A Punt Gun, used for duck hunting but were banned because they depleted stocks of wild fowl; ca. 1920’s.
Called the “Punt Gun,” this firearm of unusual size could discharge over a pound of shot at a time, and dispatch upwards of fifty waterfowl in a single go. A punt gun is a type of extremely large shotgun used in the 19th and early 20th centuries for shooting large numbers of waterfowl for commercial harvesting operations and private sport. “Used for duck hunting” isn’t the right expression for aiming this piece of artillery in the general direction of a flock of ducks, firing, and spending the rest of the day picking up the carcasses.
How they were used:
Bauhaus Stage Costumes, 1920’s.
Das Triadische Ballet, 1924
Stelzenläufer, 1927
Bauhaus Stage Workshop, 1928
Bauhaus Stage Workshop, 1928
Metal Party, 1929
“Nonsense Soldier”, Costume for the Metal Party, 1929
Costume for the Neue Sachlichkeit Party, 1926
“The Bauhaus was held together as much by social gatherings and festivities as by Gropius’s vision for a new art school. These celebrations promoted contact between school and public, giving free rein to masters and students to demonstrate creativity and design invention, conceiving invitations, posters, costumes and decorations.
“The Bauhaus parties moved from improvisations and seasonal Festivals to spectacular and monumental stage productions in Dessau. The highpoint was in 1929 with the resplendent Metal Party. They entered the building by sliding down a large chute that deposited them in the first of several rooms decorated with silver spherical balls”
– Barbican Art Gallery, 2012. Bauhaus: Art as Life. Koenig Books
I hope to be remembered for my atrocities! 