Neo-Dada
Description
Neo-Dada was an art movement with audio, visual and literary manifestations that had similarities in method or intent with earlier Dada artwork. It sought to close the gap between art and daily life, and was a combination of playfulness, iconoclasm, and appropriation. In the United States the term was popularized by Barbara Rose in the 1960s and refers primarily, although not exclusively, to work created in that and the preceding decade. There was also an international dimension to the movement, particularly in Japan and in Europe, serving as the foundation of Fluxus, Pop Art and Nouveau réalisme. Read more ↗
Key Artists
Robert Rauschenberg
Central figure of Neo-Dada whose radical 'Combines' merged painting and sculpture by incorporating urban debris, taxidermy animals, bedding, and everyday consumer items onto canvases.
Jasper Johns
Masterful painter and printmaker who undermined Abstract Expressionist heroism by painting familiar cultural symbols - such as American flags, targets, numbers, and maps - with dense, encaustic wax textures.
Allan Kaprow
Theorist and artist who bridged Neo-Dada and performance art by studying under John Cage, writing seminal essays on the legacy of Jackson Pollock, and inventing participatory environments and 'Happenings.'
Nam June Paik
Korean-born pioneer of video art and Fluxus collaborator whose playful, irreverent musical performances and television sculptures shared Neo-Dada's iconoclastic spirit and integration of everyday technology.
Carolee Schneemann
Experimental visual and performance artist who expanded Neo-Dada assemblage techniques into visceral, kinetic bodily installations and groundbreaking feminist performance art.
Jim Dine
Associated with Neo-Dada and early Pop art who attached real tools, bathroom sinks, and household objects directly onto energetic, gestural painted canvases.
Famous Artworks
Fun Facts
The label 'Neo-Dada' was popularized in the late 1950s and early 1960s by art critic Barbara Rose and others to describe young American artists who rejected Abstract Expressionist emotional angst in favor of Marcel Duchamp's anti-aesthetic appropriation of everyday objects.
↗ Source: en.wikipedia.org
When Robert Rauschenberg wanted to create a Combine incorporating a real stuffed goat for Monogram, he bought an old taxidermy angora goat for $15 from a used furniture store on Seventh Avenue in Manhattan and spent four years experimenting with its placement before setting it inside an automobile tire.
↗ Source: moma.org