The Dimensionist Manifesto

THE DIMENSIONIST MANIFESTO Paris, 1936 Dimensionism is a general movement of the arts. Its unconscious origins reaching back to Cubism and Futurism, it has been continuously elaborated and developed since then by all the peoples of Western civilization. Today the essence and theory of this great movement bursts with absolute self-evidence. Equally at the origin of Dimensionism are the European spirit’s new conceptions of space-time (promulgated most particularly by Einstein’s theories) and the recent technical givens of our age. The absolute need to evolve, an irreducible instinct, has sent the avant-garde on their way toward the unknown, leaving dead forms and exhausted essences as prey for less demanding artists. We must accept—contrary to the classical conception—that Space and Time are no longer separate categories, but rather that they are related dimensions in the sense of the non-Euclidean conception, and thus all the old limits and boundaries of the arts d i s a p p e a r. This new ideology has elicited a veritable earthquake and subsequent landslide in the conventional artistic system. We designate the totality of relevant artistic phenomena by the term “DIMENSIONISM.” / Tendency or Principle of Dimensionism. Its formula: “N + 1.” (A formula discovered in Planist theory and then generalized, reducing to a common law the seemingly chaotic and inexplicable artistic phenomena of our age.) ANIMATED BY A NEW CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD, THE ARTS, IN COLLECTIVE FERMENTATION (their interpenetration) HAVE BEEN SET INTO MOTION AND EACH HAS ABSORBED A NEW DIMENSION. EACH HAS FOUND A NEW FORM OF EXPRESSION INHERENT TO THE NEXT DIMENSION, OBJECTIFYING THE WEIGHTY INTELLECTUAL CONSEQUENCES OF THIS FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE. Thus, the Dimensionist tendency has led to: I. …L i t e r a t u r e leaving the line and entering the plane. Calligrammes. Typograms. Planism. (preplanism) Electric Poems. II. …P a i n t i n g quitting the plane and entering space. Painting in space “Constructivism” Spatial Constructions. Poly-Material Constructions. III. …S c u l p t u r e stepping out of closed, immobile, dead forms, that is, out of forms conceived of in three-dimensional Euclidean space—in order to appropriate for artistic expression Minkowski’s four-dimensional space. It has been, above all, “solid” sculpture (classical sculpture) that has opened itself up, first to inner space, then to movement, and is transformed into: Perforated Sculpture. Open Sculpture. Mobile Sculpture. Motorized Objects. And after this a completely new art form will develop: Cosmic Art (The Vaporization of Sculpture, Synos-Sense Theater, provisional denominations.) The artistic conquest of four-dimensional space / to date an artistic vacuum /. Rigid matter is abolished and replaced by vaporized materials. Instead of looking at objects of art, the person becomes the center and the subject of creation, and creation consists of sensorial effects operating in a closed cosmic space. This is how one would most concisely summarize the essence of Dimensionism: Deductive with respect to the past. Inductive with respect to the future. Alive in the present. [The following artists endorsed the DIMENSIONIST MANIFESTO in Paris in 1936:] Hans Arp Francis Picabia Wassily Kandinsky Robert Delaunay Marcel Duchamp Enrico Prampolini César Domela Camille Bryen Sonia Delaunay Sophie Taeuber-Arp Ervand Kochar Pierre Albert-Birot Frederick Kann Anton Prinner Mario Nissim Nina Negri Siri Rathsman Charles Sirató [The following foreign endorsements appeared in the first (movemental) edition of the Manifesto:] Ben Nicholson (London) Alexander Calder (New York) Vincente Huidobro (Santiago de Chile) David Kakabadze (Tblisi) Katarzyna Kobro (Warsaw) Joan Miró (Barcelona) László Moholy-Nagy (London) Antonio Pedro (Lisbon) MOSAIC The fundamental change in our worldview, the profound transmutation which results in the great formal revolution of the arts, resides in the absolute negation of materialism and of pure spiritualism. The result of this change is the advent of the synthetic idea in which spirit and matter constitute a single process. In art, spirit is the source, while matter (form) is the expression. —Kandinsky. The pedestrian’s shuffling gait: letters = linear literature. Cars on the roads, fast trains: accelerated lines = literature in two dimensions. Why do I practice superposition in painting? Because it has not been done so up until now. —Picabia. The longitudinal contraction of pictorial space. —Louis Fernandez. Polymaterial Compositions—the contemporary joy in the creation of the world. —Prampolini. The winged man: Painting in Space It is my greatest satisfaction to have ventilated Euclid’s brain: Sculpture-Ouverte —Kochar. The fact that a new mode of expression exists in the plastic arts which differs from the traditional one is in my opinion sufficient proof to justify it. Life evolves unceasingly, obeying only its own mysterious fundamental law, according to which it renews itself perpetually. —Kann. I insist on the utmost importance of the particularly psychological preoccupations which have permitted poetry, on its part, to evolve toward the automatic poem. After this last stage, poetic expression tends toward realizations in many dimensions. I consider Surrealist objects to be poetic expressions in three dimensions. It seems evident to me, that this road leads to a New Reality and that it could not have anything to do with the confusions engendered by concrete and abstract art terms. —Arp. Western painting has symbolically conquered space (depth using perspective) since the Renaissance. Cubism has rejected this conquest. It has reoccupied the surface. Abstract art, by forever simplifying itself, has rigorously maintained this result of Cubism. When the abstract painters see that there is nothing more to do within a two-dimensional surface, Painting must either die on Mondrian’s last square or accept the only living possibility, that is say, to grasp the third dimension: evolve in space. To really conquer three-dimensional space. —Kochar and Nissim. A New Reality imposes itself outside of all known Realisms; neither perspectival nor Euclidean nor chiaroscuro. New materials. Colors in the non-imitative sense. Electric light as rhythm. Rhythm as subject. Architecture being dimensional, this new expression takes its place in it by bringing surfaces and voids alive. Only a polychrome and non-decorative architecture can become dynamic and plastic in conjunction with this contemporary art. —Delaunay. Painting? The plane is dead. Today objects wish to break through the canvas. Every day, then, painting pursues its attempt at liberation: this is how it declares itself true to its tradition. —Nissim. Rotation, life form of Universes. A life form unknown to art. Use of movement in the plane for the creation of forms in space: Rotoreliefs. —Duchamp. In the universal void poetic creation invents the new dimensions of pleasure. I wish to invent, as a poem, a live animal of an unknown kingdom. —Bryen. Mankind “biological unit and entity” the only basis left to us for an entirely new art. Fusion of music and sculpture: cosmic art. Whether we want it or not, this revalorization of mankind as a center of creation will impose itself. —Sirató. The deep meaning of Dimensionism: the Biological Revolution. —Sirató and Bryen. The forms of art are materializations of a spiritual state. The great Revolution of form, which has been developing since the start of our century, is the organic result of a fundamental change in our conception of the world. The Manifesto allows for the possibility of developing in a more detailed way all of the problems it raises; in our Revue by the artists themselves, and by Charles Sirató in his book Les Arts et les Artistes non-euclidiens. The Signatories DIMENSIONISM is not a willed movement, created or directed; it is an evolution which has existed in a latent form for a long time. The Manifesto is in reality a general ascertainment deduced from the works of certain advanced artists, and, at the same time, an enlargement of the initial ideas derived from two-dimensional literature. This is the first time that a Statement of 60 lines has been able to assemble in such a short time (around two months) the unanimous and spontaneous approbation of 25 artists, the most remarkable of all the countries. This proves that our Statement is an awakening of consciousness/conscience [une prise de conscience]. We have brought to the light of day a truth—and without our background research no one would have been able to explain it with as much precision. The Dimensionist Manifesto is liberal in conception. From the interpretation of the arts to Cosmic Art, it allows for a wide range of nuance. The works of the signatories are, all of them, saturated by the Dimensionist spirit. On the other hand, we have invited only those artists to approve of us, whose work clearly exudes Dimensionist value, and who already in advance had well-established positions in the future development of our theories. OUR MANIFESTO IS A DEPARTURE. LA REVUE N + 1 FOR THE NON-EUCLIDEAN ARTS ACTIVITÉ After the appearance of the first French edition, our manifesto will appear simultaneously in several foreign languages. Each of these editions will include a photograph of the artist representing the Dimensionist Movement in their country. For example the South American edition will include Huidobro’s portrait; that of Russia the portrait of Kakabadze; that of Portugal the portrait of Pedro, etc. These special editions will be identical to the original French edition with the exception of the second page in which the text at center will be replaced by one of these photographs. In proceeding this way, we wished to accentuate the international tendency of our movement. Ever compelled by the social sense, we have wished that our theories should reach the largest number of artists, that our ideas should become living factors everywhere that there is the possibility of evolution. The first issue of Le Revue N + 1 appears in October. Our announced books will appear every four months. Our first Exhibition will take place in the fall. WE INVITE ALL THE ARTISTS IN ACCORD WITH OUR IDEAS EXPRESSED IN THE MANIFESTO TO COLLABORATE WITH US. THAT THEY JOIN US, THAT THEY SEND US PHOTOS OF THEIR WORKS, WHICH WE WOULD BE ABLE TO PUBLISH IN OUR JOURNAL. THAT THEY PARTICIPATE IN OUR EXHIBITION. THAT THEY PROPAGATE—OUTSIDE OF OUR INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION—OUR MANIFESTOS, OUR IDEAS, OUR WORKS.