Duchamp News and Notes
CSUEB News Release May 2001
An exhibition of the work of MARCEL DUCHAMP is being presented for the first time in Northern California at the center of a Duchamp Festival at California State University, East Bay, October 20, 2001 - February 20, 2002. This is a rare opportunity to see the remarkable work of the "most influential artist of the century," and explore his profound message of Androgyny - true male/female balance.
For many years Picasso and Matisse were considered the most influential artists of the 20th century. That evaluation has changed. Now, Marcel Duchamp is widely considered the most influential artist of the 20th century. How he came to occupy this position is a long rich story much of which will be "told" in the CSUEB Art Gallery and celebrated around the campus in a festival of art, music, dance, & drama.
THE MAN & HIS ART
According to Lanier Graham, the Gallery's Director, "Duchamp is often thought of as the 'Daddy of Dada', as it developed during World War I, and as the 'Grandpa of Pop', as Pop Art developed during the 1950s & '60s, as well as the 'Conceiver of Conceptual Art'. But he was a great deal more. With remarkable spontaneity and seemingly effortless ease, he put forth a lifelong series of revolutionary objects and attitudes including a remarkable nonattachment to fame or fortune. His modesty astonished everyone who knew him, while his fertile ideas have inspired countless artists. Duchamp's influence, which started during the period of Dada & Surrealism, continued to grow during the Abstract Expressionist era of Pollock and de Kooning and the Neo-Dada era of Johns and Rauschenberg. His influence continues to expand in the ever widening waves of Postmodernism today.
"He gave new status to artists by saying art is whatever the artist says isart, not what critics say art is. Many critics still hate him for that. In a world that had come to rely too much on reason, he emphasized the intuitive side of our brain by his explorations of chance and open-endedness, an open-endedness that said the viewer is the co-creator of every work of art. In short, he democratized art in a new way.
"Duchamp also was fascinated by science, especially electromagnetism. What electromagnetic energy is, and how it moves through our bodies and throughout the universe as a whole, occupied much of his thinking. Any number of his works bring together left-brain science with right-brain visualizations. In his famous work, "The Large Glass", the Bride and the Bachelors are divided and never touch, yet they are connected by "wireless" energy. He later used telephone lines to symbolize this flowing of love-energy back and forth, and reminded us that people, not communication systems, are the real 'media.'
"He grew tired of art that appeals only to the eye, and worked to elevate contemporary art above the merely visual and physical to the level of the metaphysical. His philosophical statements are among the most profound in the history of art. By using a good many words with his images, and by leaving meanings open-ended, he required that we think and feel at the same time. There was method to his madness. He based much of his work on the metaphysical ideal of Androgyny (true male-female balance) both in psychology and sociology. That earned him the rare respect of feminist art historians. Bringing together within ourselves the so-called 'male' capacity to be rational and the so-called 'female' capacity to be intuitive is the perennial goal of the great Wisdom Paths: Shamanism, Taoism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. This dynamic harmony is said to be the key to Enlightenment.
"Enlightenment became the supreme goal of Modern artists in their non-religious quest for wholeness, their secular search for the sacred. However, few were able to attain this ideal. Various kinds of self-centeredness got in the way. Duchamp was not without shortcomings and may not have attained total selflessness, but he seems to have come closer than most.
"In place of the usual (and often egocentric) insistence on self-expression, Duchamp pointed out that self-centeredness can be removed from the artistic process. In his 'ready-mades' (anonymous manufactured objects he selected and signed), he generated the idea of art-without-artists, and thus opened even further the opportunity for image-making to everyone. Selecting, he said, is a creative act. Moreover, by often replicating his earlier works, the concept of self moved even further away from the object and opened out toward the not-self. The unification of self and not-self is the ultimate aim of traditional metaphysical philosophy.
"However, he never lost respect for well-crafted quality. His every object was made with loving care, as were his relationships with others. Duchamp celebrated human nature in general and the erotic impulse in particular, advising above all loving and being loved. He also thought of the connection between art and life as a kind of oneness. And all along the way, he recommended laughter."
THE FESTIVAL: ART, MUSIC, DANCE, & DRAMA
The CSUEB Duchamp Festival, "MARCEL DUCHAMP & THE ART OF LIFE," based primarily on California collections and California scholarship, will include a wide variety of experiences that reflect the many sides of Duchamp. In the University Art Gallery "MARCEL DUCHAMP: ARTIST, HUMORIST, PHILOSPHER" will be a concise but comprehensive selection of his visual work on loan from major California museums such as the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, as well as from private collectors in the San Francisco Bay Area. This will be the first large-scale Duchamp exhibition in Northern California, and the most comprehensive Duchamp exhibition in California since his first museum retrospective in Pasadena in 1963.
The University Art Gallery also has organized a Symposium featuring recent Duchamp research by scholars from the San Francisco Bay Area. Included will be Wanda Corn, Professor of Art History at Stanford University, speaking on "Duchamp & Early American Modernism"; James Housefield, formerly of CSUEB and now at Southwest Texas State University, speaking on "Duchamp & Leonardo da Vinci"; and Lanier Graham, Director of the University Art Gallery at CSUEB, speaking on "Duchamp & Androgyny", a paper that will include parts of Graham's conversations with Duchamp when they played chess together in the 1960s. Aspects of the theme of Androgyny, which is central to understanding Duchamp's work as a whole, will be highlighted throughout the exhibition.
The exhibition catalogue is being being edited by Lanier Graham. He is well known in Duchamp circles for his book CHESS SETS (1968), which was assisted by Duchamp and dedicated to Duchamp, and for IMPOSSIBLE REALITIES: MARCEL DUCHAMP & THE SURREALIST TRADITION, the exhibition he curated in 1991 at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena. He also has written a book called DUCHAMP & ANDROGYNY which will soon be published.
Plays, dances, and music were important to Duchamp, from his earliest years to his later years when he was involved with John Cage (who was strongly influenced by Duchamp's work), and Merce Cunningham whose dancers still dance around inflatable Duchampian objects which were designed by Jasper Johns after Duchamp's "Large Glass." Duchamp himself participated in a number of performance pieces. Some of those, captured on film, will be presented in the CSUEB Multimedia Gallery including Rene Clair's ENTR' ACTE, starring Duchamp and Man Ray, Hans Richter's 8 X 8 (A CHESS SONATA IN 8 MOVEMENTS), featuring Calder, Duchamp, Ernst, and Tanguy, as well as Jacqueline Matisse (Duchamp's stepdaughter), and MARCEL DUCHAMP: IN HIS OWN WORDS by Lewis Jacobs.
In celebration of these aspects of Duchamp's spirit, the CSUEB Department of Theater & Dance is performing one of Duchamp's favorite plays, UBU ROI, directed by Edgardo de la Cruz, and presenting a new Duchampian dance on the theme of chess, under the supervision of Laura Renaud-Wilson, who studied with Cunningham. Scot Gresham-Lancaster, who worked with John Cage, is planning to present 'music' by Duchamp. Forensics will conduct a debate on the topic of "Is Duchamp the most influential artist of the 20th century?" The University Library will present an exhibition of post-Duchampian artists books.
Duchamp authorities from coast to coast are praising the concept and contentof the CSUEB Festival, both for its breadth and its depth. Among those lookingforward to the festival are Bonnie Clearwater, editor of WEST COAST DUCHAMP, Linda D. Henderson of the University of Texas at Austin, author of DUCHAMP IN CONTEXT: SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY IN THE "LARGE GLASS," Francis M. Naumann of New York, author of MARCEL DUCHAMP: THE ART OF MAKING ART IN THE AGE OF MECHANICAL REPRODUCTION, Moira Roth of Mills College in Oakland, author of DIFFERENCE/INDIFFERENCE: MUSINGS ON POSTMODERNISM, MARCEL DUCHAMP AND JOHN CAGE, Michael Taylor, Curator of Modern & Contemporary Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, who is responsible for the most important collection of Duchamp's work.
Announcement of the Duchamp Festival is featured as a special December 2000 news item at www.toutfait.com - THE MARCEL DUCHAMP STUDIES ONLINE JOURNAL, one of the most respected websites in the scholarly world. For further information, contact Diane Daniel, CLASS Publicist at (510) 885-3183, or diane.daniel@@csueastbay.edu
FEB. 1, 2001, PIONEER Newspaper CSU Gallery Preparing Marcel Duchamp Exhibit
By Marie SantosStaff Writer
Last year, Cal State East Bay saw gallery director Lanier Graham accomplish the notable feat of securing the loan of outstanding works tomount an exhibit on the legendary Andy Warhol. This year, in the fall, Graham, at the suggestion of Arts Marketing Director Sylvia Medeiros, will present "Marcel Duchamp and the Art of Life," a festival celebrating one of the most influential artists of the 20th century. Duchamp, who is often referred to as the "Daddy of Dada" as well as the "conceiver of conceptual art," became famous after the 1913 exhibition of modern art in New York City. nAt this exhibit, Duchamp received notice for his nowlegendary painting, "Nude Descending a Staircase #2." Duchamp delighted others by creating art that was not only pleasing to the eye but thought-provoking as well. "He (Duchamp) forces you to examine that object in front of you," said David King, CSUEB assistant gallery director. "He exposes people to things that they might not be exposed to otherwise." According to Graham, Duchamp, who was noted for his modesty, simplicity and his avid love for playing chess, gave the world new ways of looking at "what art is" and lifted art "from the nearly visual to the philosophical." Duchamp inspired many artists, including Jackson Pollock and Willem De Kooning. Although his work motivated many artists to create art beyond the norm, Duchamp also stirred distaste from critics who objected to his way of thinking. "He gave new status to artists by saying art is whatever the artist says is art," said Graham, "not what critics say art is." By showing us the man behind the art, Graham hopes to introduce younger generations to the "magic and mystery of this man". Toni Borris, president of Cal State East Bay's Friends of Arts, is excited about the festival, saying that Duchamp was a "unique character who didn't appeal to everybody, yet challenged people's imagination." The Warhol exhibit brought many visitors to the campus gallery, and the Duchamp exhibit is expected to do the same. According to Graham, it will be the first large-scale Duchamp exhibition in Northern California since 1963. In three years of preparation for the event, Graham has arranged to borrow Duchamp works from major museums such as the Norton Museum in Pasadena, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, as well as from private collectors in the San Francisco Bay Area. Along with a gallery exhibit of Duchamp's work, the festival willalso include performances by the CSUEB Department of Theatre and Dance, CSUEB musicians, and a presentation by the library of artists' books inspired by Duchamp.
JULY 5, 2001 PIONEER Duchamp Festival To Celebrate 'Art of Life'
By Amy DoanStaff Writer
"Warm, wonderful and wise" is how University Art Gallery Lanier Graham remembers Marcel Duchamp, the focus of next fall's "Marcel Duchamp and the Art of Life" festival. Duchamp, a French artist who died in 1968 at the age of 81, "gave new status to artists by saying art is whatever the artist says is art, not what critics say art is," said Graham. As a former curator at New York's Museum of Modern Art, Graham met Duchamp in the late 1960s. "I was writing a book about chess sets," he recalls. "I knew thatm Duchamp's fellow artists designed chess sets." The two were introduced by MOMA's founding director, Alfred Barr, and Graham was immediately impressed by the artist. "He was this big artist, and I was a young kid," he said. "He was a beautiful human being. "Lots of influential artists aren't beautiful human beings. Picasso,for instance, was a schmuck and a nasty guy." Graham dedicated his book, "Chess Sets," to Duchamp in 1968. "Duchamp was generous, supportive, gentle, and encouraged everyone to be more creative, loving and funny," Graham said. "He was always cracking jokes and full of kindness, but never forced himself on anybody.
"His work is fascinating and contains metaphors for very importantphilosophical ideas about reality and being alive. "It was the combination of all those things that make him important to me. And no other artist stimulates so much interest from my art history students." Duchamp was an extremely diverse artist, dabbling in painting, poetry, drama and dance. He is best known for his 1912 painting, "Nude Descending a Staircase," but stopped painting early in his career. "His artwork became more esoteric and complex," said Sylvia Medeiros, Cal State East Bay's arts marketing coordinator. "He moved away from the concept of painting and sculptures as being art." In 1917, Duchamp entered a signed urinal in a juried exhibition called "The Independent" which sought unique views on art. The entry was rejected. "The Duchamp Festival" will celebrate the totality of his artistic interests and depth," said Graham.
Graham spent several years applying for grants from foundations and individuals and asking curators from around the country to lend pieces for the exhibit. Some of Duchamp's most famous works will be on display in the University Art Gallery in an exhibition entitled "Marcel Duchamp: Artist, Humorist, Philosopher." The University's Department of Theater and Dance will produce "UBU ROI," Duchamp's favorite play. The Department of Music will perform compositions by Duchamp and John Cage, accompanying chess themed Duchampian dance. A Symposium will feature Duchamp scholars from the Bay Area. Included will be Wanda Corn, professor of Art History at Stanford University; James Housefield of Southwest Texas State University and formerly of CSUEB; James McManus, professor of Art History at Cal State Chico; and Kenneth Baker, chief art critic of the San Francisco Chronicle.
Graham will also be a featured speaker, discussing themes from his soon-to-be-complete book, "Duchamp and Androgyny." The book, which Graham has been working on for the past 30 years, is based on conversations he had with Duchamp during their chess games According to Graham, Duchamp saw androgyny as "the ideal of psychological wholeness. It refers to a high state of consciousness in which a person has integrated the male capacity to be rational and the female capacity to be intuitive. It has nothing to do with sexuality." Graham noted that Duchamp's famous "Mona Lisa with a Mustache" is a humorous example of androgyny. "Enlightenment is sometimes considered being able to balance the male and female traits," he added.
A forensics team will debate the question, "Is Marcel Duchamp the mostinfluential artist of the 20th century?" Kirk LeClaire's Creative Process students for the fall quarter will submit work for a student exhibition on the theme of chess. "I think it's really wonderful that all the art departments are collaborating on this," said Graham. "I hope we can continue to do more of that."
The Duchamp Festival opens with a reception hosted by Friends of the Arts on Friday, Oct. 19, from 5 to 7 p.m. in the University Art Gallery. The exhibition will run from Oct. 20, 2001, through Feb. 20, 2002. Persons wishing more information may call (510) 885-3299.
Marcel Duchamp BICYCLE WHEEL, 1913(later replica of his first "ready-made")Duchamp's Works copyright 2001 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris, Estate of Marcel Duchamp
RROSE SELAVY (Alias Marcel Duchamp). 1021. Photograph by Man Ray. Art Direction by Marcel Duchamp. Silver Print. 5-7/8" x 3"-7/8" Collection: Philadelphia Museum of Art. Duchamp's Works copyright 2001 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris, Estate of Marcel Duchamp