Hannah Höch
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Hannah Höch (; 1 November 1889 – 31 May 1978) was a German
Dada Dada () or Dadaism was an anti-establishment art movement that developed in 1915 in the context of the Great War and the earlier anti-art movement. Early centers for dadaism included Zürich and Berlin. Within a few years, the movement had s ...
artist. She is best known for her work of the
Weimar Weimar is a city in the state (Germany), German state of Thuringia, in Central Germany (cultural area), Central Germany between Erfurt to the west and Jena to the east, southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together w ...
period, when she was one of the originators of
photomontage Photomontage is the process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image. Sometimes the resulting composite image is photographed so that the final imag ...
. Photomontage, or fotomontage, is a type of collage in which the pasted items are actual photographs, or photographic reproductions pulled from the press and other widely produced media. An important element in Höch's work was the intention to dismantle the fable and dichotomy that existed in the concept of the "
New Woman The New Woman was a feminist ideal that emerged in the late 19th century and had a profound influence well into the 20th century. In 1894, writer Sarah Grand (1854–1943) used the term "new woman" in an influential article to refer to indepe ...
": an energetic, professional, and androgynous woman, who is ready to take her place as man's equal. Her interest in the topic was in how the dichotomy was structured, as well as in who structures social roles. Other key themes in Höch's works were
androgyny Androgyny is the possession of both masculine and feminine characteristics. Androgyny may be expressed with regard to Sex, biological sex or gender expression. When ''androgyny'' refers to mixed biological sex characteristics in humans, it oft ...
,
political discourse Discourse analysis (DA), or discourse studies, is an approach to the analysis of written, spoken, or sign language, including any significant semiotic event. The objects of discourse analysis (discourse, writing, conversation, communicative e ...
, and shifting
gender role A gender role, or sex role, is a social norm deemed appropriate or desirable for individuals based on their gender or sex. Gender roles are usually centered on conceptions of masculinity and femininity. The specifics regarding these gendered ...
s. These themes all interacted to create a feminist discourse surrounding Höch's works, which encouraged the liberation and agency of women during the Weimar Republic (1919–1933) and continuing through to today.


Biography

Hannah Höch was born Anna Therese Johanne Höch in
Gotha Gotha () is the fifth-largest city in Thuringia, Germany, west of Erfurt and east of Eisenach with a population of 44,000. The city is the capital of the district of Gotha and was also a residence of the Ernestine Wettins from 1640 until the ...
, Germany. Although she attended school, domesticity took precedence in the Höch household. In 1904, Höch was taken out of the Höhere Töchterschule in Gotha to care for her youngest sibling, Marianne. In 1912 she began classes at the college of Applied Arts in
Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
under the guidance of glass designer Harold Bergen.Makela 1994, p. 13 She chose the curriculum in glass design and graphic arts, rather than fine arts, to please her father. In 1914, at the start of
World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, she left the school and returned home to Gotha to work with the
Red Cross The organized International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement is a Humanitarianism, humanitarian movement with approximately 16million volunteering, volunteers, members, and staff worldwide. It was founded to protect human life and health, to ...
.Makela 1994, p. 49 In 1915 she returned to Berlin, where she entered the graphics class of Emil Orlik at the National Institute of the Museum of Arts and Crafts. Also in 1915, Höch began an intimate relationship with
Raoul Hausmann Raoul Hausmann (July 12, 1886 – February 1, 1971) was an Austrian artist and writer. One of the key figures in Berlin Dada, his experimental photographic collages, sound poetry, and institutional critiques would have a profound influence on ...
, a later activist of the Berlin
Dada Dada () or Dadaism was an anti-establishment art movement that developed in 1915 in the context of the Great War and the earlier anti-art movement. Early centers for dadaism included Zürich and Berlin. Within a few years, the movement had s ...
movement. Höch's involvement with the Berlin Dadaists began in earnest in 1917. Höch, as the only woman among the Berlin group, was singled out for her self-sufficiency, masculine presentation, and bisexuality, as she consistently addressed themes of the "New Woman" who was free to vote, to begin and enjoy sexual encounters and to seek financial independence. From 1916 to 1926, she worked in the handicrafts department for the publisher
Ullstein Verlag The ''Ullstein Verlag'' was founded by Leopold Ullstein in 1877 at Berlin and is one of the largest publishing companies of Germany. It published newspapers like '' B.Z.'' and '' Berliner Morgenpost'' and books through its subsidiaries ''Ullstei ...
, designing dress, embroidery, lace, and handiwork designs for ''Die Dame'' (The Lady) and ''Die Praktische Berlinerin'' (The Practical Berlin Woman). The influence of this early work and training can be seen in a number of her collages made in the late 1910s and early- to mid-1920s in which she incorporated sewing patterns and needlework designs. From 1926 to 1929 she lived and worked in the
Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...
. Höch formed many influential friendships and professional relationships over the years with individuals such as
Kurt Schwitters Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters (20 June 1887 – 8 January 1948) was a German artist. He was born in Hanover, Germany, but lived in exile from 1937. Schwitters worked in several genres and media, including Dadaism, Constructivism (a ...
, Nelly van Doesburg,
Theo van Doesburg Theo van Doesburg (; born Christian Emil Marie Küpper; 30 August 1883 – 7 March 1931) was a Dutch painter, writer, poet and architect. He is best known as the founder and leader of De Stijl. He married three times. Personal life Theo van Do ...
, Sonia Delaunay,
László Moholy-Nagy László Moholy-Nagy (; ; born László Weisz; July 20, 1895 – November 24, 1946) was a Kingdom of Hungary, Hungarian painter and photographer as well as a professor in the Bauhaus school. He was highly influenced by Constructivism (art), con ...
, and
Piet Mondrian Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan (; 7 March 1872 – 1 February 1944), known after 1911 as Piet Mondrian (, , ), was a Dutch Painting, painter and Theory of art, art theoretician who is regarded as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. He w ...
, among others. Höch, along with Hausmann, was one of the first pioneers of the art form that would come to be known as
photomontage Photomontage is the process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image. Sometimes the resulting composite image is photographed so that the final imag ...
.


Personal life and relationships

Art historian Maria Makela has characterized Höch's affair with Raoul Hausmann as "stormy", and identifies the central cause of their altercations—some of which ended in violence—in Hausmann's refusal to leave his wife. He reached the point of fantasizing about killing Höch.Maria Makela (1996). "By Design: The Early Work of Hannah Höch in Context". In Boswell, Peter; Makela, Maria; Lanchner, Carolyn (eds.). ''The photomontages of Hannah Höch'' (1. ed.). Minneapolis: Walker Art Center. p. 64. . Hausmann continually disparaged Höch not only for her desire to marry him, which he described as a "Bourgeois" inclination, but also for her opinions on art. Hausmann's hypocritical stance on women's emancipation spurred Höch to write "a caustic short story" entitled "The Painter" in 1920, the subject of which is "an artist who is thrown into an intense spiritual crisis when his wife asks him to do the dishes." Hausmann repeatedly implied that the only way Höch could reach her full potential, as a woman and in their relationship, was to have a child with him. Höch herself wanted children, but both times she found she was pregnant with Hausmann's child, in May 1916 and January 1918, she had an abortion. Höch ended her seven-year relationship with Raoul Hausmann in 1922. In 1926, she began a relationship with the Dutch writer and linguist Mathilda ('Til') Brugman, whom Höch met through mutual friends Kurt and Helma Schwitters. By autumn of 1926, Höch moved to The Hague to live with Brugman, where they lived until 1929, at which time they moved to Berlin. Höch and Brugman's relationship lasted nine years, until 1935. They did not explicitly define their relationship as lesbian, instead choosing to refer to it as a private love relationship. Lavin, Maud. "The New Woman in Hannah Höch's Photomontages: Issues of Androgyny, Bisexuality, and Oscillation." in ''Reclaiming Female Agency: Feminist Art History After Postmodernism'', edited by Norma Broude and Mary D. Garrard (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 2005), 324–41. In 1935, Höch began a relationship with Kurt Matthies, to whom she was married from 1938 to 1944.


Later years

Höch spent the years of the
Third Reich Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...
in Berlin, Germany, keeping a low profile. She was the last member of the Berlin Dada group to remain in Germany during this period. She bought and lived in a small garden house in Berlin-Heiligensee, a remote area on the outskirts of Berlin. She married businessman and pianist Kurt Matthies in 1938 and divorced him in 1944. She suffered from the Nazi censorship of art, and her work was deemed " degenerate art", which made it even more difficult for her to show her works. Though her work was not as acclaimed after the war as it had been before the rise of the Third Reich, she continued to produce her photomontages and exhibit them internationally until her death in 1978, in Berlin. Her house and garden can be visited at the annual
Tag des offenen Denkmals The Tag des offenen Denkmals (Day of Open Monuments) is an annual event all over Germany. The day of action has been coordinated by the Deutsche Stiftung Denkmalschutz since 1993. Historic monuments are open to the public free of charge. It takes ...
. The 128th anniversary of her birthday was commemorated on 1 November 2017 by a
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.


Dada

Dada was an artistic movement formed in 1916 in Zurich, Switzerland. The movement rejected monarchy, militarism, and conservatism and was enmeshed in an "anti-art" sentiment. Dadaists felt that art should have no boundaries or restrictions and that it can be whimsical and playful. These sentiments arose after the Great War, which caused society to question the role of government, and to reject militarism after seeing the atrocities of war. Many Dada pieces were critical of the Weimar Republic and its failed attempt at creating a democracy in post-war (WWI) Germany. The Dada movement had a tone of fundamental negativity in regards to bourgeois society. The term "dada" has no actual meaning – it is a childlike word used to describe the lack of reason or logic in much of the artwork. The main artists involved in the movement in Berlin include
George Grosz George Grosz (; ; born Georg Ehrenfried Groß; July 26, 1893 – July 6, 1959) was a German artist known especially for his caricatural drawings and paintings of Berlin life in the 1920s. He was a prominent member of the Berlin Dada and New Obj ...
,
John Heartfield John Heartfield (born Helmut Herzfeld; 19 June 1891 – 26 April 1968) was a German visual artist who pioneered the use of art as a political weapon. Some of his most famous photomontages were anti-Nazi and anti-fascist statements. Heartfield a ...
and
Raoul Hausmann Raoul Hausmann (July 12, 1886 – February 1, 1971) was an Austrian artist and writer. One of the key figures in Berlin Dada, his experimental photographic collages, sound poetry, and institutional critiques would have a profound influence on ...
. Some claim that it was Höch's relationship with Hausmann that allowed her into the sphere of Dada artists. George Grosz and John Heartfield were against Höch exhibiting with them in the 1920 First International Dada Fair, for example, and only allowed her participation after Raoul Hausmann argued for her inclusion. Later, Hausmann still attempted to deny Höch a place in the movement, by writing in his memoirs that "she was never a member of the club." She nonetheless held the title of “Dadasophin“ within the movement. Höch is best known for her
photomontage Photomontage is the process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image. Sometimes the resulting composite image is photographed so that the final imag ...
s. These collages, which borrowed images from popular culture and utilized the dismemberment and reassembly of images, were a central element of the Dada aesthetic, though other Dadaists were hesitant to accept her work due to inherent sexism in the movement. Her work added "a wryly feminist note" to the Dadaist philosophy of disdain towards bourgeois society, but both her identity as a woman and her feminist subject matter contributed to her never being fully accepted by the male Dadaists. Like other Dada artists, Höch's work also came under close scrutiny by the Nazis as it was considered degenerate. The Nazis put to a stop her 1932 intended exhibition at the Bauhaus (a German art school). They were not only offended by her aesthetic, but also by her political messages and by the mere fact that she was a woman. Her images portrayed androgynous individuals, which the Nazis despised. Nazi ideology appreciated artwork that portrayed the ideal Aryan German man and woman. The images Höch used often contrasted this look, or used it to make a point about society, such as in the piece ''Das Schöne Mädchen'' ("The Beautiful Girl"). The Nazis preferred a traditional clear rational style of artwork that did not require deep thought or analysis. They felt that the chaos of the Dada style bordered on pathological. Höch went into seclusion during the Nazi years and was later able to return to the art world after the fall of the Third Reich.


Photomontage

"Höch's photomontages display the chaos and combustion of Berlin's visual culture from a particularly female perspective" (Makholm). "Höch was not only a rare female practicing prominently in the arts in the early part of the twentieth century—near unique as a female active in the Dada group in Berlin that coalesced in her time—she also consciously promoted the idea of women working creatively more generally in society. She explicitly addressed in her pioneering artwork in the form of photomontage the issue of
gender Gender is the range of social, psychological, cultural, and behavioral aspects of being a man (or boy), woman (or girl), or third gender. Although gender often corresponds to sex, a transgender person may identify with a gender other tha ...
and the figure of woman in modern society" (The Art Story). In these montages, Höch gathered images and text from popular forms of media, such as newspapers and magazines, and combined them in often uncanny ways, which were able to express her stances on the important social issues of her time. The fact that images she included in her pieces were pulled from current newspapers and magazines gave her messages validity. The power of the works came from the intentional dismemberment and reconstruction of the images. This alludes to the notion that current issues can be viewed through different lenses. This technique was originally thought of as extremely leftist and revolutionary, but by the 1930s, it had become an accepted mode of design linked with modernity and consumerism. Thus began the notion that mass culture and fine arts could be combined in a meaningful way. The ambiguity in her work was integral to the way which she addressed issues of sexuality and gender. These complex constructions of genders allow women to embrace both their masculine and feminine attributes. This leads to an intensified sense of individualism. Photomontage is a large part of Höch's legacy as an artist.


Women in Dada

The role that women played in Dada has been the object of research in recent years, including in scholarly works by Ruth Hemus, Nadia Sawleson-Gorse and Paula K. Kamenish. While the Dadaists, including
Georg Schrimpf Georg Schrimpf (13 February 1889 – 19 April 1938) was a German painter and graphic artist. Along with Otto Dix, George Grosz and Christian Schad, Schrimpf is broadly acknowledged as a main representative of the art movement ''Neue Sachlichkei ...
, Franz Jung, and Johannes Baader, "paid lip service to women's emancipation," they were clearly reluctant to include a woman among their ranks. Hans Richter described Höch's contribution to the Dada movement as the "sandwiches, beer and coffee she managed somehow to conjure up despite the shortage of money." Raoul Hausmann even suggested that Höch get a job to support him financially, despite her being the only one from her close circle to have a stable income. On her exclusion and the sexism of the Dadaists, Höch responded, "None of these men were satisfied with just an ordinary woman. But neither were they included to abandon the (conventional) male/masculine morality toward the woman. Enlightened by Freud, in protest against the older generation. . . they all desired this ‘New Woman’ and her groundbreaking will to freedom. But—they more or less brutally rejected the notion that they, too, had to adopt new attitudes. . . This led to these truly Strinbergian dramas that typified the private lives of these men.” Höch was the lone woman among the Berlin Dada group.
Emmy Hennings Emmy Hennings (born Emma Maria Cordsen, 17 January 1885 – 10 August 1948) was a German poet and performing artist, and co-founder of the Dadaist Cabaret Voltaire with her second husband Hugo Ball. Known as the "star of the show," Hennings h ...
and Sophie Taeuber were also important figures in Zurich, while others, including
Beatrice Wood Beatrice Wood (March 3, 1893 – March 12, 1998) was an American artist and studio potter involved in the Dada movement in the United States; she founded and edited '' The Blind Man'' and '' Rongwrong'' magazines in New York City with French ...
and Baroness Else von Freytag-Loringhoven, participated in New York. Höch references the hypocrisy of the Berlin Dada group and German society as a whole in her photomontage, ''Da-Dandy.'' Höch also wrote about the hypocrisy of men in the Dada movement in her short essay "The Painter", published in 1920, in which she portrays a modern couple that embraces gender equality in their relationship, a novel and shocking concept for the time. This is an example of how Höch was able to transcend one particular medium and convey her social ideals in many forms. Höch's time at Ullstein Verlag working with magazines targeted at women made her acutely aware of the difference between women as portrayed in media and their reality, and her workplace provided her with many of the images that served as raw material for her own work. She was also critical of the institution of marriage, often depicting brides as
mannequin A mannequin (sometimes spelled as manikin and also called a dummy, lay figure, or dress form) is a doll, often articulated, used by artists, tailors, dressmakers, window dressers and others, especially to display or fit clothing and show off dif ...
s and children, reflecting the socially pervasive idea of women as incomplete people with little control over their lives. Höch worked for the magazine
Ullstein Verlag The ''Ullstein Verlag'' was founded by Leopold Ullstein in 1877 at Berlin and is one of the largest publishing companies of Germany. It published newspapers like '' B.Z.'' and '' Berliner Morgenpost'' and books through its subsidiaries ''Ullstei ...
between 1916 and 1926 in the department which focused on design patterns, handicrafts, knitting and embroidery, artistic forms within the domestic sphere which were considered appropriate for women. "The pattern designs Höch created for Ullstein's women's magazines and her early experiments with modernist abstraction were integrally related, blurring the boundaries between traditionally masculine and feminine modes of form and expression" (Makholm). She wrote a Manifesto of Modern Embroidery in 1918, which spoke to the modern woman, empowering her to take pride in her work. "She now drew on this experience and on a large body of advertising material she had collected, in images that were unprecedented in their insights into the way society 'constructs' women" (Hudson). Höch considered herself a part of the women's movement in the 1920s, as shown in her depiction of herself, alongside multiple political and cultural figures, in the large-scale photomontage ''Schnitt mit dem Küchenmesser DADA durch die letzte Weimarer Bierbauchkulturepoche Deutschlands'' ("Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany") (1919–20). Her pieces also commonly combine male and female traits into one unified being. During the era of the
Weimar Republic The Weimar Republic, officially known as the German Reich, was the German Reich, German state from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a constitutional republic for the first time in history; hence it is also referred to, and unofficially proclai ...
, "mannish women were both celebrated and castigated for breaking down traditional gender roles." In this artwork Hoch metaphorically equates her scissors, used to cut images or her collages, to the kitchen knife. This is used to symbolize cutting through the dominant domains of politics and public life in Weimer culture. Her
androgynous Androgyny is the possession of both masculine and feminine characteristics. Androgyny may be expressed with regard to biological sex or gender expression. When ''androgyny'' refers to mixed biological sex characteristics in humans, it often r ...
characters may also have been related to her
bisexuality Bisexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or Human sexual activity, sexual behavior toward both males and females. It may also be defined as the attraction to more than one gender, to people of both the same and different gender, ...
and attraction to masculinity in women (that is, attraction to the female form paired with stereotypically masculine characteristics).


Works

Höch was a pioneer of the art form that became known as
photomontage Photomontage is the process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image. Sometimes the resulting composite image is photographed so that the final imag ...
and of the Dada movement. Many of her pieces sardonically critiqued the mass culture beauty industry of the time, then gaining significant momentum in mass media through the rise of fashion and advertising photography. Many of her political works from the Dada period equated women's liberation with social and political revolution.
Maud Lavin Maud K. Lavin (born November 10, 1954) is an American writer of creative nonfiction and poetry. She is a professor emerita of Visual and Critical Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is a recipient of a Senior Research Resid ...
, "Androgyny, Spectatorship, and the Weimar Photomontages of Hannah Höch", '' New German Critique'', No. 51, Special Issue on Weimar Mass Culture (Autumn, 1990), pp. 62–86: Duke University Press:
Her work displays the chaos and combustion of Berlin's visual culture from the female perspective. In particular, her photomontages often critically addressed the Weimar New Woman, collating images from contemporary magazines. Her works from 1926 to 1935 often depicted same-sex couples, and women were once again a central theme in her work from 1963 to 1973. Her most often used technique was to fuse together male and female bodies. This fusion existed in order to give the attributed power of a man to a woman, as well as blur the lines of gender attributed actions. She also used historically feminine mediums such as embroidery and lace in her collages to highlight gendered associations. Höch also made strong statements on
racial discrimination Racial discrimination is any discrimination against any individual on the basis of their Race (human categorization), race, ancestry, ethnicity, ethnic or national origin, and/or Human skin color, skin color and Hair, hair texture. Individuals ...
. Her most famous piece is ''Schnitt mit dem Küchenmesser DADA durch die letzte Weimarer Bierbauchkulturepoche Deutschlands'' ("Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany"), a critique of
Weimar Germany The Weimar Republic, officially known as the German Reich, was the German Reich, German state from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a constitutional republic for the first time in history; hence it is also referred to, and unofficially proclai ...
in 1919. This piece combines images from newspapers of the time mixed and re-created to make a new statement about life and art in the Dada movement. ''From an Ethnographic Museum'' (1929), one of Höch's most ambitious and highly political projects, is a series of twenty photomontages that depict images of European female bodies with images of African male bodies and masks from museum catalogues, creating collages that offer "the visual culture of two vastly separate civilizations as interchangeable—the modish European flapper loses none of her stylishness in immediate proximity to African tribal objects; likewise, the non-Western artifact is able to signify in some fundamental sense as ritual object despite its conflation with patently European features." Hoch created ''Dada Puppen'' (Dada Dolls) 1916. These dolls were influenced by Hugo Ball, the Zurich-based founder of Dada. The doll's costumes resembled the geometric forms of Ball's own costumes worn in seminal Dada performances.


Important works


''Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany'' (1919)

Dada was an inherently political movement; Dadaists often deployed satire to address the issues of the time. They attempted to push art to the limits of humanity and to convey the chaos in post-war (World War I, which did not yet have this title) Germany. "Many of Höch's overtly political photomontages caricatured the pretended socialism of the new republic and linked female liberation with leftist political revolution" (Lavin). Perhaps Höch's most well known piece ''Schnitt mit dem Küchenmesser DADA durch die letzte Weimarer Bierbauchkulturepoche Deutschlands'' ("Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Beer-Belly of the Weimar Republic") symbolizes her cutting through the patriarchal society. The piece is a direct criticism of the failed attempt at democracy imposed by the Weimar Republic. ''Cut with the Kitchen Knife'' is "an explosive agglomeration of cut-up images, bang in the middle of the most well-known photograph of the seminal First International Dada Fair in 1920" (Hudson). This photomontage is an excellent example of a piece that combines these three central themes in Höch's works: androgyny, the "New Woman" and political discourse. It combines images of political leaders with sports stars, mechanized images of the city, and Dada artists.


''The Beautiful Girl'' (1920)

"The New Woman of Weimar Germany was a sign of modernity and liberation" (Lavin). Women in Weimar Germany in theory had a new freedom to discover social, political, and self-definition—all areas heavily addressed by Höch. Despite this, there were still many issues with the socioeconomic status of women. Women were given more freedom, yet in a way that seemed to be predetermined for them. They were still restricted to certain jobs and had the less employment benefits than their male counterparts. Analysis of Höch's piece ''Das Schöne Mädchen'' ("The Beautiful Girl") shows the construction of the archetype of the "New Woman". The piece combines motifs of the ideal feminine woman with car parts. In the upper right corner there is a woman's face with the eyes of a cat. Along with industrialization comes the opportunity for women to be more involved in the workforce. While this opportunity was exciting for women, it was also frightening—symbolized by the cat eyes staring down at the image. This image shows that although women were excited about the idea of the "New Woman" and the freedom this lifestyle might bring, it was a freedom that was still constructed by men, who still had most of the power in society.


''Marlene'' (1930)

This piece alludes to an ambiguous sexual identity of the subject. The image depicts two men looking upward at a pair of legs clad in stockings with high heels atop a pedestal. This pedestal symbolizes traditionalism, while the legs show sexuality triumphing over classical architecture (which would have been revered by the Nazis). The lips in the upper right corner show a feminine sexuality that is kept from the male gaze. (Lavin). For the viewer, the piece can provide the concept of a utopian moment that opposes gender-hierarchies. "Her androgynous images depict a pleasure in the movement between gender positions and a deliberate deconstruction of rigid masculine and feminine identities" (Lavin). These ideas were radical at the time when Höch raised them, but are still in the process of being addressed today. Androgyny can be viewed as a utopian ideal in Höch's works; in addition it relates to some of the radical leftist ideas in her works and the political discourse surrounding them.


''Ethnographic Museum'' Series (1924–1930)

Höch created an expansive series of works titled the Ethnographic Museum Series after a visit to an ethnographic museum. Germany had begun colonial expansion into African and Oceanic territories by the 1880s, which lead to an influx of cultural artifacts into Germany. Höch was inspired by the pedestals and masks present in the museums, and began incorporating them into her art.


''Mother'' (1930) ''Ethnographic Museum'' series (1924–1930)

The photomontage ''Mutter'' ("Mother"), part of Höch's ''Ethnographic Museum'' series, utilizes the photo of a pregnant, working class mother. Höch effaces the woman with a mask from the
Kwakwakaʼwakw The Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw (), also known as the Kwakiutl (; "Kwakʼwala-speaking peoples"), are an indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, indigenous group of the Pacific Northwest Coast, in southwestern Canada. Their total population, ...
, or the Kwakuti Indian tribe, on the Northwest Coast. She pastes a woman's mouth over the bottom of the mask, and a single eye over one of the eye holes. The image is part of an ongoing critique by Höch of Paragraph 218, a law outlawing abortion in Germany at the time.


''Death Dance'' and ''Time of Suffering'' Series

Höch also executed two series around 1943, ''TotenTanz'' ("Death Dance"'')'' and ''Notzeit'' ("Time of Suffering"). ''Death Dance'' consists of three works, titled ''Death Dance I, Death Dance II,'' and ''Death Dance III''. This series is primarily watercolor and pencil. The images show individual figures without hair or defining features, in long gray shifts, filing across barren pastel landscapes. The ''Time of Suffering'' series is black and white but contains similar figures to the ''Death Dance'' series. The series, comprising two works titled ''Time of Suffering I'' and ''Time of Suffering II'', shows the figures walking through a cemetery towards a grim reaper, and a line of people leading up into the sky.


''Strange Beauty II'' (1966)

Höch returned to the female figure in the 1960s after a long period where she favored surrealism and abstraction. Fremde Schönheit II ("Strange Beauty II") is a part of this return, showing a woman surrounded by feathery pink fauna. The woman's face is covered by a Peruvian terracotta trophy head. In this piece, Höch effaces the figure of the New Woman and replaces her head with a tribal mask, turning the figure from beautiful to disturbing.


Exhibitions

Höch's work has been exhibited internationally in solo and group exhibitions. The Whitechapel Gallery in London presented a major exhibition of Höch's work from 15 January to 23 March 2014. This exhibition was composed of over one hundred works from international collections that Höch created from the 1910s to 1970s. Highlights included ''Staatshäupter (Heads of State)'' (1918–20), ''Hochfinanz (High Finance)'' (1923), ''Flucht (Flight)'' (1931), and many works from the series ''From an Ethnographic Museum''. Examples of her work were included in ''Woven Histories: Textiles and Modern Abstraction''.


Selected solo shows

* 2017: ''Hannah Höch – Auf der Suche nach der versteckten Schönheit'', (Looking for the hidden beauty), , Hamburg, 20 April – 16 June 2017. * 2016: ''Hannah Höch – Revolutionärin der Kunst'', Kunsthalle Mannheim und . * 2015: ''Vorhang auf für Hannah Höch'' (Curtain up for Hannah Höch), ,
Stade Stade (; ), officially the Hanseatic City of Stade (, ) is a city in Lower Saxony in northern Germany. First mentioned in records in 934, it is the seat of the Stade (district), district () which bears its name. It is located roughly to the wes ...
, Germany, 7 November 2015 – 21 February 2016. * 2014: ''Hannah Höch'', Whitechapel Gallery,
London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
. * 2008: ''Hannah Höch – Aller Anfang ist DADA'' (Every Beginning is DADA), Museum Tinguely, Basel. * 2007: ''Hannah Höch – Aller Anfang ist DADA'', (Every Beginning is DADA), Berlinische Galerie, Berlin. * 1997: ''The Photomontages of Hannah Höch'',
Walker Art Center The Walker Art Center is a multidisciplinary contemporary art center in the Lowry Hill, Minneapolis, Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is one of the most-visited modern and contemporary art museums in ...
,
Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...
, and the
Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum). LACMA was founded in 1961 ...
, Minneapolis, New York City, Los Angeles. * 1993: ''Hannah Höch'', Museums of the City of
Gotha Gotha () is the fifth-largest city in Thuringia, Germany, west of Erfurt and east of Eisenach with a population of 44,000. The city is the capital of the district of Gotha and was also a residence of the Ernestine Wettins from 1640 until the ...
, Germany. * 1974: ''Hannah Höch,'' National Museum of Modern Art,
Kyoto Kyoto ( or ; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan's largest and most populous island of Honshu. , the city had a population of 1.46 million, making it t ...
. * 1961: ''Hannah Höch: Bilder, Collagen, Aquarelle 1918–1961'', Galerie Nierendorf, Berlin. * 1929: ''Hannah Höch'', Kunstzaal De Bron,
The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...
.


Bibliography

* Natias Neutert: ''Lady Dada. Essays über die Bild(er)finderin Hannah Höch.'' Lilienstaub & Schmidt, Berlin 2019, ISBN 978-3-945003-45-9. * McBride, Patrizia. "Narrative Resemblance: The Production Of Truth In The Modernist Photobook Of Weimar Germany." ''New German Critique: An Interdisciplinary Journal of German Studies'' 115.(2012): 169–197. * Chametzky, Peter. ''Objects as History in Twentieth-Century German Art: Beckmann to Beuys''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010. * Biro, M. ''The Dada Cyborg: Visions of the New Human in Weimar Berlin''. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2009. * Bergius, H. ''Dada Triumphs! Dada Berlin, 1917–1923''. Artistry of Polarities. Montages – Metamechanics – Manifestations. Translated by Brigitte Pichon. Vol. V. of the ten editions of Crisis and the Arts. The History of Dada, ed. by Stephen Foster, New Haven, Conn. u. a., Thomson/ Gale 2003. . * Bergius, H. ''Montage und Metamechanik. Dada Berlin – Ästhetik von Polaritäten'' (mit Rekonstruktion der Ersten Internationalen Dada-Messe und Dada-Chronologie) Berlin: Gebr. Mann Verlag 2000. . * Meskimmon, Marsha. ''We Weren't Modern Enough: Women Artists and the Limits of German Modernism.'' Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1999. * Gaze, Delia. '' Dictionary of Women Artists, Volume One.'' London: Taylor & Francis, 1997. * Hemus, Ruth
''Dada's Women''
London & New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. * Kamenish, Paula K. (2015). ''Mamas of Dada: women of the European avant-garde''. Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina Press. . * Sante, Lucy. "Dada's Girl: Hannah Höch Thumbs Her Nose at Art." ''Slate.'' 10 April 1997. * Lavin, Maud. "The Mess of History or the Unclean Hannah Höch". In:
Catherine de Zegher Catherine de Zegher (born Marie-Catherine Alma Gladys de Zegher Groningen, April 14, 1955) is a Belgian curator and a modern and contemporary art historian. She has a degree in art history and archaeology from the University of Ghent. From 1988 ...
(ed.), ''Inside the Visible''. The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston & MIT Press, 1996. * Makela, Maria, and Peter Boswell, eds. ''The Photomontages of Hannah Hoch.'' Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 1996. * Meskimmon, Marsha & Shearer West, ed. ''Visions of the 'Neue Frau': Women and the Visual Arts in Weimar Germany.'' Hants, England: Scolar Press, 1995. * Makela, Maria. "Hannah Höch". In: Louise R. Noun (ed.), ''Three Berlin Artists of the Weimar Era: Hannah Höch, Käthe Kollwitz, Jeanne Mammen''. Des Moines, Iowa: Des Moines Art Center, 1994. * Lavin, Maud. ''Cut With the Kitchen Knife: The Weimar Photomontages of Hannah Hoch.'' New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1993. * Bergius, Hanne ''Das Lachen Dadas. Die Berliner Dadaisten und ihre Aktionen''. Gießen: Anabas-Verlag, 1989. . * Ohff, Heinz. ''Hannah Höch.'' Berlin: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Bildende Kunst, 1968. * Sawelson-Gorse, Nadia. ''Women in Dada''. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2001.


See also

*
Kurt Schwitters Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters (20 June 1887 – 8 January 1948) was a German artist. He was born in Hanover, Germany, but lived in exile from 1937. Schwitters worked in several genres and media, including Dadaism, Constructivism (a ...
*
Marcel Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, ; ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, Futurism and conceptual art. He is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Pica ...
*
Raoul Hausmann Raoul Hausmann (July 12, 1886 – February 1, 1971) was an Austrian artist and writer. One of the key figures in Berlin Dada, his experimental photographic collages, sound poetry, and institutional critiques would have a profound influence on ...
*
List of German women artists This is a list of women artists who were born in Germany or whose artworks are closely associated with that country. A * Louise Abel (1841–1907), German-born Norwegian photographer * Tomma Abts (born 1967), abstract painter * Elisabeth von Ad ...


Notes


External links


Chronology of Dada

Cut and Paste
a history of photomontage
Essay on Hannah Höch's ''Picture Book''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hoech, Hannah 1889 births 1978 deaths Bisexual photographers Bisexual feminists Bisexual women artists German collage artists German women collage artists Dada Feminist artists German LGBTQ photographers German bisexual artists German bisexual women German modern artists People from Gotha (town) German socialist feminists 20th-century German photographers 20th-century German women photographers German dadaists