Below is a piece called Fountain, which supposedly was actually thought of by Baroness Elsa Von Freytag (more info to come about her)!
Duchamp defied the idea of art being beautiful and only there to appeal to the eye. He took useful objects and removed their use, as you can see above. He called these pieces of artwork 'Readymades'.
Fountain:
This is a urinal that has been turned on its back, and the joke here is that liquid would normally enter this object, but turning it on its back and calling it a fountain means that liquid would be dispensed out of it. Also, some might even say that it looks somewhat like female genitals...and you can work out the links of that yourself!
LHOOQ:
LHOOQ was made from a cheap postcard reproduction of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa onto which Duchamp drew a moustache and beard in pencil and wrote 'L.H.O.O.Q.'. The name is a pun, the letters pronounced in French sound similar to "Elle a chaud au cul" which roughly translates to "She has a hot arse". This is a joke about the rumoured homosexuality of Leonardo da Vinci and how Mona Lisa was thought of as a female version of himself.
Bicycle Wheel:
This piece was made to be spun, which was not the done thing when it came to artwork at the time. Artwork was not meant to be touched or interacted with, but that's what Duchamp wanted to do, he was bending the rules of art (along with the rest of the Dada artists!).
Duchamp encouraged viewers to spin the wheel and once said "To see that wheel turning was very soothing, very comforting...I enjoyed looking at it, just as I enjoy looking at the flames dancing in a fireplace." http://www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/marcel-duchamp-bicycle-wheel-new-york-1951-third-version-after-lost-original-of-1913
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| Fountain |
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| LHOOQ |
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| Bicycle Wheel |
Fountain:
This is a urinal that has been turned on its back, and the joke here is that liquid would normally enter this object, but turning it on its back and calling it a fountain means that liquid would be dispensed out of it. Also, some might even say that it looks somewhat like female genitals...and you can work out the links of that yourself!
LHOOQ:
LHOOQ was made from a cheap postcard reproduction of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa onto which Duchamp drew a moustache and beard in pencil and wrote 'L.H.O.O.Q.'. The name is a pun, the letters pronounced in French sound similar to "Elle a chaud au cul" which roughly translates to "She has a hot arse". This is a joke about the rumoured homosexuality of Leonardo da Vinci and how Mona Lisa was thought of as a female version of himself.
Bicycle Wheel:
This piece was made to be spun, which was not the done thing when it came to artwork at the time. Artwork was not meant to be touched or interacted with, but that's what Duchamp wanted to do, he was bending the rules of art (along with the rest of the Dada artists!).
Duchamp encouraged viewers to spin the wheel and once said "To see that wheel turning was very soothing, very comforting...I enjoyed looking at it, just as I enjoy looking at the flames dancing in a fireplace." http://www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/marcel-duchamp-bicycle-wheel-new-york-1951-third-version-after-lost-original-of-1913
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