Week 14, Prospective Essay Questions

1.    Detail the socio historical context in which both Dada and Surrealism were birthed.  Namely, if they were reactionary movements or a means of alternative thinking or transgression, what were some of the ways in which they challenged ideologies?  What did they challenge and why did they challenge it?  Were there particular mediums that were more transgressive than others?  Using the earlier texts from the semester, what kinds of strategies or artistic choices are resonate or indicative of these challenges?  Also, consider what ideologies Dada and Surrealism perpetuated. 

     *It is important to understand how literary movements and artists are framed, influenced, motivated, and  constructed by the inter-workings of space and time events and how artists/writers/movements likewise [re]construct.   

2.    In what ways are Oulipo forms indicative of Dada and Surrealism?  In terms of historical lineage, inheritances, and influence, compare Calvino If On A Winter’s Night A Traveller and Perec’s A Void with Roussel’s Locus Solus.  What are some reoccurring or similar themes?  What do these similarities suggest?  Is there a connection between Oulipian constraint and the Surrealist project of the unconscious?   What are those connections, if any, and what do they say or not say about the movement from  modernism to postmodernism? 

     *I feel we did not have ample enough time to delve into these texts within a larger class discussion, so it would be helpful to further explore Dada, Surrealism, and Oulipo through the texts.  Further, making connections between and among texts helps to illustrate cultural consciousness and any theoretical implications.  

3.    Using the idea of scale from the film “Powers of Ten,” explore the role of metafiction in the texts we have read this semester.  What are some of the metanarratives that Dada, Surrealism, Oulipo, and Fluxus addresss?  Further, explore how Craig Saper’s ideas of receivable texts, intimate bureaucracy, fan culture, transactional esthetics, and sociopoetic forms from Networked Art can be understood in relation to the works of John Cage and Alfred Jarry’s Ubu Rex.     

     *Clearly there is a theme here of making connections.  As a way of circling back to move forward (did you see what I did there), a comparison across time and in between forms/ideas might generate some larger implications here about these movements.  And, working through some of the complicated material from Networked Art might need additional exploration.