Dada, Where Are You? I need you.

I believe our founder, Niels, would have loved comparing BuVu to Dada. I think the similarities are startling.

Dadaism is an artistic movement in modern art that started around World War I.  . . . . The name itself is a reflection that the art was designed to seem meaningful when it is in fact a reflection of how overvalued societal norms and expectations had become. The word “Dada” in and of itself has no meaning.” Wikipedia

   

   

“A theme in Tom Robbins first two books was ‘joy in spite of everything.’ His characters suffered, died, stared down tyrants and still opted for joy. And Robbins seemed to relish playing the jester, or more accurately, the trickster, ‘a figure other cultures have used as a vehicle for mythology and mirth.’ The role fit comfortably on a smart aleck who called his family ‘a southern Baptist version of The Simpsons,’ and once led the neo-Dada Shazam Society’s ‘happenings’ with names such as, ’A low-calorie human sacrifice to the goddess Minnie Mouse.’ (At that ‘happening’ Robbins encountered a dazed docent, the wife of a Seattle surgeon, muttering, ‘Somebody put a fish down my blouse.’)” from “Mark Twain With An Illegal Smile” Bob Young, LEGACY WASHINGTON, Secretary of State of Washington https://www.sos.wa.gov/_assets/legacy/tom-robbins-profile.pdf

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“But to say it’s all meaningless. Isn’t that a cop-out?”

“Maybe. But it seems to me that the real cop-out is to say that the universe has meaning but that we ‘mere mortals’ are incapable of ever knowing that meaning. Mystery is a part of nature’s style, that’s all. It’s the Infinite Goof. It’s meaning that is of no meaning. That paradox is the key to the meaning of meaning. To look for meaning – or the lack of it – in things is a game played by beings of limited consciousness. Behind everything in life is a process that is beyond  meaning. Not beyond understanding, mind you, but beyond meaning.”

from Another Roadside Attraction – Tom Robbins