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USM Open Source History Text: The World at War: World History 1914-1945

Paul Klee, Red Balloon (1922)

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5. Hannah Höch, Cut with the Dada Kitchen Knife through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany (1919) Hannah Höch (1889-1978) was a member of the Berlin Dada movement and developed the art of photomontage. This work was made from images cut and pasted from the Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung and other periodicals. Pulsing, chaotic, and bursting with Dada energy, it is populated with well-known faces of the day – the recently abdicated Wilhelm II, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg, President Friedrich Ebert, as well as circus performers, athletes, actresses, and Hannah Höch herself – all floating among the gears and ball-bearings of industrial production. It has become one of the most recognized artworks of the Dada movement. http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/sub_image.cfm?image_id=4209
6. Otto Dix, The Skat Players (1920) Otto Dix (1891-1969) was one of the most important artists of the Dada and Neue Sachlichkeit [New Objectivity] movements. Wounded and crippled World War I veterans are a recurring theme in his work. The card players, fitted with prosthetic arms and legs, depict the German elite during the Weimar era. On the right, the soldier endowed with the Iron Cross First Class embodies the military. His earless opponent directly opposite represents finance and capitalism, while the middle figure symbolizes the “old” aristocracy. The prosthesis and sensory support apparatus represent the “cyborgization” of humanity through faith in technology and progress; at the same time, they are also a direct critique of it. Skat, a card game that was especially popular among conservatives in Germany, was also played by soldiers in the trenches during World War I. http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/sub_image.cfm?image_id=4212
7. László Moholy-Nagy, 7 a.m. New Year's Morning (c. 1930)

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