More about Duchamp's wordplay

Author(s)

  • Bert Jansen

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18352/relief.924

Keywords:

Wordplay, mètre pliant, read-y made, camouflage clothing, Hérisson cascades, lavabo

Abstract

Given Duchamp’s lifelong passion for wordplay, as is already manifested in his early humoristic drawings, I take this love as a decisive factor in the way he “found” his readymades. Another factor I find in articles and illustrations in popular magazines of the time that provide a context in which his works originated. My attempts to reconstruct this context result in another view on the nature of Duchamp’s artistic calling than the still prevailing views of the conceptual 60ties and 70ties and the postmodern 80ties.


Author Biography

  • Bert Jansen
    Bert Jansen (1946, Beek) graduated 1984 in History of Art at the Free University, Amsterdam with a thesis on Nouveau Réalisme and Martial Raysse. In 2015 he obtained his PhD at Leyden University with the thesis ‘Chacun son Marcel‘? Meerduidigheid in het werk van Marcel Duchamp [Ambiguity in the work of Marcel Duchamp].  He wrote numerous articles in catalogues, periodicals en Het Financieele Dagblad and curated several exhibitions, among which in 2013-2014 at the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen  ’Marcel Duchamp, kunstenaar-knutselaar, an artist-anartist’.

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Published

2016-06-21

Issue

Section

Articles - thematic dossier

How to Cite

“More about Duchamp’s wordplay” (2016) RELIEF - REVUE ÉLECTRONIQUE DE LITTÉRATURE FRANÇAISE, 10(1), pp. 30–69. doi:10.18352/relief.924.