Dada, the Coordinates of Cultural Politics

During World War I, an international group of young artists and writers fled to Zurich, in neutral Switzerland. In reaction to the horror of the war and the onslaught of new technology, as well as to the suffocating aesthetic of futurism and cubism, these artists began to create a new kind of art - art that was antilogical, anti-aesthetic, anarchistic, confrontional, shocking. Performing and exhibiting at the famous Cafe Voltaire, these artists called the new art "Dada." Dada: The Coordinates of Cultural of Cultural Politics, the first in the eight-volume series Crisis and the Arts: The History of Dada, provides parameters for the historical and sociological context of Dada. In a collection of essays from internationally respected scholars, Dada's manifestations in visual arts, theater, the media, and literature, as well as the correspondence between Dadas and their various manifestos, are explored to present a nuanced examination of the movement. In addition, the volume addresses the relevancy of an extensive study of Dada to present-day concerns