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MARCEL JANCO (1895-1984)
a renown painter and founder of the Dadaist movement (anti-artists)
was a contemporary of Pablo Picasso who belonged to the
Dadaists Group in Paris.
Marcel Janco, born in Romania in 1895, had joined a group
of artists at the Cafe Voltaire in Zurich, Switzerland in
1916 and was among the principal founders of the Dada Movement.
Dada was a unique artistic movement which had a major impact
on 20th century art. It was established in Cabaret Voltaire,
in Zurich, Switzerland, by a group of exiled poets, painters
and philosophers who were oppossed to war, agression and
the changing world culture. Among the founders were Marcel
Janco, Hugo Ball, Emmy Hennings, Hans Arp, Richard Huelsenbeck,
and Tristan Tzara.
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| Marcel
Janco, Ein Hod 1950's |
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Dada
soirées featured spontaneous poetry, avant-garde
music, and mask wearing dancers in elaborate shows. The
Dadaists teased and enraged the audience through their bold
defiance of Western culture and art, which they considered
obsolete in view of the destruction and carnage of World
War I. The Dadaists objected to the aesthetics of Western
contemporary painting, sculpture, language, literature and
music. The group published articles and periodicals, and
mounted exhibitions. The seeds sown in Zurich spread throughout
the world, resulting in new Dada organizations in Paris,
New York, Berlin, Hannover, and more.
Janco designed masks and costumes for the famous Dada balls,
and created abstract reliefs in cardboard and plaster. He
had an ecletic style in which he brilliantly combined abstract
and figurative elements, expressionistic in nature.
In 1922 Marcel Janco returned to his native Romania, where
he made his mark as a painter, theoretician and architect.
In 1941 he moved to the land, which was to become the nation
of Israel in 1948. It was here that Janco was one of the
founders of the New Horizons Group, organized in 1948. In
Israel, Janco painted idyllic watercolor and oil depictions
of Safed and Tiberias and was captivated by the exotic sights
of the Orient.
In 1953 on the ruins of an abandoned Arab village, Marcel
Janco established the artists’ village known as Ein
Hod, which now boasts the
Janco
Dada Museum.
In 1967 he was awarded the Israel Prize for Painting. In
the last years of his life he worked together with his friends
to erect the Janco Dada Museum. Janco died ten months after
the inauguration of the museum in 1984. |
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