Readymades of Marcel Duchamp

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"Lhooq" redirects here. For the musical production alias derived from the rectified readymade, see Jóhann Jóhannsson.

Fountain 1917; 1964 artist-authorized replica made by the artist's dealer, Arturo Schwarz, based on a photograph by Alfred Stieglitz. Porcelain, 360 x 480 x 610 mm. Tate Modern, London.

The readymades of Marcel Duchamp are ordinary manufactured objects that he selected then sometimes modified, and deemed art. By choosing the object, giving it a title and signing it, the object became a work of art.

Duchamp was not interested in what he called "retinal art" — art that was only visual — and sought other methods of expression. As an antidote to "retinal" art he began "making" readymades at a time (1915) when the term was commonly used in the United States to describe manufactured items to distinguish them from handmade goods.

He selected the pieces on the basis of "visual indifference", and the selections reflect his sense of irony, humor and ambiguity.

"...it was always the idea that came first, not the visual example", he said, "...a form of denying the possibility of defining art."

The only definition of "readymade" published under the name of Marcel Duchamp ("MD" to be precise) says in André Breton and Paul Éluard's Dictionnaire abrégé du Surréalisme: "an ordinary object elevated to the dignity of a work of art by the mere choice of an artist." [1]

Duchamp limited his yearly output of readymades and made no more than 20 in his lifetime. He felt that only by limiting output, could he avoid the trap of his own taste. Though he was aware of the contradiction of avoiding taste, yet also selecting an object. Taste, "good" or "bad", he felt was the "enemy of art."

Through the years his own concept of the readymades kept changing. "My intention was to get away from myself, though I knew perfectly well that I was using myself. Call it a little game between 'I' and "me".

Much later in life Duchamp said, "I'm not at all sure that the concept of the readymade isn't the most important single idea to come out of my work."

By submitting some of them as art to art juries, the public and his patrons he challenged conventional notions of what is, and what is not, art. Some were rejected by art juries and others went unnoticed at art shows.

"The curious thing about the readymade is that I've never been able to arrive at a definition or explanation that fully satisfies me." - Marcel Duchamp (Tomkins, page 159)

Most of his early readymades have been lost or discarded.

1 Types of readymades
2 The readymades
3 Doubts over readymades
4 References

[edit] Types of readymades

Readymades - un-altered objects
Assisted readymades
Rectified readymades
Corrected readymades
Reciprocal readymades - using Rembrandt as an ironing board.

[edit] The readymades

(Note: Some art historians consider only the un-altered manufactured objects to be readymades. This list includes the pieces he altered or constructed.)

Bicycle Wheel (Roue de bicyclette) (1913) Assisted readymade. [2]

Bicycle wheel mounted by its fork on a painted wooden stool. He fashioned it to amuse himself by spinning it, "...like watching a fire... It was a pleasant gadget, pleasant for the movement it gave." The first readymade, though he initiated the ideas two years later.

Pharmacy (Pharmacie) (1914) Rectified readymade. [3]

Gouache on chromolithograph of a scene with bare trees and a winding stream to which he added two dots of watercolor, red and green, like the colored liquids in a pharmacy.

Bottle Rack (also called Bottle Dryer or Hedgehog) (Egouttoir or Porte-bouteilles or Hérisson) (1914) Readymade. [4]

Galvanized iron bottle drying rack which he bought in 1914 as an "already made" sculpture, but it gathered dust in the corner of his Paris studio because the idea of "readymade" had not yet been born. Two years later, through correspondence from New York with his sister, Suzanne Duchamp, in France he intended to make it a readymade by asking her to paint on it "(from) Marcel Duchamp. However, Suzanne, who was looking after his Paris studio, had already disposed of it.

In advance of the broken arm (En avance du bras cassé) (1915) Readymade. [5]

Snow shovel on which he carefully painted the title. The first piece he called a "readymade". New to America, Duchamp had never seen a snow shovel which were not manufactured in France. With fellow Frenchman Jean Crotti he purchased it from a stack of them, took it to their shared studio, painted the title and "from Marcel Duchamp 1915" on it, and hung it from a wire in the studio. Many years later, a replica of the piece is said to have been mistaken for an ordinary snow shovel and used to move snow off the sidewalks of Chicago.

Pulled at 4 pins (1915) Readymade. [6]

An unpainted chimney ventilator that turns in the wind. The title is a literal translation of the French phrase, "tiré à quatre épingles", which in English means something like "dressed to the nines." Duchamp liked it that the literal translation meant nothing in English and had no relation to the object

Comb (Peige) (1916) Readymade. [7]

Steel dog grooming comb inscribed along the edge in white, "3 ou 4 gouttes de hauteur n'ont rien a faire avec la sauvagerie; M.D. Feb. 17 1916 11 a.m." In English, "Three or Four Drops of Height [or Haughtiness] Have Nothing to Do with Savagery."

Traveller's Folding Item (...pliant,... de voyage) (1916) Readymade. [8]

Underwood Typewriter cover.

With Hidden Noise (A bruit secret) (1916) Assisted readymade. [9]

Ball of twine between two brass plates, joined by four screws.

Apolinére Enamelled (1916-1917) Rectified readymade. [10]

Sapolin paint advertisement.

Fountain (1917) Readymade.

Porcelain urinal inscribed "R. Mutt 1917". The jury of the 1917 The Society of Independent Artists, of which Duchamp was a director, rejected Fountain. Artist Beatrice Wood defended its inclusion by saying "The only works of art America has given are her plumbing and her bridges." Duchamp quickly quit the society.

Trap (Trébuchet) (1917) Readymade. [11]

Coatrack, wood and metal. He submitted it to a show at the Bourgeois Art Gallery and asked that it be placed near the entryway. It went unnoticed as art during the show.

Unhappy readymade (1919) Assisted readymade. [12]

Duchamp instructed his sister Suzanne Duchamp to hang a geometry textbook from the balcony of her Paris apartment so that the problems and theorems, exposed to the test of the wind, sun and rain, could "get the facts of life". Suzanne carried out the instructions and painted a picture of the result.

L.H.O.O.Q. (1919) Rectified readymade.

Pencil on a reproduction of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa on which he drew a goatee and moustache. The name when pronounced in French is a coarse French pun — "elle a chaud au cul" means "She's got a hot ass".

50 cc of Paris Air (50 cc air de Paris) (1919) [13][14]

Glass ampoule. Original broken and replaced in 1949 by Duchamp.

Belle Haleine, Eau de Violette (1921) Assisted readymade. [15]

Perfume bottle in the original box.

Why Not Sneeze Rrose Sélavy? (1921) Assisted readymade.

Marble cubes in the shape of sugar lumps with thermometer and cuttle bones in a small bird cage.

Wanted, $2,000 Reward (1923) Rectified readymade. [16]

Photographic collage on poster.

Fresh Window (1920)

The Brawl at Austerlitz (1921) [17]

[edit] Doubts over readymades

Research published in 1997 by Rhonda Roland Shearer claims that Duchamp's supposedly "found" objects may actually have been created by Duchamp. Her research of items like snow shovels and bottle racks in use at the time has failed to turn up any identical matches to photographs of the originals. However, there are accounts of Walter Arensberg and Joseph Stella being with Duchamp when he purchased the original Fountain at J. L. Mott Iron Works. Such investigations are hampered by the fact that few of the original "readymades" survive, having been lost or destroyed. Those which exist today are predominantly reproductions authorized or designed by Duchamp in the final two decades of his life. Shearer also asserts that the artwork "L.H.O.O.Q." which is supposedly a poster-copy of the Mona Lisa with a moustache drawn on it, is not the true Mona Lisa, but Duchamp's own slightly-different version that he modelled partly after himself. The inference of Shearer's viewpoint is that Duchamp was creating an even larger joke than he admitted. [18]