Before Publication: Montage between Privacy and Publicity
Conference

At the moment of their going to press, publications irreversibly reach
their definite form. At the same time, they also reach an audience.
What is frequently forgotten in this process is that printing is
preceded by several, sometimes complex steps towards the construction
and montage of (visual) meaning. This conference sees these
constructions of meaning as montages, and addresses the materials and
processes involved before publication.

Our focus is on concrete artistic and visual artifacts such as
scrapbooks, book mock-ups, and press layouts by artists, authors, and
graphic designers. In particular, the conference sheds light on the
relationship between the spheres of privacy and publicity. This aspect
has so far received only sparse attention, whereas questions concerning
the historical genealogy of montage and collage as well their
theoretical bases have increasingly been addressed in more recent
research.


Friday, September 28, 2012

14.30
Nanni Baltzer and Martino Stierli, Universität Zürich
Welcome and Introduction

Section 1: Dada and Beyond

15.00
Adrian Sudhalter, Independent Scholar, New York
Tristan Tzara’s Dadaglobe (1920-21), Reconstructed

15.45
Vera Chiquet, Universität Basel
John Heartfield’s Photomontage: The Various Steps Between Creation,
Preparation, and Reproduction

16.30
Coffee break

17.00
Jason Edward Hill, Institut National d’Histoire de l’Art/École
Normale Superieure, Paris
Ad Reinhardt Assembles a News Picture

17.45
Doris Berger, Skirball Museum, Los Angeles
The Making of Every Building on the Sunset Strip

18.30
Discussion


Saturday, September 29, 2012

9.30
Coffee

Section 2: Image Sequences and Clusters

10.00
Introduction

10.15
Mandy Gnägi, Independent Scholar, Zürich
Unfertig als Prinzip: Sammelbilderalben

11.00
Katia Mazzucco, Independent Scholar, Venice
Unpublished Mnemosyne: Documents on Warburg Montage

11.45
Coffee break

12.15
Antonio Somaini, Université Paris 3 Sorbonne Nouvelle
The Use of Montage to Elaborate a Theory and a History of Montage:
Writing, Drawing, and Found Images in Sergei M. Eisenstein’s Texts
Before Their Publication

13.00
Lunch


Section 3: Architecture and Publicity

14.30
Introduction

14.45
Reto Geiser, Rice University, Houston
"Verbi-Voco-Visual": Textual and Visual Montages in the Work of
Sigfried Giedion and Marshall McLuhan

15.30
Craig Buckley, Columbia University, New York
Utopie and the Rhetoric of Disassembly

16.15
Robert Wiesenberger, Columbia University, New York
Mixed Media: Muriel Cooper at MIT

17.00
Discussion

This conference is free of charge and open to the public.


Venue:
Cabaret Voltaire
Spiegelgasse 1 (entrance at Münstergasse 26)
8001 Zürich

Organized by: Nanni Baltzer and Martino Stierli
Institute of Art History, University of Zurich