Dada Tank

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Dada Tank was a dadaist journal edited and published by Dragan Aleksić in one issue (in 2 editions, one uncensored and one censored), Zagreb, June 1922, after his falling out with Zenit.

Aleksić became a supporter of Dada, which means "yes, yes" in Serbo-Croatian, as a student in Prague, and after his return to Zagreb in the spring of 1921, he contributed articles about Dada to the new journal Zenit (1921-1926). Edited by Ljubomir Micić, Zenit was the main organ of the Zenitist movement in Croatia. Differences between Aleksić and Micić about Dada became increasingly divisive, and in May 1922 Aleksić stopped contributing to Zenit. The following month he published his own journal, Dada Tank, with the support of a group of artists and writers in Zagreb. Aleksić included only two illustrations in the magazine, both abstracted linocuts by the young painter and graphic artist Mihailo S. Petrov. A poet, he was primarily interested in Dada writing, and he solicited contributions to Dada Tank from recognized Western European Dadaists. In an enthusiastic letter to founding Dadaist Tristan Tzara from 14 May 1922, he identifies himself as part of the Dada movement in Zagreb and announces Dada Tank, which he describes as an international Dada review. After reporting to Tzara about Dada activity in Prague and his contributions to Zenit, he asks him for Dada reviews and books. Dada Tank features Tzara’s poem Zanzibar, Kurt Schwitters's as yet unpublished Poem No. 48 (c1920), and an excerpt from Huelsenbeck's introduction of Dada Almanach (Berlin, 1920), all translated by Aleksić into Serbo-Croatian. Dada Tank also features poems by Aleksić, which he published in German, presumably so that foreign readers could read his poetry. His verse mimics the nonsensical tone and disregard for grammar and syntax that Aleksić had found in other Dada poems. Like Dadaists before him, he inserts neologisms and English words referring to capitalism and the entertainment industry such as 'trademark' and 'ragtime' into his poems. (Source)

Issue[edit]

Dada Tank 1 (Jun 1922). Download (12 mb).

The above PDF is sourced from Bibliothèque Kandinsky.

Literature[edit]

  • Emily Hage, "Dada-Tank, Dada Jazz, Dada-Jok", in The Dada Reader: A Critical Anthology, ed. Dawn Ades, London: Tate Publishing, 2006, pp 274-284.
  • Laurel Seely Voloder, Tyrus Miller, "Avant-Garde Periodicals in the Yugoslavian Crucible", in The Oxford Critical and Cultural History of Modernist Magazines, vol. 3 (Europe, 1880-1940), New York: Oxford University Press, 2013, pp 1099-1127.

See also[edit]

Links[edit]


Avant-garde and modernist magazines

Poesia (1905-09, 1920), Der Sturm (1910-32), Blast (1914-15), The Egoist (1914-19), The Little Review (1914-29), 291 (1915-16), MA (1916-25), De Stijl (1917-20, 1921-32), Dada (1917-21), Noi (1917-25), 391 (1917-24), Zenit (1921-26), Broom (1921-24), Veshch/Gegenstand/Objet (1922), Die Form (1922, 1925-35), Contimporanul (1922-32), Secession (1922-24), Klaxon (1922-23), Merz (1923-32), LEF (1923-25), G (1923-26), Irradiador (1923), Sovremennaya architektura (1926-30), Novyi LEF (1927-29), ReD (1927-31), Close Up (1927-33), transition (1927-38).