Marcel Duchamp: Ready to make art

Marcel Duchamp was born into an art-loving family, which surely familiarized him with all possible forms of artistic expression from his earliest youth.

He started painting and drawing at the age of 15, and over the next 10 years he learned a wide variety of representational techniques, from art prints to caricatures. His paintings ranged from Impressionism to Cubism, and he traveled and studied old masters such as Lucas Cranach .

At the age of 25, Duchamp was exposed for the first time to the full force of modern inventions at the Paris Air Show in 1912, and this force changed the artist and his work immediately: Duchamp completely abandoned painting (for a time) and instead created something that approximated the perfect form that the modern industry of his time was capable of producing.

His first readymade (only later termed as such, a work of art made from found everyday objects, which the artist alters little or not at all; he simply finds and presents his artwork) was, as early as 1913, the “Roue de bicyclette ,” the bicycle wheel on the white-painted stool. Duchamp liked this work, which still did not quite achieve the uniformity of industrial production; for him it was “an object of personal edification .” However, in a 1960 interview, he added a caveat:

"The Bicycle Wheel is my first Readymade, so much so that at first it wasn't even called a Readymade. It still had little to do with the idea of ​​the Readymade. Rather it had more to do with the idea of ​​chance. In a way, it was simply letting things go by itself and having a sort of created atmosphere in a studio, an apartment where you live. Probably, to help your ideas come out of your head.

To set the wheel turning was very soothing, very comforting, a sort of opening of avenues on other things than material life of every day. I liked the idea of ​​having a bicycle wheel in my studio. I enjoyed looking at it, just as I enjoyed looking at the flames dancing in a fireplace. “It was like having a fireplace in my studio, the movement of the wheel reminded me of the movement of flames”

(The bicycle wheel was my first ready-made, so much so that it wasn't initially called a ready-made at all. It doesn't really have much to do with the idea of ​​ready-mades. It has more to do with the idea of ​​an opportunity.).

It simply let things run their course and created an atmosphere in a studio, in an apartment where you live. Perhaps to help ideas turn upside down. Turning the wheel was very calming, very soothing, an opening to thoughts other than those of everyday life.

I liked the idea of ​​having a bicycle wheel in my studio. I enjoyed watching it, like one enjoys watching the flames dance in a fireplace. It was as if I had a fireplace in my studio; the movement of the wheel reminded me of the movement of flames

Freely translated quote from web.archive.org/ .

Marcel Duchamp's Bicycle Wheel (Roue de Bicyclette) is now in the Museum of Modern Art, New York City . The artwork is part of The Sidney and Harriet Janis Collection, in its original size of 129.5 × 63.5 × 41.9 cm, but as a replica made in 1951 because the original is lost; see www.moma.org/collection/works/81631 .

The friends who had accompanied Duchamp to the air show were also shaken to the very foundations of their work:

Constantin Brâncuși's polished sculptures also approached industrial forms, such as "Mademoiselle Pogany I" in white marble, xroads.virginia.edu/ , or even more so "Le Nouveau-Né I" , www.onesttousdesartistes.tv/ .

Fernand Léger initially focused on theory, wanting to explore how art could achieve the beauty of machines. Before he had discovered this, he experienced a less beautiful side of machines during the First World War, nearly perishing in his life, but undeterred, he began his "période mécanique" (mechanical period) in 1917, which, for example, gave rise to the legendary surrealist-Dadaist film "Le ballet mécanique" (The Mechanical Ballet) in 1924.

Then it was almost World War II again, this time Léger spent the war years in the USA, and after the war he only had limited interest in machines, his art afterwards looked more like this: “La grande fleur qui marche” , 1952:

Back to Duchamp: If he was going to reorient himself, he must have thought he was going to do it properly, and after abandoning "retinal painting," he began to draw on literary sources for his art. He now considered it better to be influenced by literature than by other painters.

Raymond Roussel's play "Impressions of Africa" ​​is said to have sparked the basic ideas for the glass "The Bride Stripped Naked by Her Bachelors, Even" , while the linguistics of Jean-Pierre Brisset (like Roussel's work described by Duchamp as "fantasy delirium") is said to have exerted a further significant influence.

After the break with the powerful members of the Puteaux group, Duchamp perhaps needed a quiet atmosphere and good literature; in the spring of 1913, he certainly took a course in library science and, after successfully passing the exam, accepted a position as a library assistant at the Sainte-Geneviève Library in Paris.

The Armory Show – fame comes with a bang

Duchamp didn't mind fame, but he didn't desperately seek it either; a good starting point for fame to impose itself

While Duchamp enjoyed the tranquility of the venerable Parisian library an ocean away – here the reading room – an exhibition in the USA was to change his life:

American artists Arthur B. Davies and Walt Kuhn visited Paris at the end of 1912 to search for modern art in studios, galleries and private collections for the Armory Show in New York (International Exhibition of Modern Art, February 17 to March 15, 1913, an exhibition with such a great influence on the development of American art that the year 1913 is often cited as the beginning of modernism in America).

The American painter Walter Pach , who had lived in Paris since 1907, facilitated contacts; Davies and Kuhn selected several works by the Duchamp brothers for the exhibition, including four paintings by Marcel.

He may have long forgotten this when “Nude Descending a Staircase (No. 2)” was shown at the Armory Show in New York in 1913 – and sparked such heated discussions that the artist instantly became a celebrity. All four of Duchamp's exhibited works were sold, though not necessarily for lucrative prices; “Nude Descending a Staircase” fetched a mere $342.

But at least Duchamp found his way back to art from the quiet reading room of the library; the bicycle tire described above was followed by further readymades such as “Bottle Rack” (1914, www.cloud-cuckoo.net/ ) and “Fountain” (1917, de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_%28Duchamp%29#/media/File:Fontaine-Duchamp.jpg). He moved to New York in 1915 and was discovered there by the media; the interviewers were said to be surprised at how amiable the “bogeyman of the Armory Show” was in real life.

In New York, Duchamp met some friends again, Francis Picabia and Jean Crotti (and Albert Gleizes ), these artists had already emigrated to America due to the First World War.

Society of Independent Artists” with other artists ; in 1917, he published an early Dada publication (The Blind Man) ; in 1918, he painted his last oil painting ( “Tu m'” , generally interpreted as “Tu m'emmerdes” , “You get on my nerves” ) and left for Buenos Aires in the summer, where he played chess intensively, drew chess players, and worked on the “Large Glass” .

However, this was only completed in 1923, see above under “Old Perfection and New Perfection and Artistic Shock” . In 1919, back in Paris, Duchamp initially worked on the ready-made LHOOQ , a distortion of the Mona Lisa :

Further ready-mades followed, some under the pseudonym Rose Sélavy (later Rrose Sélavy = “Eros, c'est la vie”, “Eros, that is life”), e.g. the ready-made “Why not Sneeze, Rose Sélavy?” (Why not sneeze, Rose Sélavy?), 152 marble sugar cubes in a birdcage.

In 1920, Duchamp founded the artists' organization "Société Anonyme Inc." Katherine Sophie Dreier and Man Ray , which would organize 84 exhibitions between 1920 and 1939 (the most important being the "International Exhibition of Modern Art" of 1926 at the Brooklyn Museum of Art ).

Half a century of fantasy art for the world

In 1923, Duchamp entered into a relationship with Mary Reynolds, which lasted until Reynolds' death in 1950, despite an intervening marriage (June to November 1927, to Lydie Sarazin-Levassor, rumored to be for financial reasons).

After a few years devoted more to love (1923 to 1927) and more to chess (1928 to 1933, participation in five Chess Olympiads, theoretical publications on chess), Duchamp exhibited in 1936 in the exhibition “Phantastic Art, Dada, Surrealism” , Museum of Modern Art New York, designed decoration for André Breton’s surrealist gallery “Gradiva” in Paris, and in 1938, together with Breton, Paul Éluard and Wolfgang Paalen, the “Exposition Internationale du Surréalisme” at the Galerie Beaux-Arts Paris , with 1,200 coal sacks hanging from the ceiling as decoration of the main room.

Duchamp advised Peggy Guggenheim on the opening of her gallery in London in January 1938 with a Jean Cocteau exhibition, experienced the first part of the war in Paris and emigrated to New York in 1942, where he organized the exhibition “First Papers of Surrealism” (October 14 to November 7, 1942, featuring artists such as Max Ernst, Alexander Calder and David Hare) with André Breton.

Also in 1942 he co-founded the surrealist magazine VVV , in 1945 he designed the covers for a special issue of the magazine View dedicated to him and for an exhibition catalogue by Man-Ray, in 1946 he became a member of the jury of the “Bel Ami art competition” , in 1952 Duchamp was admitted to the “Collège de 'Pataphysique” , which had been founded shortly before in Paris (in honor of the French writer Alfred Jarry).

In 1946, Duchamp began a spatial object, which he only finished in 1966, his last work, conceived over twenty years: “Etant donnés: 1° la chute d'eau / 2° le gaz d'éclairage” , wikimedia.org/ , a kind of diorama made of many different materials and with just as many different artistic statements, touching and fascinating.

In 1954, Duchamp remarried, the ex-wife of Henri Matisse's son Pierre (Alexina “Teeny” Duchamp); in 1955 he became an American citizen; in 1963 the first Duchamp retrospective Pasadena Art Museum .

In 1964, Duchamp participated in documenta III in Kassel (posthumously he also participated in documenta 5 in 1972 and documenta 6 in 1977), in 1965 he exhibited at the Kestner Society in Hanover, in 1967 he helped organize the exhibition “Les Duchamps: Jacques Villon, Raymond Duchamp-Villon, Marcel Duchamp, Suzanne Duchamp” at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rouen, on October 2, 1968, Duchamp died unexpectedly in the night after a joyful evening with his wife and friends, his self-designed epitaph reads: “D'ailleurs c'est toujours les autres qui meurent” (Incidentally, it is always others who die).

Free thinking and imagination, humor and irony…

Marcel Duchamp Impressionism , Dadaism and Surrealism and Conceptual Art ; he worked as a painter , sculptor , writer , filmmaker and much more; he thoroughly engaged with art.

He challenged and frightened his viewers, amused and mocked them, made them think and actually seduced them into entirely new perspectives – but one thing he never did was leave the art viewer “in peace”.

Duchamp downplayed traditional painting, claiming it merely affected the retina and was “olfactory masturbation” (apparently without further explanation of how he came to olfactory fetishism, but there will certainly be long and detailed publications on the subject).

Painting was outdated, a waste of energy, impractical; now it was the turn of photography and cinema, which offered so many other ways to express life. With the readymades, he freed the art of the future (which he also created, but not exclusively) from its ties to material and craftsmanship; this was indeed the birth of conceptual art , in which the idea alone is decisive for the artwork.

Marcel Duchamp also biting irony and uninhibited humor to art; the work title “LHOOQ” (the Mona Lisa) can be read in French as “elle a chaud au cul” (she has a hot ass); the mustache on the “most adored woman in the world” is said to allude to the fact that Leonardo da Vinci himself supposedly adored beautiful young men rather than beautiful young women.

The urinal called “Fountain” , submitted under a pseudonym to the annual exhibition of the “Society of Independent Artists” and hotly debated by Duchamp himself as part of the jury and ultimately rejected, ironically called into question all previous concepts of art and also the art evaluation system.

All these new ideas led to several major media events in the art world; the art revolutionary Duchamp sparked a fundamentally new discussion about the concept of art, the effects of which can still be felt today:

… have an effect on others and their effects linger, greatly and for a long time

Duchamp participated in Dada films, for example, Hans Richter's 1947 film "Dreams That Money Can Buy," "8 × 8: A Chess Sonata in 8 Movements" (1956/57), a film about chess, which also involved Jean Cocteau, Paul Bowles, Alexander Calder, and Jacqueline Matisse. He Hans Arp, Raoul Hausmann, and Richard Huelsenbeck , "Dadascope" (1961), a film combining poetry and prose .

In 1964, Joseph Beuys “The Silence of Marcel Duchamp is Overrated” ( www.rundschau-online.de/ ) in a live broadcast “Neo-Dada” and the “Duchamp tradition .” Beuys’ “Chair with Fat” is also seen as a “Duchampian readymade.”

the British pop artist Richard Hamilton began the reconstruction of Marcel Duchamp's Le Grand Verre; the “Typo/Topography of Marcel Duchamp's Large Glass” was not completed until 2003: www.tate.org.uk/ .

Andy Warhol made a film about him, “Screen Test for Marcel Duchamp” , and in 1968, Merce Cunningham and his Dance Company the piece Walkaround Time with a stage design by Jasper Johns based on motifs from The Large Glass.

The Welsh object artist Bethan Huws refers to Marcel Duchamp in her “object display cases” ; and actions such as the wrapping of the Reichstag by Christo & Jeanne-Claude go back to Duchamp's ideas, in that something familiar and everyday is made truly visible again through covering.

Many other artists were inspired by Duchamp's ideas, from Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg to Saâdane Afif , born in 1970, who currently has around 300 images of Marcel Duchamp's urinal “Fountain Archive” “co-founder of modern art” .

There is a Duchamp Research Centre (founded in 2009 at the State Museum Schwerin), a Duchamp Research Fellowship , and a Prix Marcel Duchamp Association pour la Diffusion Internationale de l'Art Française since 2000 .

In 2004, 500 art experts voted Duchamp's ready-made "Fountain" the "most influential modern art work of all time".