03.800 --> 00:24:07.560 The police don't seem to have noticed yet. 00:24:07.560 --> 00:24:10.720 'Right, now it's my turn to give these old geezers 00:24:10.720 --> 00:24:12.760 'a 21st century face-lift. 00:24:12.760 --> 00:24:16.720 'I'm thinking absurdo-Dada is more my style.' 00:24:16.720 --> 00:24:20.080 MUSIC: I've Told Every Little Star by Linda Scott 00:24:20.080 --> 00:24:21.960 'That should bring them down to scale.' 00:24:21.960 --> 00:24:24.560 - There. - That's great, I love it. 00:24:24.560 --> 00:24:26.400 These need you on, darling. 00:24:26.400 --> 00:24:28.320 I think I'll go on here. 00:24:28.320 --> 00:24:29.960 Oh! 00:24:29.960 --> 00:24:33.040 - What does it mean then? - What does it mean? - What have we done? 00:24:33.040 --> 00:24:35.880 Well, this is almost...well, it's 100 years after Dadaism, 00:24:35.880 --> 00:24:37.920 - so this is... - Is it a student prank? 00:24:37.920 --> 00:24:40.320 - I think it's a student prank... - It kind of feels like it. 00:24:40.320 --> 00:24:42.400 It is a student prank, isn't it? 00:24:42.400 --> 00:24:44.560 I liked your balaclavas, I think, best. 00:24:44.560 --> 00:24:48.040 - Did you? - Yeah. It was more of a striking effect. 00:24:48.040 --> 00:24:51.720 It was slightly more edgy. People enjoy this one more, I think. 00:24:51.720 --> 00:24:54.960 - Mine was most probably a bit more like... - SIREN WAILS 00:24:54.960 --> 00:24:56.880 ..you know, like Pussy Riot or something. 00:24:56.880 --> 00:24:58.280 - Do you think so? - Yes. 00:24:58.280 --> 00:25:00.600 Here come the coppers. 00:25:00.600 --> 00:25:03.240 - What should we do - just leave it there? - Well, we could. 00:25:03.240 --> 00:25:05.720 Should we just walk off and leave it? 00:25:11.240 --> 00:25:14.720 I suppose the whole legacy of Dada means that people 00:25:14.720 --> 00:25:17.600 have been defacing statues for a long time, haven't they? 00:25:17.600 --> 00:25:20.160 Usually the traffic cone is the favourite one. 00:25:20.160 --> 00:25:22.640 Now you've got Banksy. 00:25:22.640 --> 00:25:26.200 It's not just being cheeky. No. CORNELIA LAUGHS 00:25:26.200 --> 00:25:28.320 No, it's a bit more, I don't know, 00:25:28.320 --> 00:25:30.440 it came out of a more political time, didn't it? 00:25:30.440 --> 00:25:33.160 For some reason I always thought Dadaism was 00:25:33.160 --> 00:25:36.640 a little less benign than Surrealism. 00:25:38.360 --> 00:25:40.560 'Well, that's its brilliance for me. 00:25:40.560 --> 00:25:43.600 'Dada can be the provocative dangerous artform Cornelia is 00:25:43.600 --> 00:25:46.880 'drawn to, but it's also the original inspiration for mindless 00:25:46.880 --> 00:25:49.040 'student pranks.' 00:25:55.440 --> 00:26:00.040 Back in Zurich, Tristan Tzara, who we last saw casting a tribal spell 00:26:00.040 --> 00:26:04.680 at the Cabaret Voltaire, was taking Dada in a radical new direction. 00:26:06.200 --> 00:26:09.080 With new publications springing up by the second, 00:26:09.080 --> 00:26:13.960 Dada's next target was the world of mass communication. 00:26:13.960 --> 00:26:18.560 Tzara planned to trick the papers with a fake press release. 00:26:21.360 --> 00:26:24.200 Tzara was using Dada's subversive energy 00:26:24.200 --> 00:26:26.680 to mock the new media culture. 00:26:26.680 --> 00:26:29.760 NEWS JINGLE PLAYS 00:26:32.800 --> 00:26:37.040 There was a pistol duel yesterday on the Rehalp near Zurich, between 00:26:37.040 --> 00:26:41.880 Tristan Tzara, familiar founder of Dada, and Dada painter Hans Arp. 00:26:41.880 --> 00:26:44.640 Four rounds were fired and, in the fourth exchange, 00:26:44.640 --> 00:26:47.440 Arp was slightly grazed on his left thigh. 00:26:49.040 --> 00:26:51.040 Armando Iannucci. 00:26:51.040 --> 00:26:53.400 How do you respond to this? 00:26:53.400 --> 00:26:55.800 - Well, this is literally news to me. - Yeah. 00:26:55.800 --> 00:26:58.480 - I'm going to put the hands down. - Yeah, I'm going to stop doing this. 00:26:58.480 --> 00:27:00.320 This was an article, 00:27:00.320 --> 00:27:02.600 this was written by the Dadaists and sent out 00:27:02.600 --> 00:27:05.640 to various publications and newspapers, and was printed. 00:27:05.640 --> 00:27:07.440 It was all made up. It was fake. 00:27:07.440 --> 00:27:10.880 And that is something that is very contemporary, 00:27:10.880 --> 00:27:14.080 because nowadays, you know, there's so much, 00:27:14.080 --> 00:27:17.160 you know, 24-hour media and newspapers that have websites 00:27:17.160 --> 00:27:21.200 - that need filling, so if you sent them a press release now... - Yeah. 00:27:21.200 --> 00:27:25.040 ..it will appear as a story, even though it's word-for-word 00:27:25.040 --> 00:27:27.160 quoting the press release that you sent out. 00:27:27.160 --> 00:27:31.840 I mean, what Dada is saying is that something that sounds very 00:27:31.840 --> 00:27:35.880 serious and true might not be serious and might not be true. 00:27:35.880 --> 00:27:39.600 I remember, about 20 years ago, we did a show called On The Hour, which 00:27:39.600 --> 00:27:43.760 was like a false news programme, but we actually did a...we made a report 00:27:43.760 --> 00:27:47.320 about an abattoir where the cows were actually rising from the dead. 00:27:47.320 --> 00:27:49.240 I remember it. 00:27:49.240 --> 00:27:52.600 ..and it nearly got on the Today programme. 00:27:52.600 --> 00:27:56.560 We submitted it as from a Bristol reporter for BBC Bristol, 00:27:56.560 --> 00:27:58.360 and it was all lined up, 00:27:58.360 --> 00:28:01.000 and John Humphrys had written his introduction and everything, 00:28:01.000 --> 00:28:04.440 and we came seconds away from it being played live. 00:28:04.440 --> 00:28:08.840 Armando Iannucci has made an art out of Dadaist manipulation with 00:28:08.840 --> 00:28:11.080 shows like The Day Today. 00:28:11.080 --> 00:28:12.320 News. 00:28:12.320 --> 00:28:15.000 London Transport say they may have to close the Underground 00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:17.720 system due to an infestation of horses. 00:28:17.720 --> 00:28:20.440 A report described the conditions in the equine plague as 00:28:20.440 --> 00:28:23.440 "like an abattoir in a power cut". 00:28:23.440 --> 00:28:27.280 To inspire other would-be Dadaists, Tristan Tzara published 00:28:27.280 --> 00:28:30.520 a set of instructions on how to tear up newspaper articles and 00:28:30.520 --> 00:28:32.160 reassemble them. 00:28:33.680 --> 00:28:36.880 Take a newspaper. Take some scissors. 00:28:36.880 --> 00:28:39.480 Choose from this paper an article. 00:28:39.480 --> 00:28:43.040 Next, carefully cut out each of the words that make up this 00:28:43.040 --> 00:28:46.480 article and put them all together in a bag. 00:28:46.480 --> 00:28:48.560 Shake gently. 00:28:48.560 --> 00:28:52.000 Next, take out each cutting, one after the other. 00:28:52.000 --> 00:28:56.320 Copy conscientiously in the order in which they left the bag. 00:28:56.320 --> 00:28:58.640 - OK. - Right, so tip it out. - Right. 00:28:58.640 --> 00:28:59.960 So, let's... 00:28:59.960 --> 00:29:01.920 This is the way they've fallen out. 00:29:01.920 --> 00:29:04.240 "We're updating squeaky-voiced felt." 00:29:05.240 --> 00:29:06.960 Hang on. 00:29:06.960 --> 00:29:11.840 "The Cumberbatch appeared correct where cardboard catchphrases, 00:29:11.840 --> 00:29:15.760 "occasionally sometimes correct," it says. 00:29:15.760 --> 00:29:20.120 - Which kind of sums up random words. - Yeah. 00:29:20.120 --> 00:29:24.480 I think what they were beginning to explore was that idea that, 00:29:24.480 --> 00:29:29.600 you know, we take so much of what we're being told for granted. 00:29:29.600 --> 00:29:33.000 We're seeing it as the voice of authority and infallible, 00:29:33.000 --> 00:29:36.680 - and they're saying it's not, really. - Yeah. - It's just words. 00:29:37.840 --> 00:29:39.760 Thank you, thank you. 00:29:39.760 --> 00:29:43.280 We've been recording a music video, and it goes like this. 00:29:43.280 --> 00:29:45.520 # I'm hardcore and I know the score 00:29:45.520 --> 00:29:47.840 # I am disgusted by the poor 00:29:47.840 --> 00:29:50.600 # And my chums matter more because we are the law 00:29:50.600 --> 00:29:53.560 # And I've made sure we're ready for class war. # 00:29:53.560 --> 00:29:56.760 Cut-up, today, is such a prevalent form. 00:29:56.760 --> 00:30:01.800 Deconstructing what you think of as true and telling you it's just, 00:30:01.800 --> 00:30:06.120 you know, it's just an assembly of information which you could 00:30:06.120 --> 00:30:08.520 put out in another combination. 00:30:08.520 --> 00:30:11.840 Any source of any information can be cut and connected... 00:30:11.840 --> 00:30:15.640 - But this is a random combination. - Yeah. - That's the difference. 00:30:15.640 --> 00:30:18.160 I think what's happening now is people are trying to do 00:30:18.160 --> 00:30:20.440 something more coherent with it. 00:30:20.440 --> 00:30:24.320 So this is Tristan Tzara's unpatented idea, 00:30:24.320 --> 00:30:28.000 - but it's led to fridge magnet poetry. - Fridge magnet poetry. 00:30:28.000 --> 00:30:30.800 And it's led to the whole of the internet, which consists 00:30:30.800 --> 00:30:36.560 mostly of people cutting up bits of film and television. 00:30:36.560 --> 00:30:38.760 The idea that we can all reedit - 00:30:38.760 --> 00:30:41.440 one day this is how all programmes will be made. 00:30:43.920 --> 00:30:45.920 That's great. Thank you.' 00:30:45.920 --> 00:30:47.480 THEY CHUCKLE 00:30:47.480 --> 00:30:49.200 DRAMATIC NEWS SHOW MUSIC 00:30:51.320 --> 00:30:54.720 Dada poets and artists jumped on the creative opportunities 00:30:54.720 --> 00:30:59.720 provided by cut-up, using the process for more than just satire. 00:30:59.720 --> 00:31:04.000 Sometimes, a painting doesn't go the way you want it to go. 00:31:04.000 --> 00:31:06.360 Damn you, fine artwork! 00:31:06.360 --> 00:31:11.880 And this happened to artist Jean Arp, who was so frustrated, 00:31:11.880 --> 00:31:17.800 he ripped up the painting and let the pieces land on the floor and 00:31:17.800 --> 00:31:21.560 where they landed, he decided that 00:31:21.560 --> 00:31:24.960 this was exactly what he wanted 00:31:24.960 --> 00:31:27.400 in the first place. 00:31:30.080 --> 00:31:33.560 That's not bad, actually. It's pretty good. 00:31:33.560 --> 00:31:36.240 And Arp's wasn't too bad either. 00:31:36.240 --> 00:31:38.440 Hello. Yes. Hello. Thank you. Yes. 00:31:38.440 --> 00:31:41.920 This Dadaist principle of tearing everything up re-emerged in 00:31:41.920 --> 00:31:45.840 '60s counter culture and nowhere more so than with 00:31:45.840 --> 00:31:49.000 William Burroughs, who made an art out of chance happening with 00:31:49.000 --> 00:31:55.400 his fragmented poetry, tape cut-ups, and even randomly reassembled films. 00:31:55.400 --> 00:31:58.520 Hello. Yes. Where are we? Hello. Yes. 00:31:58.520 --> 00:32:00.600 Hello. Yes. 00:32:00.600 --> 00:32:03.360 Burroughs' artistic experiments would trigger 00:32:03.360 --> 00:32:06.800 a new wave of cut-up in the second half of the century, passing on 00:32:06.800 --> 00:32:11.280 his Dadaist technique to musicians, from Paul McCartney to David Bowie. 00:32:12.520 --> 00:32:17.680 What I've used it for more than anything else is igniting 00:32:17.680 --> 00:32:20.120 anything that might be in my imagination. 00:32:20.120 --> 00:32:23.440 I've tried doing it with diaries and things and I was finding out 00:32:23.440 --> 00:32:27.160 amazing things about me and what I'd done and where I was going. 00:32:27.160 --> 00:32:30.360 And a lot of the things that I'd done, it seemed that it would 00:32:30.360 --> 00:32:33.720 predict things about the future, or tell me a lot about the past. 00:32:33.720 --> 00:32:35.840 I don't know, let's see what happens. 00:32:40.840 --> 00:32:45.160 # I'm an alligator 00:32:45.160 --> 00:32:47.040 # I'm a momma-papa... # 00:32:47.040 --> 00:32:50.280 From our pop stars to our counter cultural heroes, 00:32:50.280 --> 00:32:53.160 we're all a little bit under the influence of Dada. 00:32:54.680 --> 00:32:58.440 In 1919, the Dada epidemic hit Cologne. 00:32:58.440 --> 00:33:01.880 Each time it spread, Dada mutated and evolved. 00:33:03.520 --> 00:33:09.240 Zurich Dada had introduced absurdist nonsense, Berlin Dada had targeted 00:33:09.240 --> 00:33:14.240 the political establishment, and New York Dadaists sent up the art world. 00:33:14.240 --> 00:33:18.840 Now, in Cologne, it was all about shock for shock's sake. 00:33:18.840 --> 00:33:21.640 A Cologne publication called the Berlin Dadaists 00:33:21.640 --> 00:33:26.400 counterfeits of Dada for their strongly held beliefs. 00:33:26.400 --> 00:33:30.800 It claimed, they can neither shit nor pee without ideologies. 00:33:32.640 --> 00:33:37.960 What Cologne Dada lacked in politics, it made up for in anarchy. 00:33:39.040 --> 00:33:42.840 The Dada early spring exhibition incensed audiences with an 00:33:42.840 --> 00:33:46.760 entrance via a public urinal of a beer hall and on the way in, 00:33:46.760 --> 00:33:50.000 the public were showered with obscenities. 00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:52.080 BLEEP. BLEEP. BLEEP. 00:33:52.080 --> 00:33:57.880 Audiences were so incensed that they destroyed artworks in fits of rage. 00:33:57.880 --> 00:34:01.640 And Max Ernst, the leader of Cologne Dada, actively encouraged 00:34:01.640 --> 00:34:06.040 this destruction, displaying a sculpture with an axe attached. 00:34:06.040 --> 00:34:09.600 The police said, "Enough is enough!" and closed down the show. 00:34:14.360 --> 00:34:17.920 To find out what all this anarchy and destruction was about, 00:34:17.920 --> 00:34:20.040 I'm going to meet Michael Landy, 00:34:20.040 --> 00:34:24.440 one of the mischievous Young British Artists who introduced 00:34:24.440 --> 00:34:27.120 Dada's shock tactics to a new generation in the '90s. 00:34:33.040 --> 00:34:36.760 Michael is best known for destroying all of his possessions 00:34:36.760 --> 00:34:38.080 in the name of art. 00:34:38.080 --> 00:34:39.960 Hello? 00:34:39.960 --> 00:34:42.000 And judging by the look of his house, 00:34:42.000 --> 00:34:44.199 he hasn't replaced many of them since. 00:34:46.280 --> 00:34:48.280 DRAMATIC WESTERN STYLE MUSIC 00:34:57.920 --> 00:35:02.080 In Cologne, Max Ernst had a wooden sculpture with an axe 00:35:02.080 --> 00:35:04.680 attached to it, so that they could destroy it. 00:35:04.680 --> 00:35:06.920 - Oh, yeah. - What do you know about that? 00:35:06.920 --> 00:35:10.400 Destruction in art has kind of, like, a long history, really. 00:35:10.400 --> 00:35:15.320 And I think Dada was like, it brought, like, destruction... 00:35:15.320 --> 00:35:19.080 It's not necessarily nihilistic, it can also be creative. 00:35:19.080 --> 00:35:20.280 Yeah. 00:35:20.280 --> 00:35:23.480 Picasso talks about having, like, every time you make a painting, 00:35:23.480 --> 00:35:25.880 in a sense, it's a kind of mini-destruction. 00:35:25.880 --> 00:35:30.760 You know, you've got to take things apart to recreate, in a sense. 00:35:30.760 --> 00:35:34.160 You've got to take the previous generation apart, in a sense. 00:35:34.160 --> 00:35:38.320 You've got to almost, like, dismiss what they do and kind of 00:35:38.320 --> 00:35:41.320 recreate yourself with a whole new set of values. 00:35:41.320 --> 00:35:43.400 Cos you did your destruction... 00:35:43.400 --> 00:35:46.320 Yeah, I destroyed all my worldly belongings, yeah. 00:35:46.320 --> 00:35:50.120 - Was it absolutely everything? - At the time, yeah, at the age of 37. 00:35:50.120 --> 00:35:51.760 And how did you destroy it? 00:35:51.760 --> 00:35:54.000 We didn't get an axe to it or anything like that. 00:35:54.000 --> 00:35:56.720 It was actually a quite methodical way of doing it. 00:35:56.720 --> 00:35:58.840 So did you destroy your artwork as well? 00:35:58.840 --> 00:36:02.400 Yeah, I destroyed my artwork, I destroyed my friends' artwork. 00:36:02.400 --> 00:36:05.800 So would you say that was a Dadaist thing to do? 00:36:05.800 --> 00:36:07.480 Yeah, in some respects, yeah. 00:36:07.480 --> 00:36:09.680 I would say it's a pretty absurd thing to do. 00:36:09.680 --> 00:36:12.320 Yeah, and it did get up people's noses because obviously 00:36:12.320 --> 00:36:15.920 - people work their whole lives to acquire things, don't they? - Yeah. 00:36:15.920 --> 00:36:18.680 And there I was, destroying them all. 00:36:18.680 --> 00:36:22.640 Michael Landy and his mates shocked the art world in the 00:36:22.640 --> 00:36:26.400 '90s with the notorious Sensation exhibition. 00:36:26.400 --> 00:36:30.280 There was Damien Hirst with his shark, 00:36:30.280 --> 00:36:33.520 Tracey Emin with her unmade bed, 00:36:33.520 --> 00:36:37.400 and Marcus Harvey with his portrait of serial killer Myra Hindley, 00:36:37.400 --> 00:36:39.760 made with child handprints. 00:36:39.760 --> 00:36:43.640 But while Cologne Dada had its show shut down by the police, 00:36:43.640 --> 00:36:46.840 the YBA's just provoked a few headlines in the tabloids. 00:36:49.800 --> 00:36:52.840 You were involved in the Sensation show, weren't you? 00:36:52.840 --> 00:36:54.280 Hands up, I was, yeah. 00:36:54.280 --> 00:36:58.720 I mean, Sensation is like a collection of Charles Saatchi's. 00:36:58.720 --> 00:37:01.640 I mean, Dada is like... 00:37:01.640 --> 00:37:05.040 They're a group of artists who create manifestos, you know. 00:37:05.040 --> 00:37:07.680 They have like shared ideologies. 00:37:07.680 --> 00:37:11.240 I think the only similarity would be the media. 00:37:11.240 --> 00:37:15.400 Dada was being more provocative than I am and their audience is 00:37:15.400 --> 00:37:18.880 very conservative. I mean, what people think of art is like 00:37:18.880 --> 00:37:22.200 a nice landscape painting or a nice cherub in bronze. 00:37:22.200 --> 00:37:23.760 They don't think, you know, 00:37:23.760 --> 00:37:26.280 a mannequin with a light bulb on its head is art. 00:37:26.280 --> 00:37:29.440 - Yeah. - So they're trying to shock people, aren't they? - Yeah, they are. 00:37:29.440 --> 00:37:32.840 That's what they're trying to... Get up their noses and make them angry. 00:37:32.840 --> 00:37:37.160 Yeah. So, any final thoughts on Dada? 00:37:37.160 --> 00:37:40.560 I'd just like to thank Dada really for paving the way for people 00:37:40.560 --> 00:37:42.600 like me to come along. 00:37:42.600 --> 00:37:46.040 - Yeah. Thank you, Dada. - Thank you, Dada. 00:37:46.040 --> 00:37:48.720 HE CHUCKLES 00:37:48.720 --> 00:37:52.360 I've brought a piece of artwork along with me for you. 00:37:52.360 --> 00:37:55.720 - Do you know the history of me and artwork? - I know, yeah. 00:37:55.720 --> 00:37:57.600 It's one of my prized possessions. 00:37:57.600 --> 00:38:00.520 - Well, now, you're making me feel bad. You can take it home. - No. 00:38:00.520 --> 00:38:03.040 No, I want you to do what you've got to do with it. 00:38:03.040 --> 00:38:05.160 I could make you do it. I'd feel much better. 00:38:05.160 --> 00:38:07.840 - You can follow my instructions. - Have you got any ideas? 00:38:07.840 --> 00:38:11.400 - Maybe show it to me first. - So I'll go and get the plate. - OK. 00:38:11.400 --> 00:38:13.880 And then we'll talk about how to destroy. 00:38:13.880 --> 00:38:16.760 - How we're going to get rid of it. - Yeah, here it is. - Aw. 00:38:16.760 --> 00:38:19.720 It's a wedding plate for Bill and Cath. 00:38:19.720 --> 00:38:22.320 William and you know...the royals. 00:38:24.600 --> 00:38:25.800 So the classic way, 00:38:25.800 --> 00:38:28.720 I suppose of destroying it is the Grecian way, isn't it? 00:38:28.720 --> 00:38:31.360 - I like the idea of poking it off something. - OK. 00:38:31.360 --> 00:38:33.480 You could poke it off the top of my head. 00:38:33.480 --> 00:38:36.720 - We could balance on top of my head and you could push it off. - Yeah. 00:38:36.720 --> 00:38:40.760 - You know where your broom... - I've got a flat head. I'll go and get the broom. 00:38:47.160 --> 00:38:50.720 - OK, I'll try and balance on my head. - Yeah. Right, are you ready? 00:38:53.800 --> 00:38:56.160 LOUD CLATTER 00:38:56.160 --> 00:38:57.400 - Did that break? - Yeah. 00:38:57.400 --> 00:38:58.960 There. 00:38:58.960 --> 00:39:01.600 - That looks nice now, I like that. - Yeah, that looks nice. 00:39:01.600 --> 00:39:04.480 - Yeah, I like that as well. - I could sellotape that back together. 00:39:04.480 --> 00:39:07.480 - Are you going to sweep that up and put it in a poitrine? - In a latrine? 00:39:07.480 --> 00:39:11.680 - In a poitrine, yeah. Not a latrine. - Put a cloche over it. 00:39:11.680 --> 00:39:13.400 - A what? - A cloche. 00:39:13.400 --> 00:39:16.040 THEY CHUCKLE 00:39:16.040 --> 00:39:18.320 'When I do silly things in my comedy, 00:39:18.320 --> 00:39:19.760 'it's a bit of throwaway fun, 00:39:19.760 --> 00:39:23.160 'but when I do them with an esteemed Young British Artist, I am 00:39:23.160 --> 00:39:26.800 'surely creating a piece of Dadaist performance art!' 00:39:26.800 --> 00:39:30.600 You find me, several tenths of my way through this journey and 00:39:30.600 --> 00:39:33.160 exploration into what is Dada. 00:39:33.160 --> 00:39:35.480 I've spoken to several people, 00:39:35.480 --> 00:39:39.840 all of which seem to have varying ideas about Dada. 00:39:39.840 --> 00:39:42.880 Was it political, anarchic? Was it comedy? What was it? 00:39:42.880 --> 00:39:45.520 It was probably all of those things and more. 00:39:45.520 --> 00:39:47.880 But what I can say is since the beginning, 00:39:47.880 --> 00:39:50.880 I thought I had quite a good idea about what Dada is. 00:39:50.880 --> 00:39:53.120 I think I'm probably more confused now, 00:39:53.120 --> 00:39:58.600 so I shall continue my journey and find out what exactly is Dada. 00:40:00.160 --> 00:40:01.200 SQUEALING 00:40:02.880 --> 00:40:04.000 UM! 00:40:05.400 --> 00:40:08.760 To help me answer that question, I'm meeting the man who updated 00:40:08.760 --> 00:40:12.400 Dada's absurdist style for my generation. 00:40:15.040 --> 00:40:16.640 FANFARE 00:40:18.680 --> 00:40:21.440 Now, where is he? 00:40:21.440 --> 00:40:23.200 FANFARE 00:40:26.200 --> 00:40:30.120 - Strangers meeting in the night. - I never expected to see you here. - No. 00:40:30.120 --> 00:40:32.880 - Take a seat. - What are you doing here? - I don't know. 00:40:32.880 --> 00:40:35.560 - What are you doing here? - I don't know. A car brought me. 00:40:35.560 --> 00:40:36.920 I know nothing! 00:40:36.920 --> 00:40:38.960 Let's find out! 00:40:38.960 --> 00:40:42.840 Well, Terry, what does Dada mean to you, if anything? 00:40:44.920 --> 00:40:49.520 I've never seriously thought about what it means to me. It just is. 00:40:49.520 --> 00:40:51.840 - Do you know what it is? - Yeah. I do. 00:40:51.840 --> 00:40:56.080 I think what was interesting, the fact that it was anti-war, 00:40:56.080 --> 00:40:58.560 it was a reaction to the First World War, 00:40:58.560 --> 00:41:04.840 a reaction to bourgeois society, and these very boring tastes. 00:41:04.840 --> 00:41:07.440 I think the anger is what's interesting about it, 00:41:07.440 --> 00:41:10.880 how they were angry about the world nightmare they were living in 00:41:10.880 --> 00:41:14.040 and yet, you deal with it in different ways. 00:41:14.040 --> 00:41:17.160 And it's the humour side that we always went for. 00:41:17.160 --> 00:41:19.600 Is that what it was? Was there a war going on, 00:41:19.600 --> 00:41:23.120 so we're going to have to have fun and lighten the situation? 00:41:23.120 --> 00:41:26.200 Or you go absurd. You go totally Absurdist. 00:41:26.200 --> 00:41:30.040 If we're in an absurd situation, a complete nightmare out there, 00:41:30.040 --> 00:41:33.720 well, let's create nightmares and throw it back at society and 00:41:33.720 --> 00:41:35.560 see if you can shake it up. 00:41:35.560 --> 00:41:39.760 - That's a really good point cos it really was just madness. - Yeah. 00:41:39.760 --> 00:41:43.360 I mean, I left America because of the Vietnam War and all of 00:41:43.360 --> 00:41:45.480 that and I realised I was more... 00:41:45.480 --> 00:41:49.400 I was more Dadaist than I realised 00:41:49.400 --> 00:41:53.880 because completely against the war, I hated the way society was 00:41:53.880 --> 00:41:57.360 structured and behaving, and I wanted to make people laugh. 00:41:57.360 --> 00:41:59.640 - Yeah. - Bah-boom! 00:41:59.640 --> 00:42:01.600 MUMBLING SINGING WAGNER 00:42:04.760 --> 00:42:06.480 BLESSING IN LATIN 00:42:11.200 --> 00:42:15.360 What interests me is how many artists that I've always been 00:42:15.360 --> 00:42:19.200 either copying, admiring, or being influenced by, 00:42:19.200 --> 00:42:24.720 were the Dadaists, and George Melly wrote a review of Python and 00:42:24.720 --> 00:42:31.520 he referred to me as a product of Max Ernst. Wow! 00:42:31.520 --> 00:42:35.760 - So you weren't aware before...? - I was only aware of his paintings. 00:42:35.760 --> 00:42:38.000 I wasn't aware of his collages. 00:42:44.000 --> 00:42:47.560 This is a film by Hans Richter, who was a Dadaist. 00:42:47.560 --> 00:42:49.440 Look at this. 00:42:49.440 --> 00:42:51.640 It's called Ghosts Before Breakfast. 00:42:58.320 --> 00:43:01.840 - The silly walk! - It is, look. That's it. Isn't it? - Yup! 00:43:01.840 --> 00:43:03.920 So, who saw that then? 00:43:03.920 --> 00:43:06.720 - Probably nobody. - Is it just a coincidence? 00:43:06.720 --> 00:43:11.000 But that's what I love about things, how coincidental things can be. 00:43:11.000 --> 00:43:14.480 - Yeah. - We were just doing it. We weren't aware of what we were doing. 00:43:14.480 --> 00:43:18.120 There's a bubbling pot, isn't there? Where Dadaists pop out like 00:43:18.120 --> 00:43:22.800 bubbles and they're not aware that they are being called Dadaists! 00:43:22.800 --> 00:43:24.040 Yeah. I know. 00:43:24.040 --> 00:43:28.960 I think it was easier when we were doing Python, certainly for me, 00:43:28.960 --> 00:43:33.480 coming to this country, the categories are more clear. 00:43:33.480 --> 00:43:36.280 You know, the bankers, City guys, pin stripe suits, 00:43:36.280 --> 00:43:39.800 bowler hats, working class, look like working class, 00:43:39.800 --> 00:43:41.640 the middle class was the middle class. 00:43:41.640 --> 00:43:45.200 Now, I think it's harder to be Dadaist right now. 00:43:45.200 --> 00:43:48.000 Maybe it's ripe for a new uprising of Dadaism. 00:43:48.000 --> 00:43:52.880 I think it's really hard to get to grips with cos you can't find 00:43:52.880 --> 00:43:54.600 what the enemy is. 00:43:54.600 --> 00:43:58.080 You can't react against it cos it's so atomised now. 00:43:58.080 --> 00:44:01.000 SWANEE WHISTLE 00:44:08.160 --> 00:44:10.840 In the early '20s, with the war over, 00:44:10.840 --> 00:44:14.480 the global outposts of Dada converged in Paris. 00:44:15.640 --> 00:44:18.640 First, Tristan Tzara from Zurich, 00:44:18.640 --> 00:44:21.880 then Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray from New York... 00:44:21.880 --> 00:44:23.480 Oi, Marcel! 00:44:23.480 --> 00:44:27.080 ..and then, Max Ernst from Cologne. 00:44:29.400 --> 00:44:31.880 A new supergroup was formed. 00:44:35.320 --> 00:44:38.840 Paris Dada offered its groupies more spectacle and more sheer 00:44:38.840 --> 00:44:42.160 silliness than anything that had gone before. 00:44:42.160 --> 00:44:45.000 It was Dada with bells on. 00:44:45.000 --> 00:44:46.240 BELLS SHAKE 00:44:47.560 --> 00:44:49.800 HE HUMS FLORAL DANCE 00:44:54.320 --> 00:44:56.640 By way of self-promotion, 00:44:56.640 --> 00:44:59.640 the Dadaists plastered stickers across the city. 00:45:03.440 --> 00:45:08.960 BELL RINGS AND DROWNS OUT SPEECH 00:45:20.360 --> 00:45:26.000 Francis Picabia made a drawing on a blackboard and then erased it 00:45:26.000 --> 00:45:28.600 at the exhibition. 00:45:30.320 --> 00:45:35.160 And to announce the opening of a Man Ray exhibition, 00:45:35.160 --> 00:45:37.120 the space was filled 00:45:37.120 --> 00:45:40.600 with balloons and the Dadaists popped them as people came in. 00:45:41.880 --> 00:45:45.200 Paris audiences were so outraged, 00:45:45.200 --> 00:45:48.440 they threw tomatoes and raw meat at them. 00:45:48.440 --> 00:45:52.480 Now, I'm meeting an artist who knows exactly how it feels to be on 00:45:52.480 --> 00:45:55.160 the receiving end of groceries. 00:45:55.160 --> 00:45:57.600 Martin Creed's Turner Prize-winning show, 00:45:57.600 --> 00:46:01.400 The Lights Going On And Off, which consisted of the lights going 00:46:01.400 --> 00:46:04.880 on and off, invited the question - is this art? 00:46:04.880 --> 00:46:09.160 And prompted some gallery goers to throw eggs at the wall. 00:46:09.160 --> 00:46:14.240 - So this is your studio? - Yeah. - Well, show us around? - Well, so there's... 00:46:14.240 --> 00:46:18.240 - These are paintings. - Oh, yeah. I've heard about them. 00:46:18.240 --> 00:46:21.920 - That's a bag. - Yeah. - That's a bag, that says... 00:46:21.920 --> 00:46:24.000 That actually says "whatever". 00:46:25.560 --> 00:46:29.080 - Oh, yeah. - There's some boxes here. - Yeah. 00:46:29.080 --> 00:46:33.120 - What's this? - A knitting thing with the stripes getting bigger. 00:46:33.120 --> 00:46:36.240 - What's it going to be? - No, that is what it is. 00:46:36.240 --> 00:46:39.000 - Oh, is it? - This is a pair of trousers 00:46:39.000 --> 00:46:40.760 I've been working on. 00:46:40.760 --> 00:46:44.000 - What are you going to do with them? - Well, just erm... 00:46:45.960 --> 00:46:49.240 - ..wear them. - JIM CHUCKLES 00:46:49.240 --> 00:46:52.080 - Wow! - That is a hat. 00:46:52.080 --> 00:46:53.800 - How does it look? - Looks good. 00:46:53.800 --> 00:46:55.080 Aye. 00:46:56.960 --> 00:46:59.600 - What is that? - That's a Panda. A Fiat Panda. 00:47:02.160 --> 00:47:04.040 So what about Dada? 00:47:04.040 --> 00:47:06.640 You got anything that's Dadaesque in here? 00:47:06.640 --> 00:47:09.880 Er, I don't, well, I don't know about, I don't know, 00:47:09.880 --> 00:47:17.120 - maybe a lot of it is because I think it's sort of a bit stupid. - Yeah. 00:47:17.120 --> 00:47:18.800 You know? I think that's... 00:47:18.800 --> 00:47:21.480 - That's what Dada is. - Aye, like being stupid. 00:47:21.480 --> 00:47:24.760 But there's political meaning and then you've got to balance that 00:47:24.760 --> 00:47:27.720 - with the daftness or the stupidness. - Right, aye. 00:47:27.720 --> 00:47:29.520 Cos I'd probably fall on the daft side. 00:47:29.520 --> 00:47:33.400 I would go...I think I would definitely fall on the stupid side. 00:47:33.400 --> 00:47:36.320 You'd be even further, right the other end! 00:47:36.320 --> 00:47:38.720 - Yeah. - Yeah. 00:47:38.720 --> 00:47:42.160 Cos I think it's like more, you know, 00:47:42.160 --> 00:47:45.600 - it's more like life, cos life's stupid. - Yeah. 00:47:47.000 --> 00:47:51.720 'Like the Dadaists, Martin filled the gallery half full with balloons. 00:47:51.720 --> 00:47:54.960 'His works are starting to feel rather familiar.' 00:47:54.960 --> 00:47:58.840 - That was your idea, wasn't it? Balloons. - I didn't know about that. 00:47:58.840 --> 00:48:01.120 This is what I've been finding, 00:48:01.120 --> 00:48:05.040 the Dadaists did have a lot of ideas for the first time. 00:48:05.040 --> 00:48:08.320 - Yeah, it looks like it, aye. - And, um... 00:48:08.320 --> 00:48:10.720 - and then you had them later. - Right! 00:48:10.720 --> 00:48:13.160 THEY LAUGH 00:48:13.160 --> 00:48:15.720 I'm just wandering about here. 00:48:15.720 --> 00:48:18.760 I mean, who knows what they were really trying to do, those people? 00:48:18.760 --> 00:48:21.000 - I don't know. - I don't know. 00:48:21.000 --> 00:48:22.640 No, I don't. 00:48:24.520 --> 00:48:28.280 And I don't know either, but, aye, I don't know. 00:48:28.280 --> 00:48:30.600 - I don't know. - I don't know. 00:48:30.600 --> 00:48:33.480 Well, there we are then, that's the answer to that, isn't it? 00:48:35.920 --> 00:48:38.440 Is there any reason behind any of your stuff? 00:48:38.440 --> 00:48:41.320 Maybe it's trying to do what you're not supposed to do. 00:48:41.320 --> 00:48:43.600 When I did this film of people being sick, 00:48:43.600 --> 00:48:46.440 and one of people shitting as well, 00:48:46.440 --> 00:48:53.080 just cos it's a taboo of our, like, British society. 00:48:53.080 --> 00:48:58.040 And are you allowed to go into a gallery and laugh your head off. 00:48:58.040 --> 00:49:00.920 Yeah, well, I would have thought so, aye. 00:49:00.920 --> 00:49:03.720 - That's what I encourage whenever I have my shows. - Aye. 00:49:07.200 --> 00:49:12.080 'Martin's invited me to join him in his latest nonsensical idea, 00:49:12.080 --> 00:49:14.400 'blind painting. 00:49:14.400 --> 00:49:17.360 'So I'm going to do a portrait with absolutely no idea 00:49:17.360 --> 00:49:19.120 'what it's going to look like.' 00:49:20.880 --> 00:49:23.640 - It is weird, isn't it? - It is weird. 00:49:51.800 --> 00:49:53.960 - I think I'm done. - Yeah, I think I have. 00:49:53.960 --> 00:49:55.920 - Right. - So we're going to... 00:49:55.920 --> 00:49:58.560 - What are we going to do, just show? - Oh, aye, OK. 00:49:58.560 --> 00:50:00.440 Whoa! 00:50:00.440 --> 00:50:01.760 Oh, yeah. 00:50:01.760 --> 00:50:03.400 THEY LAUGH 00:50:06.360 --> 00:50:08.040 - Oh, God. - Oh, it's dripping. 00:50:08.040 --> 00:50:09.600 Put them down on here. 00:50:09.600 --> 00:50:13.240 Aye. Don't want it to drip. Amazing. 00:50:15.120 --> 00:50:17.440 So has this got anything to do with Dada? 00:50:17.440 --> 00:50:19.280 I suppose it's just a new idea. 00:50:19.280 --> 00:50:21.360 Maybe cos it's like trying to do it the way you're not 00:50:21.360 --> 00:50:23.560 supposed to do it, cos you find that if you're going to do 00:50:23.560 --> 00:50:25.960 - a picture of something you should... - So it's getting rid of 00:50:25.960 --> 00:50:28.120 - all conventions. - ..at least look at what your... 00:50:28.120 --> 00:50:31.200 I feel like, you know, if you try to control things 00:50:31.200 --> 00:50:34.200 - it doesn't necessarily make them better, you know? - Yeah. 00:50:34.200 --> 00:50:35.960 This has got no bearing on anything. 00:50:50.360 --> 00:50:54.400 In Paris Tristan Tzara achieved his dream by gathering together 00:50:54.400 --> 00:50:59.000 all the Dadaists to form a movement, Movement Dada. 00:50:59.000 --> 00:51:02.680 It was the culmination of all the nonsense of Dada, 00:51:02.680 --> 00:51:06.840 and for a brief moment Dada was the talk of the town. 00:51:08.800 --> 00:51:13.160 But for some, like Max Ernst and Man Ray, the nonsense was wearing thin. 00:51:13.160 --> 00:51:18.160 They'd begun searching for meaning through dreams and the subconscious. 00:51:19.280 --> 00:51:23.880 Man Ray famously took a metronome, cut out an eye from a photograph, 00:51:23.880 --> 00:51:28.120 put them together and made a new work, Object To Be Destroyed. 00:51:28.120 --> 00:51:30.560 I think I might have a go myself. 00:51:33.920 --> 00:51:36.240 Connect and print. Is that what I do? 00:51:36.240 --> 00:51:38.160 Enter the password. 00:51:38.160 --> 00:51:40.360 Shove a little bit of light music on. 00:51:41.840 --> 00:51:45.360 MUSIC: Left Bank Two by The Noveltones 00:51:49.200 --> 00:51:51.120 There is something blurry happening. 00:51:53.200 --> 00:51:57.480 Then you cut out an eye. 00:52:00.760 --> 00:52:04.800 And then he stuck the eye on the metronome 00:52:04.800 --> 00:52:07.240 and there... 00:52:07.240 --> 00:52:09.840 he had a new work, 00:52:09.840 --> 00:52:12.480 Object To Be Destroyed. 00:52:21.920 --> 00:52:25.320 So with all the Dadaists all going off in different directions 00:52:25.320 --> 00:52:28.680 there was nothing holding this movement together 00:52:28.680 --> 00:52:31.880 and, what's more, egos were taking over. 00:52:32.960 --> 00:52:36.880 So Tristan Tzara, right, he wanted to be the leader of the Dadaists. 00:52:36.880 --> 00:52:39.800 "Oh, look at me, I want to be the king of the Dadaists!" 00:52:39.800 --> 00:52:42.520 In fact they used to call him Tzar Tristan. 00:52:42.520 --> 00:52:46.160 But soon Dada had rivals in the Paris art world, 00:52:46.160 --> 00:52:49.000 including the French poet Andre Breton, and he was 00:52:49.000 --> 00:52:52.880 getting up the noses of other poets as well, like Paul Eluard. 00:52:52.880 --> 00:52:57.200 Dada was about to reach its bitter end in July 1923 00:52:57.200 --> 00:53:01.080 at the Soiree Of The Bearded Heart. 00:53:02.200 --> 00:53:06.320 So early on in the evening, Andre Breton takes offence at some 00:53:06.320 --> 00:53:10.280 performer and whacks him with his cane and gets thrown out, then 00:53:10.280 --> 00:53:14.720 a bit later on, just before Tristan Tzara's play The Gas Heart 00:53:14.720 --> 00:53:18.720 is on, there's like a rumpus going on in the stalls. 00:53:18.720 --> 00:53:20.280 Then who is it? 00:53:20.280 --> 00:53:23.600 It's Paul Eluard, the poet. He demands to see Tristan Tzara, 00:53:23.600 --> 00:53:26.280 so Tristan Tzara comes out, they have a pushing and shoving match 00:53:26.280 --> 00:53:30.040 and then Paul Eluard lamps Tristan Tzara, 00:53:30.040 --> 00:53:33.680 he goes down and that was it, you know, it was kind of all over 00:53:33.680 --> 00:53:36.680 by then really, so we went off to the boozer to talk about it, 00:53:36.680 --> 00:53:38.960 and had a right old laugh. 00:53:38.960 --> 00:53:41.400 Dada had died a death. 00:53:41.400 --> 00:53:44.520 But some Dadaists, like Max Ernst and Man Ray, 00:53:44.520 --> 00:53:46.400 found another gang to join, 00:53:46.400 --> 00:53:50.320 jumping ship to Andre Breton's new art movement, 00:53:50.320 --> 00:53:52.280 Surrealism. 00:53:53.280 --> 00:53:56.440 But I don't know if anyone really, really and honestly knew 00:53:56.440 --> 00:53:59.480 what Dada was all about yet. 00:53:59.480 --> 00:54:02.160 And to be honest, neither do I. 00:54:03.560 --> 00:54:07.040 But perhaps if I look out on this historic city, 00:54:07.040 --> 00:54:12.960 take in its atmosphere, I might get a feel for Dada 00:54:12.960 --> 00:54:20.360 and finally get to grips with this contradictory movement. 00:54:21.760 --> 00:54:24.320 No, Paris didn't do much for Dadaism, 00:54:24.320 --> 00:54:27.480 and, to be honest, it's not doing a lot for me either. 00:54:27.480 --> 00:54:28.640 I'm off. 00:54:34.960 --> 00:54:36.800 Terry! Terry! 00:54:38.120 --> 00:54:40.160 What is... What is Dada? 00:54:40.160 --> 00:54:42.360 Come on, what is Dada? 00:54:42.360 --> 00:54:45.080 - Leave me alone! Leave me alone! - What is it? 00:54:46.760 --> 00:54:49.320 - What is Dada? - I'm not going to tell him, I'm not going to tell him. 00:54:51.880 --> 00:54:54.640 What is Dada? 00:54:56.000 --> 00:54:59.480 Everyone needs a shed to go to when all else has failed. 00:55:00.800 --> 00:55:02.320 What is Dada? 00:55:02.320 --> 00:55:06.080 What is Dada? What...is Dada? 00:55:06.080 --> 00:55:08.040 - VOICE ECHOES: - Eh, what do you reckon? 00:55:08.040 --> 00:55:11.880 Turkey. Tutankhamen. 00:55:11.880 --> 00:55:14.160 - Hello. - What? 00:55:14.160 --> 00:55:18.080 Moon River, wider than a mile. 00:55:18.080 --> 00:55:19.680 Hello. 00:55:19.680 --> 00:55:21.000 Hello. 00:55:21.000 --> 00:55:23.240 Yes, Arthur Smith at your service here. 00:55:23.240 --> 00:55:26.920 What exactly is Dada? 00:55:26.920 --> 00:55:31.600 Dada is a virgin microbe that fills up all the space 00:55:31.600 --> 00:55:35.200 that reason cannot with its convention. 00:55:35.200 --> 00:55:37.680 Good, glad you sorted that out for me, then. 00:55:37.680 --> 00:55:39.360 Yeah, I mean, in a sense, you know, 00:55:39.360 --> 00:55:42.560 if you start trying to analyse it then you'll end up 00:55:42.560 --> 00:55:45.840 disappearing up your own bottom, and it recognises that. 00:55:45.840 --> 00:55:50.480 So some people reckon is political, some people think it's just 00:55:50.480 --> 00:55:54.560 stupid absurdist comedy, or is it all of it? What is it? 00:55:54.560 --> 00:55:59.800 You've got to defy convention and logic in order to amaze 00:55:59.800 --> 00:56:03.080 and stimulate people, I suppose. 00:56:03.080 --> 00:56:06.960 Dada gave a licence for people to be stupid and in some sense 00:56:06.960 --> 00:56:11.880 it is the founder of modern comedy and you've definitely acted on 00:56:11.880 --> 00:56:18.040 your licence to be stupid, and Vic and all your mates, so well done. 00:56:18.040 --> 00:56:19.640 Thanks. 00:56:19.640 --> 00:56:21.880 Well, I'm stuck here alone in my bar, 00:56:21.880 --> 00:56:24.200 and you're stuck there alone in your bar, 00:56:24.200 --> 00:56:28.840 and yet we're together, Jim, that's a kind of Dadaism all by itself. 00:56:28.840 --> 00:56:30.760 That's beautiful. 00:56:30.760 --> 00:56:34.160 'Right, where do I go from here?' 00:56:42.800 --> 00:56:46.480 We're nearly at the end of our voyage, and have we discovered anything? 00:56:46.480 --> 00:56:49.760 Yes, I think we have. I think we know a little bit more about Dada. 00:56:49.760 --> 00:56:52.760 Do you know more about Dada? Do I know more about Dada? 00:56:52.760 --> 00:56:55.040 I do, but do you? 00:56:55.040 --> 00:56:57.200 I don't and you do. 00:56:57.200 --> 00:57:01.320 And I think one thing that we have learned is that a bloke 00:57:01.320 --> 00:57:03.920 from the BBC, that's me, sitting on a pedestal, 00:57:03.920 --> 00:57:05.640 can't tell you what to think. 00:57:05.640 --> 00:57:08.360 They'll put it all together in the edit anyway. 00:57:08.360 --> 00:57:09.920 Dada is... 00:57:09.920 --> 00:57:11.360 - Completely... - Maverick... 00:57:11.360 --> 00:57:14.360 - Deconstructing... - This serious idea about... 00:57:14.360 --> 00:57:17.040 - Art... - It's just an assembly... 00:57:17.040 --> 00:57:19.760 - Of artists who create... - Art that was... - Incredibly modern... 00:57:19.760 --> 00:57:21.200 - Very... - Coincidental... 00:57:21.200 --> 00:57:23.600 - Free-form... - Negligence... 00:57:23.600 --> 00:57:26.640 - They were a bit stupid... - And want to make people laugh... 00:57:26.640 --> 00:57:28.520 - The spirit of Dada... - Was about... 00:57:28.520 --> 00:57:31.200 - A whole new set of... - Extraordinary... - Ideologies... 00:57:31.200 --> 00:57:33.800 - They were angry about... - Convention and... 00:57:33.800 --> 00:57:36.360 - People being sick... - It's like a big political... 00:57:36.360 --> 00:57:38.720 - Shake it up. - I would say it's pretty absurd... 00:57:38.720 --> 00:57:41.040 - It just is... - More like life... 00:57:41.040 --> 00:57:43.600 - Nonsensical anyway... - More provocative... 00:57:43.600 --> 00:57:46.240 - Than beer and sausages... - I'm sure it's something like that. 00:58:15.240 --> 00:58:17.080 Thank you. 00:58:17.080 --> 00:58:19.720 LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE