Gesamtkunstwerk
Americannoun
Etymology
Origin of Gesamtkunstwerk
First recorded in 1935–40; from German: literally, “total art work”
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Music and dance were interwoven in a festival production that approached Wagner’s idea of the integrated artwork, or Gesamtkunstwerk.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 2, 2022
It is a Gesamtkunstwerk comprising visual art, literature, philosophy, speculation, koans and sociopolitical commentary.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 22, 2021
Words, concepts and images that pervade his work have become commonplace signifiers in contemporary discourse: Valhalla, Liebestod, Valkyrie, Gesamtkunstwerk, Flying Dutchman, Nibelung, Brünnhilde, Götterdämmerung, Siegfried, Leitmotiv, endless melody, to name just a few.
From New York Times ● Sep. 16, 2020
A performance artist who has collaborated with the Royal Opera House choir, she imagined Bank Job as Wagnerian Gesamtkunstwerk, or a total work of art.
From The Guardian ● Sep. 15, 2020
Inevitably, one of his subsequent shows—he created about two hundred in his lifetime, mostly as a freelance curator—focussed on the Wagnerian ideal of the Gesamtkunstwerk, the supposedly total art work.
From The New Yorker ● Jul. 15, 2019
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
