Gefängnis. Das graue Haus. Das Haus im Schatten
2015
Book, 19.5 x 12.5 cm, 576 p., language : German, publisher : Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen, ISBN : 978-3-8353-1834-2.
Materials: ink, paper
Collection: Collection M HKA, Antwerp (Inv. no. B 2028/885).
Literary synopsis
This volume compiles three prison novels by the famous Dada artist Emmy Hennings. In 1916 she opened the Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich with Hugo Ball. Here, the Dada group rebelled not only against the war, but against art itself. Hennings’ novel Gefängnis (Prison), published in 1919, caused a great sensation. Based on her personal experience (she spent several stints in prison, at least once for forging passports), using powerful, expressive language, she dissects the experience of imprisonment down to its last linguistic detail. With existential urgency, the reader is shown exactly what it means to be in prison. For many years, Hennings was concerned with the relationship between delinquency and the penal system, crime and punishment. The other two prison texts, Das graue Haus (The Grey House) and Das Haus im Schatten (The House in the Shade) bear witness to this.
Authorship: Artist Author.
Creative Strategy: No Link to Artworks.
Genre: Autobiography.
Publishing: Publishing House.
