perhaps it means simply in allegorical terms that having acquired or consummated ‘opposites’ the life spirit continues on through a new cycle eternally in Nature.

If duchamp is seen as a kind of platonist things start to make sense it seems.

I enjoyed reading about your adventure and take on Etant Donnes. One thing that caught my attention was the question of where the viewer “is” when looking through the door peepholes. There are many examples in Duchamp’s work that relate in one way or another to architecture: doors, and windows in particular. Its as if he had constructed a sort of mental “house”. I have always been surprised not to have found any mention in the multitude of books on the artist that the Large Glass resembles a double-hung window. If one wants some fresh air one “cracks a window”.

The souped up window of The Brawl at Austerlitz seems to place the viewer on the “outside” of a building. THe window knobs of Fresh Widow seem to indicate that the viewer is “inside”. The door of Etant Donnes was imported from Spain, as you mention (Duchamp lived part of the year there). It reminds me of doors of Mexican haciendas that open onto a court yard that is surrounded by the home. If this is the a similar situation the viewer is on the “outside” – on the sidewalk/street looking onto another exterior within. Of course, in reality, this ‘outside” is within a museum. This is not to far removed from looking at at a diorama of some scene/event in a history museum. The suspension of disbelief, etc. And their is no hacienda as perhaps the “house” does reside in the mind.

Last week I had the chance to see Etant Donnes for the third time. Of course there is nothing that can equal the impact of one’s first viewing.
I have to admit that I was dismayed to see the nude falling into bad condition. Since seeing it four years ago a vertical crack on the thigh of the left out stretched leg is very plain to see. A smaller crack on the stomach is distracting as well. Needless to say, this can only lead to breaking the spell of the incredible illusion that Duchamp developed. In any case it is a given the multitude of interpretations of Etant Donnes will not abate anytime soon. My own take is that it is in the broadest sense is that it is about, or for, Freedom. The lantern held high refutes whatever events, violent or not, led the nude to recline so in that tangle of brush. Freedom is something that Duchampp embraced all his life in one form or another.

Thank you for plodding through this rambling.

Best wishes -

Kurt Godwin

Yes. I did think about helping them, about showing them what wonderful things lay behind a closed door. But I am a teacher, and I know that, when I enthusiastically tell my students to look at so and so, they don’t do it or think “what’s the fuss about”. Of course, there are one or two exceptions but it’s generally the rule. I now tend to ask them to tell me what fascinates them and it works better for their learning.

I feared that, if I showed them, I would take away from Duchamp’s piece, from the encounter (mine as much as theirs). And it was difficult. I smiled to a couple of people as if I was going to start speaking, and then didn’t. They must have thought I was a right weirdo.

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if I may venture to say so, it was not only luck. You say you took pleasure in watching people leaving after failing to find it – I wondered why you had not helped them…

The door itself is extraordinary! I believe Duchamp fell in love with that door, which he found near Cadaqués (Dali’s home) and had it shipped to the US.

I think people do pilgrimages, and Bilbao is a good example of that. They are not about art, though, but architecture, which has become one of the primary aesthetic expressions of society. Every city wants their flagship building and people travel to see them (there’s no way around it!). But the art? Believe me, not very good in Bilbao… There is something magical about pieces that are displayed in optimum conditions, like Van Gogh’s sunflowers at the National Gallery in London, or, to a certain extent, the Mona Lisa at the Louvre. With Duchamp, though, I was lucky enough to be alone…

I think people do make art pilgrimages. To visit museums, certainly, Bilbao is a good example.