I am writing this from the Cafe Voltaire, the nightclub where the Swiss DADA movement launched in 1916. I am in awe of this place, and I love the fact that it is still used as a workspace, as well as an exhibition and performance hall for post-DADA art.

On the first floor, there is a gift shop where you can buy totebags imprinted with “YSL is dead” and other ironic and anarchic sayings. They sell several small random objects d' art (and I do mean random, and purposefully so). I'm very surprised to see beautiful notebook and pen and ink sets for sale, I guess in deference to the history of DADA writers who once (and still?) worked here.

In the basement, there is a space that is now used for exhibitions and performances. I'm guessing that the room has always had this purpose. The current exhibition is on the FLUXUS sub-movement, which I gather is based on the idea that art should be a part of the everyday flux, or flow, of life .. and that art should not be a profession, or the result of intellectualism, but something that everyone takes part in, naturally, throughout their lives. I'll do some research at some point and add more about the movement to this post. There is a large projection screen on the back wall, upon which video of performances that were given in the 60s is shown. I can tell that these videos were shot in this same space. There are computers on which you can watch more video, and books that are filled with art and journal entries (written in alternating colors of ink) from the leading artists in the movement. “Word art” seems to be huge in FLUXUS, and in DADA as well, as many of the pieces are prints having several disconnected phrases of varying typography, arrayed in different directions and patterns, sometimes complimented with symbols. I picked up a pamphlet on the movement, which is written in German, but it is full of word art, and maps describing the “phylogeny” of the movement and its artists.

In the artists' cafe on the second floor, I'm sitting at a tiny table in a tiny chair that seems to have been built just for me, next to an outlet and a window overlooking the small shops on the narrow, cobble-stoned Grossmuenster Strasse. I am using Christine's netbook, which I love, because it weighs 2 lbs and fits easily in my handbag. I'm listening to an eclectic mix of music; so far, I have recognized an unusual cover of “Eleanor Rigby,” and MIA's “Paper Planes.” The walls next to me are thick and made of stone, in the fashion of an ancient Swiss building like this one, and adorned with more random DADA art: framed “word art,” painted canvases with model train tracks on top, cutouts of cartoon dogs and cheerful gnomes smoking pipes.

Behind me, there is a fully stocked bar, from which I have ordered my two caffes with milk. Of course the presentation was amazing, with a miniature glass of water, miniature jug of milk, miniature Nobblesse chocolate, and white coffee cup and saucer all arranged on a black platter in the shape of an artist's palette.

Beyond the bar, the artists' cafe continues and expands into a larger room. It looks like a room in a converted warehouse, and in fact reminds me of our back workshop at Cannytrophic .. I could definitely picture Paluska here, building his Absolut Vodka music machine. There is a gas fireplace surrounded by small vintage couches, and in one corner I see a young artist showing a woman his paintings, which are stacked against the wall. I think he might work here. I see a disco ball, and a marble bust with a ridiculous fur of some sort covering the face. There are murals on the wall, of an impish two-bodied creature named “Da und Da” and a whimsical cartoon figure in a tuxedo and curled mustache, exclaiming, “Da Da Da Da Da Da Da Da.” There are numerous vintage prints and posters, and on one, a flapper holds a bottle of liquor, labeled “Da Da,” over the inscription, “to be da-da or not Da Da, das isch d'Frag.” Another poster proclaims to the world, “DADA global siegt.” There are more murals of surreal gnomes, and old black and white photographs of artists and writers that must have come to this cafe, and copies of type-written manifestos. A few feet from the back wall, dark maroon velvet curtains hang limply underneath theater-grade lighting. I imagine that the curtain is for evening theater or musical or spoken word performances.. and that when the lights are turned down, this room with its high ceilings becomes an artists' bar and club. I am staring at everything in wonder, and I probably look crazy because everyone else is just enjoying a caffe.

.. it has suddenly occurred to me that the bar they took me to last Thursday night was decorated in a surreal, possibly DADA way. At the time, I did marvel at the giant, disproportional skeleton hanging from the roof, the dark red lighting, the posters of Che, and the multiple flatscreens displaying the same video art feed... but I didn't make the connection, since I didn't yet know of Zurich's important role in the DADAist and surrealist movements. That place was huge, and had been built into a converted warehouse (the shape of the buildings in the area reminded me of Fanueil Hall, so I am guessing that they were centuries-old warehouses).

I spent a few hours making my way to this Voltaire Cafe earlier this afternoon. On the way, I stopped by a couple of churches, the Fraumuenster (the oldest parish church in Zurich, with a square tower topped by a giant clock) and the Grossmuenster (a cathedral from which the Swiss Reformation was launched, buit in the Romanesque, neo-Gothic style, with vibrant royal blue and red stained glass). When I leave here, I will go to the Bahnhoffstrasse, which is apparently the place to go for Swiss shopping (something like Boston's Newbury St).

I'll be having dinner with Christine and her department tonight, and I'm absolutely excited to meet more theoretical astrophysicists and particle physicists. l want to learn about their research, and see what my life could been, had I chosen that path, and perhaps live vicariously through them. I know the lifestyle of a physicist was not for me, but I miss a certain closeness to the inherent fabric and structure of the universe, that I felt when studying relativity or quantum mechanics.