Cut & Paste: A History of Photomontage

November 20, 2004 4:48 AM

Cut & Paste: A History of Photomontage.
posted by plep (11 comments total)

Cool stuff, but I wish there was more here to look at. I especially dig the Raoul Hausmann cut-ups in the 1920's section, which reminds me of the type of work Winston Smith was doing 50+ years later for the Dead Kennedy's.
posted by HifiToaster at 6:09 AM on November 20, 2004

Nice link. Looks familiar...;-)

More cool photomontage work here, here, and here
posted by MrBaliHai at 7:18 AM on November 20, 2004

What? No Monty Python?
posted by kamylyon at 8:45 AM on November 20, 2004

otherwise very nifty :)
posted by kamylyon at 8:46 AM on November 20, 2004

They're pretty cool. The present day landscape ones have some intriguing detail you just keep staring at.
posted by meowchow at 10:14 AM on November 20, 2004

I just picked up Hannah Hoch's Album the other day, so this is a nicely serendipitous post that will keep me busy. Great stuff as always, plep!

(Incidentally: welcome, hifitoaster! Good to see you again, if only online...
posted by scody at 11:33 AM on November 20, 2004

Brilliant!
posted by Arch Stanton at 2:57 PM on November 20, 2004

Does anyone know of the history of 'cut and paste' of actual paintings/originals-- not reproductions? Any cultures/movements that took existing work and recontextualized it? Or when the first incidence of 'tagging'/ graffiti took place? (Someone has told me that it was ancient Rome, painting on walls/statues as a form of political sloganeering/protest).
posted by buddhanarchist at 4:29 PM on November 20, 2004

buddhanarchist: How about Robert Rauschenberg's Erased de Kooning 1953? The ultimate tag/recontextualilzation using an original IMO.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 7:43 PM on November 20, 2004

I was thinking more of prior to the 20th century-- its ofcourse assumed by art historians that recontextualizations are an event developed in the modernist tradition-- but I'm not sure I believe that. Adolf Wolfi used images from Campbell's soup adverts back in the 20's-- long before Warhol-- so things are not always as they seem; Also: what about recontextualization/collage in non-western societies?
posted by buddhanarchist at 2:00 AM on November 21, 2004

neato.
posted by echodolphin at 11:12 AM on November 23, 2004