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I think how much hatred and revulsion I feel looking at this is the brilliance here.
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this post was submitted on 30 May 2025
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Traditional Art
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When you say modified it, you mean he rotated it and signed it with a marker?
I can understand that it is influential due to subverting the norm and because we are having this conversation about it. To me, it loses something when it can literally just be replaced by anything similar. Example, that banana on a wall that sold for millions. There are 8 copies of "Fountain" and all are considered original. People piss in it and also unironically call that art.
I tend to agree with Greyson Perry on the matter - "I find it quite arrogant, that idea of just pointing at something and saying 'That's art.'"
There aren't 8 copies. There are hundreds. Those are just the full sized ones Duchamp made, and most he did make them from fiber glass, glazed ceramic and other materials, not store bought. There are dozens of miniatures, interventions and reinterpretations in dozens of different materials and finishes. Paintings, abstracts, photographs, deconstructions, etc.
I do agree that just pointing at something and saying that's art doesn't make it art. But Fountain is categorically not that.
Well I wouldn't say categorically, as otherwise there wouldn't still be discussions like this!
Though I take your points and there is certainly something to be said about the actual production of such items. I was speaking mainly on Winerack as I know that was a "readymade" but didn't know much about Fountain before today and it certainly is interesting reading. I was under the impression that they were also simply porcelain urinals bought as is.
It doesn't matter if it was readymade or not. Only the original urinal was bought from a hardware store. The point that Duchamp is trying to convey—and I would think it is similar with Winerack and Banana duct-taped to a wall—is that art is not the object itself. It is not pointing at an object and saying “that's art”. The point is that art is what the artist makes, takes, extracts, transforms, then presents, in such a way that says or conveys a meaning to other people. An urinal, a winerack, a banana, a pile of garbage, 175 pounds of candy, a hat rack, or a spade, ordinary objects devoid of context say nothing until a person takes them and manipulates them into something that makes the object scream “look at me! now think about it”. It is the artist's choices, human intention and action, that imbues objects with meaning and turn them into art. Often times the presentation is not accidental, but it was the result of thinking long and hard about how to best communicate the point the artists wants to make. The urinal could've been presented in its ordinary day-to-day form, but the orientation, the graffiti, the pieces that were removed that come with urinals, even the height at which it is supposed to be presented are intentional. The art is not the object, but the choices made by the artist.