Biography of Marcel Duchamp

Nude appearances

28 July 1887
October 2, 1968
Marcel Duchamp was born in Blainville (Rouen, France) on 28 July 1887. Conceptual artist, whereby the artwork must replace the pure aesthetic Act, he began to paint in 15 years, influenced by the impressionist technique. In 1904 he moved to Paris, where he joined the brothers Gaston. He attended the Académie Julian for some time but, bored, abandons her almost immediately. In the years from 1906 to 1910, his works exhibit different characters from time to time in relation to the influences of the moment: first of Manet, Bonnard and Vuillard, then emotionalism and ending with Fauvism.
In 1910 after seeing for the first time the works of Paul Cézanne, abandoning Impressionism and Bonnard. For a year, Cezanne and Fauvism are its stylistic connections. But everything is meant to be a short. In the years 1911 and 1912 he painted all his most important paintings: boy and girl in spring, sad young man on the train, Nu descendant un escalier n° 2, the King and Queen surrounded by swift nudes, the passage of the Virgin to the bride. In 1913, the Armory Show in New York, Nu descendant un escalier n° 2 is the work that elicits greater scandal. Exhausted exploratory possibilities with painting, began work on the large glass. The work includes a collection of graphics on glass plates and metal and is full of unconscious and alchemical symbolism. Its meaning is not easily decipherable, but can be considered a global, ironic claim, both of painting, or more generally of human existence. The first are "ready-made", everyday objects with artistic status, including the famous bicycle wheel. The following year buys and signs the everyday bottle.
In 1915 he moved to New York where he begins the great friendship with Walter and Louise Arensberg. Consolidating its contacts with Francis Picabia and Man Ray knows. He continued his studies to complete Mariée mise à nu par ses Célibataires, meme (1915-1923), which will never lead to the end. In 1917 makes the famous Fountain, which is rejected by the jury of the Society of Independent Artists. He travels first to Buenos Aires, then in Paris, where he meets all major environmental esposnenti Dadaist, that in a few years will give life to surrealism. In 1920 he was back in New York. Together with Man Ray and Katherine Dreier founded the Société Anonyme. Takes on the pseudonym Rose Sélavy. Engages with experimental photography and feature films and produces the first "optical discs" and "optical machines". In 1923 he begins to devote themselves professionally to the game of chess and almost completely abandoned the artistic activity. Only realization is the film Anémic Cinéma. Incorporates artistic activity only in 1936, when he participates in the exhibitions of the surrealist group in London and New York.
Begins to design the Boite en válise, a portable collection of reproductions of his most significant works. Surprised in France since the outbreak of the war in 1942 embarks for the United States. Here he devoted himself mainly to his last major work, Étant donneés: 1. la chute d'Eau, 2. le gaz d ' éclairage (1946-1966). Participates in exhibitions and organises and sets up in turn. In 1954 he dies his friend Walter Arensberg, and his collection was donated to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Part of ben 43 works of Duchamp, including most of the major works. In 1964, on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the first "Readymade", in collaboration with Arturo Schwarz, produces an Edition numbered and signed its most representative 14 Readymade. Marcel Duchamp died in Neuilly-sur-Seine on October 2, 1968.
Article contributed by the team of collaborators.