Mz 442
Kurt Schwitters
German, 1887–1948
1922
A compact Merz collage in which Schwitters arranged cut-and-pasted colored and printed papers and a scrap of cloth on paper to turn discarded advertising and fragments into a precise, abstract picture.
You’re struck by a tight patchwork of worn rectangles—the newspaper-text ground and warm brown papers punctuated by a dense indigo square and a torn yellow label with a printed emblem—whose seams, stains, and frayed edges create a quiet, tactile rhythm.
This Merz piece helped expand modernism’s language by elevating everyday ephemera and waste into art, challenging artistic hierarchies and prefiguring later collage, assemblage, and Pop art practices.
Medium
Cut-and-pasted colored and printed papers, and cloth on paper with cardstock border
Dimensions
17 7/8 × 12 1/2" (45.4 × 31.8 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Katherine S. Dreier Bequest
Accession
197.1953
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
