I’ve made the pilgrimage to Philadelphia that Duchamp lovers have to do if they want to see his “hidden” masterpiece ?ɂ?tant donn?ɬs. Willed to the Philadelphia Museum of Art after the artist’s death—the museum holds the largest collection of significant Duchamps—the piece was called ?Ǩ?the strangest work of art any museum has ever had in it?Ǩ by Jasper Johns. Although it’s been permanently installed in the museum since 1969—what you see above is behind a closed door—there is a current Duchamp show there running through November and ?ɂ?tant donn?ɬs is the centerpiece:
Tucked away in a dark nook of the Philadelphia Museum of Art?ǨѢs modern and contemporary wing lies one of the most confounding works of art of all time. It is perverse, bizarre, funny, poignant, sad, scary, revealing, literal, and symbolic all at once. And as one might expect, photographs have never done it justice.
Marcel Duchamp?ǨѢs ?ɂ?tant donn?ɬs is radically different from the 20th-century provocateur?ǨѢs previous work (urinal-as-sculpture, a bicycle wheel fastened to the top of a stool, Nude Descending a Staircase). The piece begins with a wooden barn door pierced with two inconspicuous peepholes. For the uninformed or uncurious, that?ǨѢs where it ends (it?ǨѢs not hard to imagine the inner dialogue: ?Ǩ?It?ǨѢs just a door? How ?ǨDuchampian?ǨѢ?Ǩ).
Peer through the holes, however, and you?ǨѢre immediately captivated by the sculptural tableau beyond?Ǩa naked woman seen from the neck down, lying on a bed of twigs with a campy pastoral scene and waterfall visible in the background. The figure?ǨѢs skin is pale but life-like; her legs are splayed, and her bare labia are front and center. There is something that seems victim-like about the figure, her body limp and exposed. However, the woman?ǨѢs left hand suggests something else entirely. It is active, steadily holding up a gas lamp and illuminating the scene.
Marcel Duchamp’s Secret Masterpiece by Rachel Wolff
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Dreams Money Can Buy: Surrealist Feature Film from 1947