Search results
Marcel Janco (German: [maʁˈsɛl ˈjaŋkoː], French: [maʁsɛl ʒɑ̃ko]; common rendition of the Romanian name Marcel Hermann Iancu [marˈtʃel ˈherman ˈjaŋku]; 24 May 1895 – 21 April 1984) was a Romanian and Israeli visual artist, architect and art theorist.
Marcel Janco was a co-founder of Dadaism and a pioneer of Constructivism in Eastern Europe. He was a versatile visual artist, architect and art theorist, who designed landmarks in Bucharest and founded Ein Hod art colony in Israel.
- Jewish, Romanian, Israeli
- May 24, 1895
- Bucharest, Romania
- April 21, 1984
- Summary of Marcel Janco
- Accomplishments
- Biography of Marcel Janco
- GeneratedCaptionsTabForHeroSec
Romanian born artist Marcel Janco relocated to Zurich in his twenties and joined forces with his friend Tristan Tzara in developing the Dada movement. They eventually expanded their new aesthetic, based on a combination of Cubism and Expressionism, to three-dimensional works and then a kind of early performance art. Eventually Janco abandoned the m...
Janco and Tzara collaborated in establishing performances at the Cabaret Voltaire. Purposefully wild and primitive in nature, these performances were intended to join a canon of work challenging tr...Janco eventually abandoned Dada, finding it somewhat negative in outlook, and instead, embraced Constructivism. His exploration of this style, eventually moving into the fields of urban planning an...Janco played a major role in the modernization of Israeli Art, importing the latest trends in Constructivism from Romania. Once established he joined local artists in developing a more abstract app...Childhood
Born to a wealthy family in Bucharest, Marcel Iancu was an emotional, dreamy boy, who recalled his childhood as a time of "freedom and spiritual enlightenment." From a young age, he felt guilty about his wealthy lifestyle and developed a desire for social justice. In 1912, he began his artistic career by creating illustrations for the Symbolist magazine Simbolul, co-editing it with his friends Ion Vinea and Tristan Tzara. Other early influences on the artist were the work of Cézanne, Cubism,...
Early Training
At the outbreak of World War I, Tzara, Iancu, and his brother Jules moved to Zurich, where Marcel changed his surname for the more easily pronounceable 'Janco.' He studied architecture at the Federal Institute of Technology where he was inspired by the philosophy of Gesamtkunstwerk - the concept that decor should be integral to architectural design. These three young Romanians, along with Hans Arp, Richard Huelsenbeck, Hugo Ball, and Emmy Hennings, created an artistic collective that would ev...
Mature Period
By 1922, Janco had returned to Romania where he was still known as Marcel Iancu. Here he became a vital nexus for modernist currents, joining Das Neue Leben and the Radikale Künstler along with Arp and Hans Richter and attending Theo van Doesburg's First Constructivist Congress. He founded the modernist magazine Contimporanul(1922-1932), writing articles on a range of subjects including design, abstraction, architecture, film, and theatre. He believed in the power of primitive art, noting in...
Learn about Marcel Janco, a pioneer of Dada and Constructivism who collaborated with Tristan Tzara and created masks, paintings, and architecture. Explore his biography, quotes, and important artworks from his career.
- Romanian-Israeli
- May 24, 1895
- Bucharest, Romania
- April 21, 1984
People also ask
Who is Marcel Janco?
Was Marcel Janco a Jewish artist?
Why was Janco important?
Who painted Marcel Janco?
Marcel Janco was an Israeli artist who participated in the Dada movement and co-founded the Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich. MoMA has four of his works online, including a book and a print, and has exhibited him in various shows.
May 17, 2021 · Learn how Marcel Janco, a Jewish-Romanian artist, became a co-founder of Dadaism and a critic of the madness of war and fascism. Explore his paintings, drawings, and sculptures that reflected his vision of a chaotic and absurd reality.
- Ana-Teodora Kurkina
Marcel Janco was a Romanian and Israeli visual artist, architect and art theorist. He was the co-inventor of Dadaism and a leading exponent of Constructivism in Eastern Europe. In the 1910s, he co-edited, with Ion Vinea and Tristan Tzara, the Romanian art magazine Simbolul.
Dec 6, 2023 · Created in 1919 by the painter and architect Marcel Janco (also known in Romanian as “Iancu”), the mask-portrait is an important and rare document of the Dada movement and an embodiment of the so-called “approximate man” — a term that encapsulates many of the movement’s characteristics (“Approximate Man” is the title of a book ...
