Abigail Child’s short, ELSA merdelamerdelamer, is a smoky, punky and sexy chapter in the collectively made Feminist bio-drama, MamaDada about the Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven, avant-garde performance artist, sculptress and poet. The Baroness travelled from Germany to Tennessee, New York to Paris, was lovers with William Carlos Williams and perhaps gave the famous urinal to Duchamp, whom she describes as her “cast-iron lover.” This brief excursion is inspired by an event that was lost in development where Man Ray and Duchamp made a film of the Baroness shaving her public hair.
