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In 1917 Marcel Duchamp bought a mass-produced urinal, signed it 'R. Mutt 1917', called it Fountain and submitted it to a New York exhibition that promised to show any work whose artist paid the fee. The organisers refused to display it. The original was lost; a photograph by Alfred Stieglitz records it.

Marcel Duchamp

Art

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The exhibition was run by the Society of Independent Artists, whose motto was 'no jury, no prizes'. Its board decided the urinal was not art, and Duchamp, himself a board member, resigned. Since 1913 he had been presenting ordinary manufactured objects as art, starting with a bicycle wheel mounted on a stool, and by 1915 he called them 'readymades'. In the small magazine The Blind Man, he and two friends argued that what mattered was the artist's choice, not his handiwork. A 1917 letter in which Duchamp told his sister that a female friend had sent in the urinal has led some historians to credit the artist Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven; most museums still credit Duchamp. In 2004, 500 art-world professionals voted Fountain the most influential artwork of the 20th century.

Türkçe oku
Marcel Duchamp 1917'de seri üretim bir pisuar satın aldı, üzerine “R. Mutt 1917” yazdı, adını Fountain (Çeşme) koydu ve ücretini ödeyen her sanatçının eserini sergileyeceğini söyleyen bir New York sergisine gönderdi. Düzenleyiciler eseri sergilemedi. Asıl pisuar kayboldu; onu bugün Alfred Stieglitz'in çektiği bir fotoğraftan biliyoruz.

Sergiyi, sloganı “jüri yok, ödül yok” olan Bağımsız Sanatçılar Derneği düzenliyordu. Derneğin yönetim kurulu pisuarın sanat olmadığına karar verdi; kurulda kendisi de bulunan Duchamp istifa etti. Duchamp 1913'ten beri sıradan fabrika ürünlerini sanat eseri olarak sunuyordu; ilki bir tabureye takılmış bisiklet tekerleğiydi ve 1915'te bunlara “hazır nesne” (readymade) demeye başladı. İki arkadaşıyla çıkardığı küçük The Blind Man dergisinde, önemli olanın sanatçının elinin emeği değil, seçimi olduğunu savundu. Duchamp'ın 1917'de kız kardeşine yazdığı ve pisuarı bir kadın arkadaşının gönderdiğini söylediği bir mektup, bazı tarihçileri eseri sanatçı Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven'a atfetmeye yöneltti; müzelerin çoğu ise hâlâ Duchamp'ı sahibi olarak gösteriyor. 2004'te 500 sanat profesyoneli Fountain'ı 20. yüzyılın en etkili sanat eseri seçti.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Fountain (Duchamp)
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