Provocative and disruptive. These two words fully describe the genius of Dadaism, Marcel Duchamp . Born in Blainville (Rouen, France) on July 28, 1887 and died in Neuilly-sur-Seine on October 2, 1968, Duchamp was a conceptual artist, so that the work of art must be replaced by the pure aesthetic act. READ ALSO: Kiki de Montparnasse and Man Ray, a roaring love Marcel Duchamp: from Impressionism to Ready-Made
Born on July 28, 1887 in the beautiful Blainville-Crevon , Marcel Duchamp already from the age of 15 picks up brush and colors and he begins to paint impressionist canvases. Over time, Duchamp changes several painting stylespassing from the impressionism of Edouard Manet, to the post-impressionism of Paul Cezanne, to arrive then to the intimism of Bonnard and Vuillard ending with the Fauvism of Henri Matisse.
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This phase of experimentation and pictorial research ends when between 1911 and 1912 he realizes the work entitled Nu descendant un escalier nº2 ; a picture as innovative as it is provocative, with a cubist and at the same time futurist tone, which arouses scandal even at the Armory Show in New York in 1913, marking the drift of the exploratory possibilities of painting and opening the season of a new way of conceiving art, originating the subversive Ready- Made , literally “already done”.
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Dadaism, or simply Dada, will treasure the Ready technique -Made invented by Duchamp and will make it the most subversive element of the movement . In this period, iconic works such as the bicycle wheel , fountain were bornand LHOOQ which will become the emblem of Duchamp and the non-sense spirit of Dada. Even if the origin of the movement is as ambiguous as its name and despite this current exalts the case as the main foundation for the realization of works, poems, films, etc., its meaning is very precise: to rejuvenate traditional art , to be disruptive, subversive, giving a new meaning to what already exists.
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This is how the 3 works mentioned above explain: Bicycle wheel is nothing more than a modern sculpture: once the statues were conceived as immobile and immovable, while now, with the bicycle wheel, the thing changes and the sculpture stops being an elitist object that exists only for them contemplated and not touched.
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Here the public for the first time can make the sculpture move by interacting with it . Likewise, Fontana is simply a Vespasian who is elevated to the status of a work of artarousing scandal in those who look at it; some theories speak that it can even be the representation of a uterus, thus creating a conceptual contrast between what in itself is an object intended for male use and what is instead its visual representation that instead refers to the female world. READ ALSO: Van Gogh and Munch disbanded by the artist who denounces global warming
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Last example and the most famous painting, admired and taken up by the world: the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. Here Duchamp makes a printed copy of it and draws her mustache, writing at the base of the workLHOOQ . ie Elle a chaud au cul, translated “She’s hot in the ass”. In this way Duchamp has upset and one of the most significant icons in the history of art.
The Mona Lisa is so universally known and admired by all that I have been very tempted to use it to cause scandal. I tried to make that mustache really artistic.
(Marcel Duchamp) From art to chess
Thanks to him and his innovative Ready – Made will also be taken up by other artists of the movement, such as the famous Man Ray . Now thanks to Duchamp we can celebrate the birth of conceptual art. Over time, the French artist even transformed himself into a Ready-Made by playing the role of a woman and assuming the pseudonym of Rose Selavy . In all this , painting and sculpture are not his only interests . Well, he also engages in experimental photography and feature films.
In 1923 he then devoted himself professionally to the game of chess and almost completely abandoned his artistic activity. Surprised in France by the outbreak of the war, in 1942 he embarked for the United States and devoted himself above all to his last great work, Etant donnes . In 1964, on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the first ‘Readymade’, in collaboration with Arturo Schwarz, make anumbered and signed edition of his 14 most representative Ready-Mades . Only 4 years later, on 2 October 1968, Marcel Duchamp died in Neuilly-sur-Seine at the age of 81.
To fully understand the character and his work, we recommend reading Marcel Duchamp: The Afternoon Interviews by Calvin Tomkins.
