Abstract MarcelDuchamp, the conceptual artist of the first half of the twentieth century, sparked heated debates during his practices in the art world and had a significant impact on how we view modern art today. This paper examines how Duchamp's evolution as an artist began with roots in traditional methods of paint and Greenberg-sanctioned expression and progressed to satire of the conventional art world, practices, and ways of viewing art. It discusses how the works of MarcelDuchamp mark an important period in art history of dramatic change and movements that, when understood today in their context in history, can be seen as responsible for paving the way for the contemporary art of today.
From the Paper "One of Duchamp's most ambitious works was his mixed media The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even (also known as The Large Glass), depicting the "bride" in the upper panel with nine "bachelors" looking on from below. Duchamp accompanied the work with his extensive set of working notes about the piece (called the Green Box), the sexuality of the mechanical structures depicted to represent human beings, and the imaginative physics that govern the piece. The piece captures the idea of the mechanical as it depicts a frozen scene being acted out by the "figures" in both panes. The celebration of movement as art is continued in Duchamp's amusement by cracks occurring the work when it was accidentally broken in 1927. "
Abstract This paper discusses the life and work of MarcelDuchamp, focusing on his "readymades". This paper presents an overview of a making activity that can be developed in conjunction with the historical/critical discussion of Duchamp's readymades. The paper concludes with suggestions as to how these readymades can be turned into a useful classroom activity with the assistance of teacher guidance.
From the Paper "Overall, Duchamp's readymades engage humor, analogy in scale, shifts, and transitions in translating elements. They form representation of the physical and the conceptual transformations of urban landscape into maps. Duchamp started his series of readymades when he worked on objects resembling the Eiffel Tower and the Ferris Wheel. The Bottle Rack was among Duchamp's first readymades, transformed from its utilitarian origins by the artist's selection and signing of the object. The artist may not have made this bottle rack, but he displaced it and disallowed it of its utility. Its metal forms echo the cast-iron structure of the Eiffel Tower. Bottle Rack transforms a machine-made household object into a sculpture of equally strange metal forms."
Tags: source, of, imagery, conventional, definition, industrial-porcelain, art
Abstract This paper explains that MarcelDuchamp saw sculpture as a self-contained object that packages its own space and ideas, whereas Kurt Schwitters, in direct contrast to Duchamp's view, saw sculpture as the relationships of the parts to the whole actively which serve to create the space and idea. The paper then proposes that, in fact, sculpture has the ability to express Duchamp's and Schwitter's opposing ideas simultaneously, and to become a multidimensional spatial experience.
From the Paper "At the same time, Marcel Duchamp was introducing the ready-made object. His inverted urinal, among other objects, significantly impacted our thinking of sculpture as well. At the other end of the spectrum from Schwitters, Duchamp glorified, to the point of fetishizing , the objectness of sculpture. By opposite means, he too questioned the meaning of spatial experience."
Abstract This paper explains that the Dada movement, whether a painting, book or treatise, was intended to make the viewer think, to reconsider every one of his or her opinions, to break through the old boundaries and begin to look at the world in a new way. The author points out that MarcelDuchamp's "Fountain", an ordinary urinal, was his manifesto about the society for which the "artwork" had been made because, in this still nearly-Victorian age, Duchamp committed the unpardonable sin of making public that which should never even be mentioned. The paper relates that Francis Picabia's "painting" "Sainte Vierge" or "Holy Virgin", which is no easier to identify with than Duchamp's "Fountain", is an inkblot; the importance of which is the viewer's initial reaction to this Dada art. The paper includes several long quotations.
From the Paper "Whether in New York or Europe, Dada was a "movement" of the avant-garde. In order to understand the Dada, one must look into the conditions that gave it form and substance. The First World War was only an immediate cause - it was the spark that caused people like Duchamp and Picabia to search for a radically new form of expression. But Dada was more than paintings. Drama and literature could as much be expressions of Dada as any of Duchamp's or Picabia's works. By the time, Duchamp and Picabia had begun, independently, to create the style that would become Dada; the avant-garde had already established itself as a synthesis of the radical and the rebellious."
Abstract Discusses the controversy surrounding MarcelDuChamp's 1912 painting. Reaction to the artistically provocative painting and title at New York's 1913 Armory Show. Origins of DuChamp's painting. His ideas and experiments with abstraction and time-lapse photography. Rejection of "Nude" by the Cubists. His impact on American artists, critics and the public.
From the Paper "Marcel Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase (1912) became one of the best known painted images of the twentieth century when it developed into a major focal point for the hilarity and outrage that surrounded the 1913 International Exhibition of Modern Art. On view in New York, in February and March, the exhibition--which is better known as the Armory Show, after its location--was presented by the Association of American Painters and Sculptors (AAPS) and assembled chiefly by two of its members, Arthur B. Davies and Walt Kuhn, who went to Europe to select the works. When the show opened it proved to be one of the wonders of the age, and a defining moment in the history of American art. The American public, and even the members of the AAPS, had never seen anything like these works, which ranged from Van Gogh and Gauguin to Picasso and Brancusi. Duchamp's painting, with its ..."
Abstract The paper shows how MarcelDuchamp paved the way for the acceptance of Andy Warhol's work by redefining what was considered art. The paper describes how Duchamp took several everyday objects and combined them in an unexpected way, while Andy Warhol's work transformed ordinary objects into art. The paper points out the similarities and differences between the two artists' style of art.
Outline:
From Readymades to Soup Cans
Defining the Pop Art Movement
From the Paper "Andy Warhol's work transforms ordinary objects into art that summarizes the industrialization that permeated his society. Perhaps the most poignant proclamation by Warhol was his painting of 50 soup cans. This symbolized the uniformity and confines of modern society. Each of the cans was an individual in its own right, but in mass, the individuality disappeared. Duchamp paved the way for the acceptance of Warhol's work by redefining what was considered art .
"Duchamp's 'Readymades' radically changed ideas about what art is and what art is not. Duchamp used ordinary, mass produced objects placed in gallery spaces. One of the most controversial examples of this type of redefinition of a common object was his rendition of a urinal, which he creatively redubbed "The Fountain." . Transforming ordinary objects into an art form exemplifies a key similarity between Warhol and Duchamp."
From the Paper "This paper will discuss the influence that Marcel Duchamp had on the Dadaist movement in art. Dada originated in Paris and Zurich during the First World War. The despair of that war caused many Europeans to perceive a breakdown in the society of their time. This in turn led to the creation of Dada, a style of art which was paradoxically opposed to art. By seeking the destruction of art as they knew it, the European Dadaists made a statement about their world, which was apparently crumbling down around them. At approximately the same time in history, the concept of Dada was also being introduced in the United States by way of New York City. Although they were not directly involved in the war, the New York Dadaists still rejected the traditional values of the art world. This rejection was accompanied by a sense of humor, and their art often utilized elements of nonsense ... "
Abstract The paper discusses the origins of the Futurist Movement whose art-work reflected the energy and the changes of the late nineteenth/early twentieth century. It shows how Norwegian Impressionist artist, Edvard Munch's "The Scream" - which relayed a message of total dread and horror that comes from trying to realize the preciousness of life in a world of carnage - laid the groundwork for the movement's message. The paper examines the work of others who identified with this movement, such as writer Filippo Marinetti and artist MarcelDuchamp. The paper also touches on the Dadaism movement which orginated from refugees from WWI Germany and explores the works of several Dadaists, such as artist Jean Arp and historian Hans Richter.
From the Paper "While Dadaism had movements all over the world, it was birthed from refugees of World War I in Zurich. The dehumanizing impact of the industrial age moved into the realm of the absurd during the Great War. No one in Germany escaped the horror of that bloody war unscathed. It was like a self-inflicted plague, not altogether unlike tuberculosis or any other disease, only making less sense. During that war was the first time that the modern implements of fighting came into use on the battlefield, and the soldier in the trenches achieved a new level of insignificance. They became canon fodder, with death often time coming from hidden mines, distant snipers, from big guns and airplanes that could only be heard and not seen. The carnage of the war and the desperation that followed clearly marked the souls of these artists. Painting landscapes made no sense in that context."
Abstract Describes the artist's performance of Rrose Selavy. The Rrose persona. Its network of meanings. Relationship of Rrose to DuChamp's readymades. Commodity aspect of readymades. Postmodernism. Visual portrayal of women. Boundaries of sexual differences. History and ideas of assisted and semi-readymades. Notion of artistic function. Cites specific examples.
From the Paper "Marcel Duchamp's project is as complex, ambiguous, and rich as anything undertaken by any artist of the twentieth century. One of the most elaborate networks of meaning started by Duchamp derives from his 'performance' of Rrose Selavy, the female personification first used as a signature, mocked up in a series of posed drag photographs by Man Ray, and then persisting as an alter ego for Duchamp in many subsequent projects. The spectacle of a male artist who adopts a female persona and employs 'her' in the titles of various works, as the 'author' of other pieces, and simply as a sort of working fiction in his life raises questions of many kinds. Certainly the eroticization of the communication between artist and spectator, the performative nature of gender, the nature of the patriarchal art system and art history, and the meaning of authorship of works of art are all implicated in ..."
Abstract Discusses the artwork and its impact. The historical and cultural context of the time it was exhibited. How it was received by critics and the public. How the piece affected and transformed art. The aesthetic significance of the sculpture. Aesthetic example of modern art. Overview of Duchamp's life and avant-garde art.
From the Paper "This research examines Marcel Duchamp's artwork Fountain. The research will set forth the historical and cultural context in which the work first presented and then discuss how it was received, its impact on the history of art, and how it affected and transformed art, including the relevance of art criticism of the work to its aesthetic significance.
No discussion of Duchamp's art would be complete without reference to the sundry trends and styles of modernism and postmodernism. And no account of Duchamp's Fountain can be considered complete that does not include reference to the manner in which his output as a whole both proceeds and departs from various trends. Indeed, the cultural context for the creation of Fountain as a work of modern art is as important to an understanding of it as is the fact of context as an aesthetic ..."
Abstract In a discussion on art theory, this paper examines the historico-temporal conceptual paradigm, which attempts to account for art making practices throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. The paper relates that this is the legacy of "modernism" versus what has come to be known as "postmodernism." The paper also relates that,
the two legacies, however, are intertwined and cannot be separated. Next, the paper identifies and explains the recognizable features of postmodernism, namely, the breaking of restrictive boundaries as seen by MarcelDuchamp's decision to display a urinal in an art gallery, the style of pastiche, and the erasing of boundaries that have traditionally separated high culture from popular culture.
From the Paper "A paradigm can be thought of as a theoretical framework which forms the foundation of critical analysis of a particular work of art. Generally, paradigms consist of a complex web of philosophical principles that define a particular worldview. Paradigms are not always successful in defining and analyzing works of art, however; as the literary critic Frank Kermode once wrote on the subject of paradigms, "If we cannot break free of them, we must make sense of them." Thus, a lot of the thinking on theoretical paradigms is self-reflective; in other words, a work of art may spurn an analysis that causes one to question the nature of the very paradigm being employed to analyze that work."
Abstract The paper discusses modernist architect Marcel Breuer's background and his style of work. The paper relates that Breuer is well known for his emphasis on the technical and structural aspects of his buildings. The paper adds that his architecture is recognized for its attention to light and shading, particularly in the use of tinted or shaded windows and overhanging elements. The paper notes his many accomplishments.
From the Paper "Born in Pecs Hungary in 1902, Marcel Breuer attended university at the newly formed Weimar Bauhaus, attracted to the promises of new architectural and artistic approaches (Marcel Breuer: architect biography, par. 1). He attended the Bauhaus in the early twenties and taught there after finishing his studies. Though the Bauhaus did not yet offer architecture when he began there, Breuer, aided by Georg Muche, began to study housing anyway. He had a particular interest in high-rise structures and soon after developed a seven-story apartment block that would be mass-produced in the years to come (Marcel Breuer: architect biography, par. 1)."
Abstract Discusses the aesthetic strategies used by both. Examines Seurat's "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jette" and MarcelDuchamp's "Nude Descending a Staircase," describing Seurat's pointillism style and Duchamps's work in experimental forms.
From the Paper "Seurat's "A Sunday Afternoon On the Island of La Grande Jette" and "Nude Descending a Staircase" by Marcel Duchamp. Among the many art historians and theorists who have made an attempt to determine the means and methods by which the artistic term ..."
Abstract This paper examines modern art's Dadaist movement of early twentieth century. It looks at parallel movements of its time, hand made art and decorative craft objects and the emergence of consumerism. This historical period surrounding World War II, had a wonder for technology in terms of machinery. The author defines the immense influence of the Dadaist on Art and society today.
From the Paper "We all know the story of how Marcel Duchamp took a urinal, called it "Fountain", put it in an art show and then defended his action on the grounds that as he was an artist and he said the urinal was art, then it was.
This is just the sort of thing that has given modern art a bad name. But why should it have? Why should that urinal not be art?"
Tags: tristan, tzara, technology, marcel, duchamp, urinal, fountain, war, materialism, art, world, war, i, hand-made, hand, made, arp, manray
From the Paper "The influence of Marcel Duchamp and Jean Cocteau on the use of the nude as a subject in art falls outside the usual categories of influence. Duchamp's singular experience with his Nude Descending a Staircase (1912) was instrumental in his decision to turn from any conventional type of art career and become the twentieth-century archetype of the anti-artist. Even though the popular 'scandal' surrounding the painting was of a type that would have launched a more typical artistic career, and his intentions with regard to the Nude were somewhat conventional, Duchamp's subsequent path was devoted to the exposure of art's ways and means. The nude, however, was one subject whose dimensions fascinated him and at the end of his career he created the disturbing multimedia work Given: 1. The Waterfall 2. The Illuminating Gas (1946-66) which, in some..."
