Marcel Duchamp
Early Life
Marcel Duchamp was born on July 28, 1887, in Blainville-Crevon, a small town in the Normandy region of France. He was the third of six children born to Eugene and Lucie Duchamp. His father was a successful notary, and his mother was a painter who encouraged her children's artistic pursuits. Duchamp's siblings, Raymond Duchamp-Villon, Suzanne Duchamp, and Jacques Villon, were also artists.
Education and Early Career
Duchamp began his formal art education at the age of 14, attending the Lycee Pierre-Corneille in Rouen, France. He later studied painting at the Academie Julian in Paris. Duchamp's early work was influenced by Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painters, but he soon developed his unique style that would come to define his career.
In 1908, Duchamp joined the Puteaux Group, a collective of artists and writers associated with the Cubist movement. Duchamp's work during this period was marked by a shift towards abstraction and a rejection of traditional artistic conventions. His painting "Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2" (1912) is considered a landmark work of the Cubist movement.
Dadaism and Readymades
In the 1910s, Duchamp moved to New York and became involved with the Dada movement, a radical art movement that rejected traditional aesthetics and embraced absurdity and irrationality. Duchamp's contribution to Dada was his concept of the "readymade," an ordinary object that the artist selected and designated as art. His most famous readymade, "Fountain" (1917), a urinal signed with the pseudonym "R. Mutt," challenged traditional notions of art and authorship.
Later Career and Legacy
In the 1920s, Duchamp largely withdrew from the art world, focusing instead on chess, which he considered an art form in itself. Despite his withdrawal, Duchamp's influence on the art world continued to grow. His readymades and his ideas about art's relationship to the viewer laid the groundwork for movements like Pop Art and Conceptual Art.
Duchamp died in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, on October 2, 1968. His legacy continues to be felt in the art world today, with many artists citing him as a major influence.