Fluviana

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"FLUVIANA: Courtesy James Joyce (Photo Fischer, Salzburg)."

Fluviana is the title of four black-and-white photographs by the Salzburg artist Adolph Johannes Fischer , which, thanks to James Joyce 's mediation, were published in 1929 in the avant-garde magazine "transition". Although the photographs were published under Fischer's name, they were erroneously attributed to James Joyce since 1974 by the art historian Werner Spies , the Germanist Harald Weinrich and the art historian Christa-Maria Lerm Hayes and used as an opportunity to stylize Joyce as a conceptual or object artist, which he wasn't. After all, the photos of the floating debris were taken by Fischer, but the show pieces and their names were taken by Johann Baptist Pinzinger, who exhibited the floating debris in his “Salzach Museum” in Raitenhaslach .

History of the "Fluviana"

"FLUVIANA: Courtesy James Joyce (Photo Fischer, Salzburg)."
"Sketches by Franz Kafka , Courtesy Max Brod " ("transition", No. 27 (1938))

In 1928 James Joyce, vacationing in Salzburg, visited the Bavarian Raitenhaslach together with the Salzburg painter and writer Adolph Johannes Fischer , where Fischer photographed the flotsam and driftwood exhibits of the “Salzach Museum” at the so-called “Most-Hans”.

Four of Fischer's black-and-white photographs were published in 1929 in the avant-garde magazine "transition", whose table of contents "Fischer" cites as the author of the river photographs: "FISCHER ... River Pictures". The photographs have the following captions: "1) Hydra 2) Foot 3) Lobster 4) Racer", "1) Foot, 2) Head of Gazelle", "Seal" and "1) Foot 2) Lobster".

The summary caption indicates with the usual phrase for loans that the Salzburg fisherman took the “Fluviana” photographs, which were kindly made available to “transition” by James Joyce: “FLUVIANA: Courtesy James Joyce (Photo Fischer, Salzburg ) ". - Similarly, the editor Eugene Jolas published Franz Kafka's drawings in “transition” (no. 27) in 1938 without attributing them to Max Brod : “Sketches by Franz Kafka, Courtesy Max Brod”.

In addition, in the “Glossary” of the “Fluviana” booklet, publisher Jolas lists the names of two dozen exhibits in the “Salzach Museum”, which have been translated into English, and concludes with the note that the showpieces were photographed by Adolph Fischer:

"The river pictures published in this number were discovered by Mr. James Joyce during a visit in Raitenhaslach, Austria, last summer. They represent tree-roots collected by a resident from the mass washed up in the Salzach River. Some of the names he has given these curious formations of nature are: "Serpent which seduced Eve"; "Nine-headed Hydra"; "Seadog"; "Sea-Spider"; "Leech"; "Gazelle-Head"; "Mammoth-Head"; "River Eel"; "Club-Foot"; "Flat-Foot"; "Staff of the Wandering Jew"; "Lizard"; "Sand Viper"; "Snail"; "Nail of Noah's Ark"; "Sea-Miss"; "King Serpent with Little Golden Crown"; "Pig's Ear"; "Pincers"; "Sea-Lobster". He also collected stone formations washed up in the river and gave them such names as these: "Adam's Shoe-Last"; "Eve's Flat Iron"; "Heart (lost in Heidelberg)"; "Stone of the Wise". They were photographed by Adolph Fischer of Salzburg. "

Although this clearly states by whom the showpieces were selected, named and photographed, the "Fluviana" have been used again and again since 1974 by some art historians and literary scholars, who have seen the photographs but ignored Jolas' explanations. To declare Joyce the concept or object artist that he was not.

The legitimate Fluviana concept artists

Johann Baptist Pinzinger's inn at Griesmühle in Raitenhaslach (1906)

If the “Fluviana” photographs are viewed as conceptual works of art, their creator is the visual artist Adolph Johannes Fischer , who photographed the stranded objects in the “Salzach Museum” and under whose name the photos were published in 1929 in “transition”. If you see the show pieces in the “Salzach Museum” as conceptual works of art, Johann Baptist Pinzinger, the founder of the “Salzach Museum”, is the legitimate “Fluviana” concept artist. Had Joyce actually considered the "Fluviana" to be his work, they would have been listed under his name in the "transition Bibliography" (transition, No. 22) in 1933. All the more so since there is even a photograph of a print galley from “Work in progress” under his name. In fact, the "Fluviana" are recorded under the name "Fischer", which means that the repeatedly erroneous attribution of the "Fluviana" to Joyce, which has been repeated since 1974, along with all the interpretations based on it, is unfounded.

Title of the floating debris exhibits in the "Salzach Museum"

Adolph Johannes Fischer , author of the "Fluviana" photographs

The following is a list of the titles that Hans Pinzinger ("Most-Hans") gave to the exhibits in his "Salzach Museum":

1. Seven-headed Hydra , 2. The left foot of Emperor Charles from the Unterberg , 3. An antediluvian Mamutschädel , 4. The Simson be Ohrwaschl , 5. A Gamskopf, 6. A cobra , 7. A vial of the Egyptian darkness , 8. The eye of the law, 9. A board like the one some people wear in front of their heads, 10. A claw from the Tazelwurm, 11. A bottle of Locarnogeist , the more you shake the cloudier it becomes, 12. Gambskrikl, 13. To Adam his shoe last , 14. Brain atrophy bacillus , 15. To Mussolini his' Nas'n, as she was shot back then, 16. An electric tremor of 110 volts caught in the Salzach , 17. A wooden nail from Noa's ark , 18. That Nose bone of a unicorn , 19. A seal from the Salzach , 20. A mermaid from the Salzach, 21. A tomahack , 22. Garzellen antlers, 23. A flat foot , 24. Twisted legs of a Charleston dancer , 25. The last stick tooth of the mountain dairyman from the Hinterstoißer Alm, 26. A piece of d he soap with which the Salzburg people wanted to wash the black bull white, 27. Wooden nail from a salt ship, 28. The comb with which Lorelei combed out her red bristles, 29. A wrench from Schmiednatzl from Ramsau , 30. The fast runner from Hallein , 31. The heart that was lost in Heidelberg , 32. A boot from the most beautiful maiden from Salzburg, 33. The arrow of Wilhelm Tell , 34. A few drops of real Salzburg mason's sweat, “a rarity”, 35. The ravages of time , 36. a blacksmith tongs from Schmiednatzl from Ramsau, 37. a pistol , 38. a clubfoot , 39. the shoe of any citizen, of all tax obligations is fulfilled, 40. a pork , 41. the Gordian knot , 42. an antediluvian leech , 43. A snail from Raitenhaslacher Weinberg , 44. A young whale , the old has Jonas swallowed, 45. the Eva her irons , 46. the last bread awakening from the Noah's Ark , 47. the leg of Schmied von Kochl, 48. Purse shrinkage bacillus, 49. A king's snake with a golden crown, 50. An antediluvian bat, 51. The walking stick of the eternal Jew , 52. The stone that fell from the heart of the aviator Kohl when he saw America, 53. The beard of the emperor Barbarossa , 54. A collection of beautiful and very rare stones from the Salzach.

Web links

literature

  • Rupert Linsinger: A strange collection. In: “River and Tent”. 1928. pp. 110ff. (Detailed contemporary review of the “Salzach Museum”, 1928).
  • Eugene Jolas : transition 16/17. Adolph Johannes Fischer: Fluviana, p.296-297, "Glossary". p.326-328. p.327 (1929).
  • Werner Spies : Max Ernst. Collages, Inventory and Contradiction (1974).
  • Dougald McMillan: transition. The History of a Literary Era. 1927-1938 (1975).
  • Harald Weinrich : The transitory moments of language. In: Files of the VI. International Germanist Congress in Basel (1980).
  • Christa-Maria Lerm Hayes: James Joyce as a source of inspiration for Joseph Beuys (2001).
  • Christa-Maria Lerm Hayes: Joyce in Art (2004).
  • Andreas Weigel : James Joyce's stays in Austria. Innsbruck (1928), Salzburg (1928) and Feldkirch (1915, 1932). In: Michael Ritter (Hrsg.): Praesent 2006. The Austrian Literature Yearbook. Literary events in Austria from July 2004 to June 2005. pp. 93–105. (2005).
  • Christa-Maria Lerm Hayes and Alison Armstrong: "Joyce in Art, a Dispute." "Irish Literary Supplement" 25, ii (Spring 2006): 2-3. Christa-Maria Lerm Hayes 'reply to Alison Armstrong's review of "Joyce in Art" in "Irish Literary Supplement" (Fall 2005) and Alison Armstrong's reply to Lerm Hayes' reply.
  • Eva Gilch: The “Most-Hans” by Raitenhaslach and James Joyce. In: Oettinger Land. A local history series for the entire Altötting district. Published by the "Oettinger Heimatland" eV Altötting. Annual series 2008. Volume 28, pp. 221–226.
  • Andreas Weigel : fragmentary biographies. Searching for and securing traces of Adolph Johannes Fischer and Fritz Willy Fischer-Güllern . In: Michael Ritter (Ed.): Praesent 2011. The Austrian Literature Yearbook. Vienna: present 2010.

swell

  1. ↑ Eugene Jolas: transition 16/17. "Table of Contents" (1929).
  2. ↑ Eugene Jolas: transition 16/17. "Glossary". p.326-328. p.327 (1929).
  3. ↑ Andreas Weigel: fragmentary biographies. Searching for and securing traces of Adolph Johannes Fischer and Fritz Willy Fischer . In: Michael Ritter (Ed.): Praesent 2011. The Austrian Literature Yearbook. Vienna: present 2010.
  4. ↑ Eugene Jolas: transition, No. 22. “transition Bibliography”. p.145-172. p.159 (1933).
  5. ↑ Eugene Jolas: transition, No. 22. “transition Bibliography”. p.145-172. p.153 (1933).
  6. ^ Hans Pinzinger (Burghausen) and Wolfgang Hopfgartner (photo archive Raitenhaslach).