"Fümms bö wä tää zää Uu, pögiff, kwii Ee".
January 1, 2013 2:27 PM   Subscribe

A podcast about Merzbarn, the final project in Cumbria, England of Kurt Schwitters, Collagist, Sound Poet (See previous), Dadaist, Sculptur. His previous project Merzbau had been lost and then found.
posted by adamvasco (9 comments total) 18 users marked this as a favorite
 
Ooooooh...
posted by Merzbau at 2:48 PM on January 1, 2013 [1 favorite]


How is this related to Merzbow?
posted by legospaceman at 2:53 PM on January 1, 2013


legospaceman: "How is this related to Merzbow?"

It is the namesake (and in some ways an aesthetic influence / precedent).
posted by idiopath at 3:43 PM on January 1, 2013 [1 favorite]


Oh, Kurt Schwitters! I love that he created art the Nazis had to blow up and the British had to save with heavy equipment. There are not that many artists who call for such an -- engineered -- approach to their art.
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:10 PM on January 1, 2013


Excellent!
posted by R. Mutt at 5:37 PM on January 1, 2013


I recognized this immediately as George Melly's "Sounds that Saved My Life (Homage to K.S.)", which appears on the amazing album Miniatures.
The only other time George has performed it was when he was threatened by bottle-bearing hoodlums outside a Manchester club. Rather than fight or run (equally disastrous reactions) he calmly read this amazing poem to the hoard of toughs. This completely flummoxed them – they slunk away.
Fümms bö wö tää zää Uu, pögiff, kwii Ee, indeed.
posted by erniepan at 7:06 PM on January 1, 2013 [2 favorites]


Many years ago, I heard a Radio 4 programme about Schwitters' life in the Isle of Man, where he was held as a German national during the war. It was utterly remarkable, with stories of him sleeping in a 'nest' under his bed and so on. It also covered his last years in Ambleside, where I lived.
posted by quarsan at 9:08 PM on January 1, 2013


Joyce Kahn writes a little about Schwitters and Wantee (Edith Thomas) named because of the way in which she would pop her head around his door and ask ‘do you want tea ?
posted by adamvasco at 4:05 AM on January 2, 2013


I love that you declare him 'excellent', R. Mutt, as he rejected the Dadaists as a destructive force. I'm a big fan of Schwitters - he was a pioneering installation artist, multimedia artist ("I am an artist and I paint with nails!") and as I argue elsewhere, anticipates the medium of the web - both architecturally and behaviourally. I'll have to catch up with the podcast later, but I've done some work with Littoral, who are the current custodians of the Merzbarn in Cumbria. They've done some excellent work in re-establishing Schwitters as part of the British cultural pantheon and in restoring and maintaining the Merzbarn itself. I may well have some photos of it dotted around, if anyone is interested.
posted by davemee at 1:10 AM on January 4, 2013


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