Abstract

While modernism and its avant-garde are often excluded from studies of environmental or ecological concerns, associated mostly with modern technologies, urban life and expanding media, this essay in contrast proposes that the arc that culminates in postmodern ecopoetics extends backwards to WWI-era Dada ecology. Using as a case study the body poetics of German-born New York Dada poet Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven, this study advances a theory of Dada ecopoetics, exploring a number of crucial themes such as a radical dismantling of nature/city boundaries; a desublimated trash aesthetic; a multi-sensorial immersive perspective; an anti-pastoral aesthetic; and ultimately, a radical ecopoetic liminality