Dada Dance: Sophie Taeuber's Visceral Abstraction

Rather than being seen as an authored photo in its own right, it has stood as documentary evidence of Dada live performance.5 Masked performances and varied descriptions of dances show up on the programs or in written recollections of nearly every Dada occasion-and adding this remarkable image would burnish the aura of any one of them.4 Contenders for the specific event could include the legendary Cabaret Voltaire opening on February 5, 1916, or its nightly events over the following months; the "First Dada Evening," at Waag Hall, which lists on the program three Dada dances and a Cubist dance; or the first exhibition of Dada artists in 1917 at the Gallery Corray, which was followed by the opening of Galerie Dada and another eight Dada soirees. Naima Prevots's 1985 article for Dance Research Journal first gave the photo the location and date of the Galerie Dada opening, and the costume to Arp.\n True, we are first taken by the sharp angles where a squared head abuts tubular arms, but in one archival print of the photo, it is possible to make out the dancer's black gown and body position.