"Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada Through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch of Germany."

Hannah Höch, Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada Through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch of Germany, collage, mixed media, 1919-1920 (Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin)

This photomontage was made between 1919 to 1920. In this year, Germany was experiencing tremendous political upheaval after WWI. Violent conflict broke out between Spartacists, the far left-wing communists, and the Freikorp. The Freikorp, (translated to free copse), was a paramilitary group encouraged by members of the government to oppress the German Revolution, the Marxist Spartacist League, the Bavarian Soviet Republic. In addition, they attacked certain political figures, such as Karl Liebnecht and Rosa Luxemburg, who were arrested and killed January 15, 1919.

Hoch uses readily available and current images from newspapers and magazines to reconstruct a story told from her perspective: a total fragmentation of government and a country. The title, "Cut with the Kitchen Knife" appropriately describes the way in which her media is processed. In the same instance, it is also a allegory for the schism running through Germany at the time. Being the kitchen knife, a domestic tool, the title hints at the themes of feminism woven into the image. Most of the powerful and popular male figures are emasculinated, infantized, or satirized. Hoch uses the portrait of Kathe Kollwitz, a prominent female German expressionist, as the focal point of the piece, around which gears and machines of industry move and rotate. Countries that give women the right to vote are highlighted in a map of western Europe, which is pasted to the lower right corner of the photo montage. Instead of signing the piece, Hoch places a portrait of herself on this map, identifying her values.

View a beautifully annotated video from SmartHistory about this piece.