Greta Knutson or Knutson-Tzara (also known as Greta Knutson; 1899–1983) was a

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

modernist Modernism is both a philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new forms of art, philosophy, an ...

visual artist, art critic, short story writer and poet. A student of

André Lhote André Lhote (5 July 1885 – 24 January 1962) was a French Cubist painter of figure subjects, portraits, landscapes and still life. He was also active and influential as a teacher and writer on art. Early life and education Lhote was born ...

who adopted

Abstraction Abstraction in its main sense is a conceptual process wherein general rules and concepts are derived from the usage and classification of specific examples, literal ("real" or "concrete") signifiers, first principles, or other methods. "An abstr ...

Cubism Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassemble ...

and

Surrealism Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to l ...

, she was also noted for her interest in

phenomenology Phenomenology may refer to: Art * Phenomenology (architecture), based on the experience of building materials and their sensory properties Philosophy * Phenomenology (philosophy), a branch of philosophy which studies subjective experiences and a ...

. Knutson was married to

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

n-born author and co-founder of

Dada Dada () or Dadaism was an art movement of the European avant-garde in the early 20th century, with early centres in Zürich, Switzerland, at the Cabaret Voltaire (Zurich), Cabaret Voltaire (in 1916). New York Dada began c. 1915, and after 192 ...

ism

Tristan Tzara Tristan Tzara (; ; born Samuel or Samy Rosenstock, also known as S. Samyro; – 25 December 1963) was a Romanian and French avant-garde poet, essayist and performance artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, comp ...

, but they later divorced.

Biography

Born in

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

, Greta Knutson was a Swedish surrealist painter, art critic, poet, and writer. She was born to an affluent family in 1899 and was fluent in several foreign languages. She attended the Carl Wilhelmson Academy of Fine Arts for one year, then studied at the

Kungliga Konsthögskolan The Royal Institute of Art ( sv, Kungliga Konsthögskolan) is an institution in Stockholm, Sweden for higher education in art,Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

during the early 1920s."Greta Knutson", in

Penelope Rosemont Penelope Rosemont (born 1942 in Chicago, Illinois) is a visual artist, writer, publisher, and social activist who attended Lake Forest College. She has been a participant in the Surrealist Movement since 1965. With Franklin Rosemont, Bernard Mar ...

, ''

Surrealist Women ''Surrealist Women: An International Anthology'' is an anthology edited by Penelope Rosemont. It was published by University of Texas Press The University of Texas Press (or UT Press) is a university press that is part of the University of T ...

'',

Continuum International Publishing Group Continuum International Publishing Group was an academic publisher of books with editorial offices in London and New York City. It was purchased by Nova Capital Management in 2005. In July 2011, it was taken over by Bloomsbury Publishing. , al ...

, London & New York, 1998, p.69. It was there that she began frequenting Andre Lhote's studio and became his disciple. When she moved to Paris her stay became permanent and she would only ever return to Sweden occasionally. She was interested in Cubism, Surrealism, and Abstraction as art concepts. She was interested in the change of art from the real world around us to the surreal world of the unconscious. It was also in France that Knutson met Tzara, reportedly in 1924.''Madame Tzara? Greta Knutson şi Tristan Tzara'' (October 3, 2007)
, at the

Romanian Cultural Institute The Romanian Cultural Institute ( ro, Institutul Cultural Român, ICR), headquartered in Bucharest, was established in 2004 on the older institutional framework provided by the Romanian Cultural Foundation and before 1989 by the Institute for ...

in Stockholm; retrieved May 2, 2008 She married him on August 8, 1925. Jacques-Yves Conrad
''Promenade surréaliste sur la colline de Montmartre''
, at the University of Paris III: Sorbonne Nouvellebr>Center for the Study of Surrealism
; retrieved May 2, 2008 The couple had a son, Christophe, born on March 15, 1927, at

Neuilly-sur-Seine Neuilly-sur-Seine (; literally 'Neuilly on Seine'), also known simply as Neuilly, is a commune in the department of Hauts-de-Seine in France, just west of Paris. Immediately adjacent to the city, the area is composed of mostly select residentia ...

. In 1925, Knutson inherited a large fortune. With funds from her inheritance, Tzara built the family residence in

Montmartre Montmartre ( , ) is a large hill in Paris's northern 18th arrondissement. It is high and gives its name to the surrounding district, part of the Right Bank. The historic district established by the City of Paris in 1995 is bordered by Rue Ca ...

, commissioned to architect

Adolf Loos Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos (; 10 December 1870 – 23 August 1933) was an Austrian and Czechoslovak architect, influential European theorist, and a polemicist of modern architecture. He was an inspiration to modernism and a widely-k ...

(a former figure of the Modernist Movement in Vienna). The house turned into a social spot for other Surrealists. She partly modified the structure to accommodate her personal studio, which Loos had omitted in his original design. Knutson adopted Surrealism during the 1930s. She and Tristan Tzara however parted in 1937 Daniele Leclair, ''René Char. Là où brûle la poésie'', Edition Aden, Paris, 2007, p.108-110. (they were pronounced divorced on 25 October 1942). During the war, Knutson had a love affair with the French poet and resistance leader

René Char René Émile Char (; 14 June 1907 – 19 February 1988) was a French poet and member of the French Resistance. Biography Char was born in L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue in the Vaucluse department of France, the youngest of the four children of Emile ...

. Knutson painted several portraits of Char. She also broke with Surrealism, pursuing her interest in phenomenology, and in particular in philosophers

Edmund Husserl , thesis1_title = Beiträge zur Variationsrechnung (Contributions to the Calculus of Variations) , thesis1_url = https://fedora.phaidra.univie.ac.at/fedora/get/o:58535/bdef:Book/view , thesis1_year = 1883 , thesis2_title ...

and

Martin Heidegger Martin Heidegger (; ; 26 September 188926 May 1976) was a German philosopher who is best known for contributions to phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. He is among the most important and influential philosophers of the 20th centur ...

. During the late 1930s, she painted a portrait of

Swiss Swiss may refer to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina *Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses *Swiss-system tournament, in various games and sports *Swiss Internation ...

sculptor

Alberto Giacometti Alberto Giacometti (, , ; 10 October 1901 – 11 January 1966) was a Swiss sculptor, painter, draftsman and printmaker. Beginning in 1922, he lived and worked mainly in Paris but regularly visited his hometown Borgonovo to see his family and ...

; she later recounted that her model confessed to her that his borrowings from

African art African art describes the modern and historical paintings, sculptures, installations, and other visual culture from native or indigenous Africans and the African continent. The definition may also include the art of the African diasporas, su ...

, although discussed by critics, were only coincidental, and had to do with the fact that

primitivism Primitivism is a mode of aesthetic idealization that either emulates or aspires to recreate a "primitive" experience. It is also defined as a philosophical doctrine that considers "primitive" peoples as nobler than civilized peoples and was an o ...

was in fashion.

Rosalind E. Krauss Rosalind Epstein Krauss (born November 30, 1941) is an American art critic, art theorist and a professor at Columbia University in New York City. Krauss is known for her scholarship in 20th-century painting, sculpture and photography. As a critic ...

, ''The Originality of the Avant-garde and Other Modernist Myths'',

MIT Press The MIT Press is a university press affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts (United States). It was established in 1962. History The MIT Press traces its origins back to 1926 when MIT publish ...

, Cambridge, 1985, p.85. Knutson was a productive writer, publishing essays of art criticism, and, only sporadically, poems. She wrote in both Swedish and French. Late in her life, she also authored

novella A novella is a narrative prose fiction whose length is shorter than most novels, but longer than most short stories. The English word ''novella'' derives from the Italian ''novella'' meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) facts ...

s and

prose poetry Prose poetry is poetry written in prose form instead of verse form, while preserving poetic qualities such as heightened imagery, parataxis, and emotional effects. Characteristics Prose poetry is written as prose, without the line breaks associ ...

fragments. Together with poet

Gunnar Ekelöf Bengt Gunnar Ekelöf (15 September 1907, in Stockholm – 16 March 1968, in Sigtuna) was a Swedish poet and writer. He was a member of the Swedish Academy from 1958 and was awarded an honorary doctorate in philosophy by Uppsala University in 1958. ...

, she translated works of

Swedish literature Swedish literature () refers to literature written in the Swedish language or by writers from Sweden. The first literary text from Sweden is the Rök runestone, carved during the Viking Age circa 800 AD. With the conversion of the land to Chris ...

into French, but her own poetry was never issued as a volume during her lifetime. “The story of the cliffside path/Will be a path that licks the flagstone/Will lift its hand toward the iron/ Path to the broken porch shelter of the pursued/ night came morning gone/toward the gentle flock and the boat sleeping/ against the temple of the riverbank.”, an excerpt of her poem, translated from French, that originally was in Le Surrealisme ASDLR. She also had several solo art exhibits, notably one in Paris in 1929 and one in Stockholm in 1932. Greta Knutson committed suicide in Paris in 1983 but her works, influence, and legacy will live on forever.

Legacy

Greta Knutson's French-language poems were translated into

by poet Lasse Söderberg, and, together with her husband, she was the subject of a study by art historian Cecilia Sjöholm. Söderberg, Sjöholm, actor Christian Fex and writer Jonas Ellerström took part in the ''Madame Tzara?'' event, held at the

in Stockholm during October 2007.

References

External links

Greta Knutson
at the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Knutson, Greta 1899 births 1983 deaths Swedish art critics Swedish essayists Swedish emigrants to France 20th-century Swedish painters Swedish poets Swedish translators 20th-century Swedish women artists 20th-century Swedish poets Swedish women poets Artists from Stockholm Abstract artists Cubist artists Swedish surrealist artists Women surrealist artists Phenomenologists Swedish women short story writers Swedish short story writers Swedish women essayists Swedish women critics 20th-century French women writers 20th-century translators 20th-century short story writers 20th-century essayists People of Montmartre Surrealist artists 1983 suicides Suicides in France

Biography

Legacy

References

Further reading

External links