Taeuber, Arp, and the politics of cross-stitch.(Sophie Taeuber and Hans Arp)(Critical essay)

In July 1918, Tristan Tzara, reading his "Dada Manifesto" at a soiree in a Zurich guildhall, issued a call for "works that are strong straight precise and forever beyond understanding." (1) His words may well have been in response to--and perhaps also a spur to and in ongoing dialogue with--a set of compositions, characterized by strictly vertical-horizontal geometry, that the artists Sophie Taeuber and Hans Arp produced from about 1916 to 1918 (Figs. 1-6). (2) These objects are, in a sense, the visual counterparts of Tzara's manifesto--works that have come to exemplify Dada in its first phase--and, on first glance, they seem to have all the characteristics that Tzara demanded of art. Whether realized in collage or cross-stitch embroidery, these compositions are surprisingly durable things, executed with painstaking care in sturdy wool or thick paper. The apparent regularity of the rectangular patterns suggests an almost formulaic logic, but the configurations insistently elude rational analysis. As Tzara asserted, "Logic is a complication. Logic is always wrong." (3)

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