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Paul Joostens 1889 – Antwerp – 1960 Unititled
Mixed media (wood, metal, rope), ca. 1922-24 Size 21 x 7.5 x 7.5 cm Provenance C. & M. Verbaet, Antwerp Literature Philippe Van Den Bossche, Paul Joostens, Ostend, Muzee, 2014, p. 145 (ill.), p. 324
A loner, egocentric, not in the least through his difficult character, Joostens stands out in the Belgian art world of the twenties. As early as 1917 he experimented with colorful abstract paper-collages. But it was probably during his trips to Paris in 1919 or 1920 that he really discovered the world of Dada. Together with his one-time friend the poet Paul Van Ostaijen, Joostens worked in the spirit of liberty and revolt against society so typical for the movement, though he never officially belonged to it. During his stay in Berlin, Van Ostaijen had befriended George Grosz, Walter Mehring and Paul Citroen. The remarkable typography of his most famous collection of poems Bezette Stad shows a big affinity with Dada. Though Joostens was mainly a visual artist he also wrote frequently. His letters to his fellow artist Jos Leonard show a very dada-like spirit, as does his essay Salopes, le quart d’heure de rage ou soleil sans chapeau, published in 1922.
With its “body” of sinuous and twisted lines, topped with shredded bits of rope evoking hair, this assemblage has a particularly female feel. It evokes in an abstract way the grotesque puppets that were so popular in dada-art, like those made by Hannah Hoch, but also the machine-drawings by Francis Picabia. Joostens had a very complex relation to women. They seem to have both fascinated and repulsed him. In 1924 he married Mado Milo in Paris, with Michel Seuphor as one of his witnesses. As it could have been expected, the marriage turned sour very quickly.
But it is with his three-dimensional assemblages of wood, metal, ropes, rubbish, objet-trouvés and disposable material, created in the early twenties that Joostens can be ranked as Belgium most interesting initiator of Dadaism. These are very similar to the Merzbilder that Kurt Schwitters made in Hannover around the same period. As Schwitters, Joostens collected all sort of litter from the streets and the Antwerp quays, nailed and glued them together into the most bizarre objects. Despised vestiges of everyday life were preserved and became art as harmonious compositions with an abstract quality. At the same time sentimental and ironical, they bring to mind the fleetingness of life. The irrational of the assemblages could help to undermine a fossilized bourgeois culture and prepare the road to an artistic renewal.
Paul van Ostaijen, Floris and Oscar Jespers in Floris Jespers’ studio
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