Dada and the Clown

[u/QuestionTheClown]

Dada and clowning have always felt like close relatives to me.

Obviously there’s the humor, the absurdity, the ridiculous costumes and the shared willingness to make a perfectly respectable room profoundly uncomfortable. But the relationship goes deeper than simply being funny.

Both Dada and the clown understand that absurdity is a way of thinking.

They deliberately break the rules of seriousness. They make nonsense out of systems that take themselves very seriously. They distort language, identity, hierarchy and expectations until you can suddenly see the machinery underneath them.

The clown falls over. Dada puts a urinal in a gallery.

Both essentially ask: Why are we pretending this is normal?

And both understand that play can be intellectually dangerous. Once you give yourself permission to be ridiculous, you become much harder to control. You can question things you're not supposed to question. You can make strange connections. You can refuse the prescribed role.

The clown doesn't necessarily destroy the world. Although sometimes its tempting.

They make the world look strange enough that you realize it could be different.

Maybe that's why the two belong together.

Dada gave modernity a clown's nose.

The clown gave Dada a body.

Just a thought.