NEW YORK.-Maya Stendhal Gallery proudly presents Universal Language & The Avant-Garde, a show exploring the artistic relationship between artists Viking Eggeling (1880-1925) and Hans Richter (1888-1976). Since the early 1920’s, the avant-garde has embraced film’s capacity to capture themes and philosophies associated with progressive artistic expression. Rare drawings, some never before exhibited, and film works document Eggeling and Richter’s pioneering move from painting and drawing to creating the most influential avant-garde films and ideas in art history. “The Godfather of American Avant-Garde Cinema” Jonas Mekas’ work Film Stills and Installation Quartet: Birth of a Nation (1997) will be shown as a powerful demonstration that the avant-garde’s collective vision is still very much alive.

In 1918 in Zurich, Switzerland, Dada artists Viking Eggeling and Hans Richter met, and subsequently worked together for three years on a series of drawing studies in which “a precise interrelationship of contrasting elements remained the key for a new synthesis.” Rhythmic articulation of abstract form, line, and space reaches a point in which the paper’s static surface is no longer suitable. On view are extraordinary works from this time, leading up to the critical moment when the artists switched their activities to filmmaking. In 1920, the artists wrote the manifesto “Universelle Sprache” based on their observations. The show explores how this idea brought a social consciousness to their art, connecting abstract form to a universal language that permeated national borders and was to be understood by all.

The exhibition marks the first time new works by Swedish born Viking Eggeling have been unveiled to the public in decades. This is a landmark show for an artist who was recognized by his contemporaries as “one of those creatures who in their solitude exceeded the limits of their time.” Exceptional drawings (1915-1925) display the relentless commitment to finding new modes of expression that put Eggeling at the forefront of modern art. These works expose the creative vision that led to his groundbreaking film Symphonie Diagonal (1925), also on view.

Hans Richter’s rare archival documents, studies, and gesture drawings present crucial historical information to understanding how he came to create the films Rhythmus 21 (1921), Rhythmus 23 (1923), and Ghosts Before Breakfast (1928), all on view. Personal notes and letters reveal issues that compelled both he and Eggeling in avant-garde film theory and practice. Documents discuss his crucial role within the Dada movement and the ideas that made it one of the most significant philosophies in modern art.

Richter served as Director of the Film Institute at City College, New York and lectures from his tenure expose just why later artists continue to look to him for inspiration. Jonas Mekas’ Film Stills and Installation Quartet: Birth of a Nation (1997) gives a voice to a ‘Nation’ of independent filmmakers who exist at the fringe of traditional cinema. Included are fleeting portraits of his inspirational mentor Hans Richter, as well as George Maciunas, Harry Smith, Andy Warhol, Jack Smith, and many more. These ‘splices of life’ when viewed in cinematic sequence, bring together the 160 members of the independent film community Mekas has captured with his camera over four decades.

This documentary is a cinematic testimony to the fact that the universal ideas and worldviews propagated by Eggeling, Richter, and the avant-garde continue to stimulate today’s most innovative artists.