75
are in the collection of M. Hagenbach in Basel. A similar work is reproduced
in the little anthology, Cabaret Voltaire, which appeared in 1916. These works
are collages of various materials, paper, cloth, string, stone, wood.
The world of memory and dream
Towards the end of her life, Sophie Taeuber was transfigured by a strange
light, as though she knew of her approaching destination. She always knew
the right way, like a traveler who has seen the roads of the country from a high
tower. Forces emanated from her that transformed the world of the day. Once
a radiant landscape streamed out of her, which permeated a mediocre place
in which we happened to be, so that it unfolded in fragrant splendor. She
always lived in contact with the real world of dreams. Only fairy-tales of per
fect beauty could reflect the radiance and light of her being.
The world of dream and memory is rank with impenetrable darkness and
radiant with pure light. This darkness and this light, however, do not mean
day and night as in our earthly day, but are one with the infinite. Like flames
and waves, the dead and the living course through this world. They pass
without weight through space and time. They release likenesses, which multi
ply like echoes, which accompany them with amity or pursue them with
hatred. They give rise to confusing sorrows and joys. They change their shape
for that of another. They disguise themselves. Dead men meet again alive, and
live men have long been resting in their graves. When we meet these dead
men in our unreal world of the day, they laugh and act as if nothing of the sort
had happened, and talk about some trifling business. In that world even we
people of the day become one with the infinite.
She painted the soul of the dream, the invisible reality. She drew radiant,
geometric messages. She drew lines that plumbed bottomless depths. She
drew solemn lines, laughing lines, lines that glowed white, whirling line
dances, jagged whorls, trellises of lightning. She let lines flare up wildly
around bundles of lines, until lines and bundles burst into flames of flowers.
She let lines whirl around rigid points, suddenly stop in gracious recollection,
and join into forms that sent off a glittering like a spring day. She painted
the golden glittering skeleton of the stars. She let points blush with shame.
She let points grow into berries, giant fruits, suns. She let points crumble into
ashes. She sowed pearls in white flowerbeds, and harvested moons. She de
signed courses for sacred flights. She painted the life of closed eyes that sing
inward. She drew the outline of silence.
Usually I meet Sophie under the olive trees by the Mediterranean. She
