Once upon a time, there was a urinal...

After Gustave Courbet¹, but in a more radical manner, another French artist decided, just about a century ago, to ask a simple question both to his peers and to the then authorities on art: what is art?

He did this without giving a speech and, at first, without revealing his identity. He just sent to the Salon des indépendants in New York (1917) a manufactured object purchased in a Parisian department store which he left untouched, merely giving it a title (Fontaine) and signing it under someone else’s name (R. Mutt). He proceeded as for a painting, i.e. handwriting on the object itself. Therefore, this artist was not offering anything to be seen or discovered, in the retinal and didactic sense of these two words.

He limited his ‘work’ to the choice of a very ordinary object which he transformed without tampering with it. He just signed it and decided to exhibit it in an ‘artistic’ place, under the authority of a scholarly jury presumably capable of telling the difference between art and non-art.

By choosing to exhibit the manufactured object in such a place, the artist, without a painting or a sculpture, was therefore addressing himself not so much to the public as to the jury – the experts – whose (sought-after) reaction revived the question raised by the artist (since the object was rejected) and, as a result, further increased the fame of its author in the American art circles, once his true identity was revealed².

We are talking, of course, of the very ironical Marcel Duchamp and his famous urinal. The French critic Marc Jimenez specified: ‘The paradox about Fontaine, about this urinal (...) is, undoubtedly, that it landed into the field of art when, in fact, it meant to get out of it’³.

The Duchamp effect

A paradox indeed, since Marcel Duchamp’s influence on artists and critics in the sixties turned out to be considerable, especially in the United States and in France⁴. It went as far as making him the father (something he denied with a smile⁵) of what was to become the ‘contemporary art’ which we can all see nowadays in museums, historical art centres and art fairs – amongst others.

Through this radical gesture addressed to the experts and the art circles of his time, Marcel Duchamp ‘illustrated’ his invention christened way back in 1915 ‘ready-made’, and laid the path for an artistic trend still predominant. Its characteristic is precisely the expression of an idea, a concept, to the detriment of ‘physical’ work resulting into formal creation⁶, or at least without basing the essential part of the work (the very notion which is being questioned) on ‘physical’ work, since that can be done by a different person⁷.

Anyone visiting a museum soon realises that indeed ‘something’ happened from the sixties onward. The intensity of this ‘something’ is very different – despite its importance – from the shock produced by the impressionists’s palette and by the other main trends that followed, gathered under the term ‘modern art’.

No need to look in the rooms devoted to contemporary art⁸. There is nothing or hardly anything to gaze at (something which Marcel Duchamp himself stated about his ready-made works, even though they are on show in museums). The object is there. Recognising it is mainly a cerebral process.

To appreciate his works, you need to ‘find’ or reconstitute the idea of the artist (provided markers are given) from the elements (traces, prints, signs, materials, etc.)⁹ left in a particular order on the walls, the floor or in the space, like a page written in a foreign language you have to learn. You have to perceive his intentions¹⁰, to catch the main thread. Then, like the critics, curators or galleries who made the selection on offer, you have to ask yourself: is it relevant?

This brings you to redefine from a specific example – which contemporary art artists don’t necessarily call ‘work’ anymore, but rather ‘labour’, ‘approach’, ‘proposal’ or ‘experiment’ – the question raised by Marcel Duchamp, especially as every new ‘proposal’ tends to challenge the limit between art and non-art, to ban any rule unrelated to the work in progress¹¹. In fact, this is another of the characteristics of the said contemporary art, and this is also why, when facing it, we are all self-taught, in a way.

Hence the extreme perplexity of the audience and of those artists and intermediaries still attached to ways of expression linked to the material finality of the works and therefore to an history of art which they still regard as valid when judging the artistic production, as well as the personality and experience of the artist.

An audience and some specialists more akin to the poet Rilke¹² than to Duchamp in that respect, if one looks, for example, at the type of relationship Rilke entertained with creation in his Lettres à un jeune poète - to name an artist who lived in Duchamp’s time.

For if this perplex audience agrees, like Courbet (and Rilke), that the rules cannot be dictated by a small group of irremovable experts, or by buyers, it also knows that, without going against them explicitly, artists used to bring about some changes in the (main) rules governing their profession and subjects.

Thanks to their talent and their perception of the world and of life, a perception which cannot be dissociated from their own experience as artists and as human beings (see Rilke), artists used to have an influence on the tastes of the audience (and especially their sponsors) in successive touches, so to speak, without which the history of (non contemporary) art would be awfully banal. Therefore, they transformed the rules without disowning them, thus facilitating the transmission of a forever revised, refined and increased memory and expertise.

When this became impossible, when, after 1850, the academy turned into academicism, artists rebelled – although most were endowed with a solid academic profession – against their conservative peers and middle-class audience, who had sought refuge in the representations of an era they no longer belonged to.

Stepping back in time?

But the problem nowadays is that the contemporary art crowned by institutions, the media and the international market, that very own art which is supposed to be accessible to most and associated with ‘true’ life¹³, suffers from a lack of audience. Much more so than before, considering the progress made in education since the days of the impressionists¹⁴.

There are, of course, some buyers and visitors who make a success of contemporary art. Gigantic and costly museums are built, always with the same commendable purpose: making our contemporaries discover the art of their time. Nowadays, any town wanting to be better known by the public, the media and tourists must have ‘its’ contemporary art museum¹⁵. And yet, how many visitors come in the end?

Something quite paradoxical too. The more you exhibit contemporary art, the more it becomes obvious, since the same artists are on show here and there¹⁶. But are they truly the only ones worthy of interest?

Have they not rather been picked out (something certainly honourable but not necessarily unquestionable) by a main network of art galleries, curators, media, critics, fairs, all taking concerted action¹⁷ in France, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, the United States, Great Britain, etc.

Besides, although it claims to be part of our daily life, of ‘real’ life, what does contemporary art tell us about our existence and the world we live in? Not much, if the audience doesn’t understand it¹⁸. And what of those who do?

When considering works which (sometimes rightly) ‘attack’ the art and money circles but which are shown and bought by these very circles, what must we think, for example, of their relevance? And what credit must we give to the artists who accept money from those who represent the circles they criticise? Here are some questions of interest to the audience who understands contemporary art.

Let us remember that when an artist is highly rated on the international market, the price of his works can soon cause incomprehension among the audience actively involved in contemporary art circles, something unknown to writers or film makers, since the price of a book or a cinema ticket is the same for everyone and quite affordable. Certainly more affordable than the prices paid by millionaires like François Pinault or Bernard Arnault for works whose purchase makes the market rise¹⁹.

This is not art

Sometimes, words alone cannot express what makes a work of art unique. Even among connoisseurs. Speaking of ‘quality’ in art is dangerous. Misunderstandings are never cleared up. We all have our own opinion about it, starting from those who state ‘this is not art’. And depending on your interlocutor and how learned you are on the subject, a tribunal of experts – like the scholarly jury challenged by Duchamp – will rule: you are a square, an ignorant, a fascist, a reactionary, an avant-gardist, a fraud, a snob, a trendy guy, a connoisseur... and there will ensue a dialogue, an argument or a silence!

For there is a history of art (of the styles) which can ‘explain’ art to us, starting from Lascaux. And a history of contemporary art to ‘explain’ (but without stepping back or returning to the past) the art of our time. Joining both is difficult, not to say impossible. The fine arts of yesteryear cannot be compared to current visual arts – even the terms are different, to suit the new and/or mixed techniques invading the artistic field²⁰.

It is therefore truly difficult, after the ‘urinal’, to decide alone how justifiable the art of our time is. Keeping in touch, reading books, going to exhibitions does help, but is it enough?

Expertise is sovereign, yet we already know that it gets things wrong. This was admitted by a representative of the merchant sector in Switzerland, Peter Bläuer, patron of the Basle contemporary art fair, Liste: ‘We are well aware that Art Basel or Liste make a census of galleries and artists who will not be heard of again in ten years time. At present, there are as many artists as grains of sand on the beach. Even I, an art historian, feel at a loss. I sometimes think that a particular artist is of no interest, and then a year later I revise my judgement. Many of them are serious, but many of them play at being ‘trendy’ too. All in all, fairs are snapshots of an era.’ (Journal des arts, 9/22 June 2006).

A provisional expertise

The situation is not new. Here, at WHO’S WHO IN INTERNATIONAL ART, we have often talked about it. But, due to the increasing amount of peremptory opinions about art these days, including among artists, we felt it right to come back for a while to the question raised by Marcel Duchamp and the effects it produced, without forgetting that, whether you like or not, any answer remains quite provisional.

This is why the expertise we support is that which takes into consideration the path of the artist as much as the works produced at a given point of it. Without trying to compare paths between themselves or with the current norms which rule the art market and the institutions.

In other words, the main thread of ‘our’ expertise – and therefore of the criteria used to introduce the following 152 artists²¹ (as opposed to 146 in 2006), originating from 22 countries – lies entirely in a reconstitution centred around the intentions and experiences of the artists, within the different artistic fields they either explore or refer to explicitly.

It is then up to you, the audience, buyers and intermediaries to proceed to ‘your’ evaluation, depending on your own interests and experiences.

Enjoy the discoveries and the contacts!

The editorial staff

1 French critic Marc Jimenez: ‘Before Gustave Courbet, a painting was appreciated and judged according to its conformity with the norms and conventions in use. Aesthetic criteria were an integral part of the social, moral or even religious rules which formed a kind of inviolable pact between the artist and the public – the art circles of the time.’ La querelle de l’art contemporain, Gallimard, 2005, p. 51 (Folio essais). Hence this statement by Courbet himself: ‘Once I am dead, people will have to say of me: here was a man who never belonged to any Church, any institution, any academy, and above all any system, except that governed by freedom.’ L’aventure de l’Art au XIXe siècle, under the supervision of Jean-Louis Ferrier, Chêne-Hachette, 1991, p. 653. A freedom which he illustrated through paintings like La Rencontre or Bonjour Monsieur Courbet (1874), or L’origine du monde (1866).

2. Marcel Duchamp’s fame in the United States was due to the scandal – already – caused by the exhibition of his canvas Nu descendant l’escalier in 1913 (rejected by the Salon des Indépendants de Paris a year before).

3. See La querelle de l’art contemporain, op. cit. p. 53.

4. But Marcel Duchamp was first discovered in the United States. His fame in France came much later, not until the sixties.

5. See DVD Collection Artistes, Lapsus, France 5 – Réunion des Musées Nationaux.

6. For André Malraux, for example, an artist was someone who created shapes.

7. Marcel Duchamp: ‘the expression ready-made imposed itself to me (...), it seemed suitable for those things which were not works of art, nor sketches, which did not correspond to any of the standard terms used in artistic circles; the choice of those ready-made items never arose from any aesthetic delight. (...) The ready-made style makes you bring the idea of aesthetic criteria back to a mental choice rather than the capacity or the intelligence of the hand, which I used to criticise in so many painters of my generation (...). It may well be that the ready-made style is the only really important idea to be retained from my works.’ Marcel Duchamp, Marc Partouche, Images en manoeuvres éditions, 1992, p. 48.

8. We are not referring here to the art conceived by living artists but to the expression which designates the ‘true’ art of our time: ‘It (the expression) possesses the qualities of ready-made formulas, being explicit enough for the interlocutor to understand that we are talking of a certain type of art, and not of all the art produced by all the artists who are alive at the moment and therefore contemporary to us.’ L’art contemporain, Catherine Millet, Flammarion, 2006, p. 7.

9. One no longer represents. One presents. What is the point of painting an object, a body or an interior if they can actually be displayed. Without any intermediary.

10. ‘If there are no criteria, there are still some parameters which enable you to evaluate a work, for example, a definite coherence in the intentions of the artist, in the technical procedures employed, in the specific treatment, sometimes original, given to the materials, a certain logic or rationality in the artistic behaviour, mastery at conducting the project.’ Marc Jimenez, L’esthétique contemporaine, Klincksieck, 1999, p. 82.

11. ‘It is the works of art which generate the criteria and not the other way round.’ Marc Jimenez, op.cit. p. 274

12. ‘A work of art is good when it was born out of necessity. The nature of its origin is its judge. This is why, dear Sir, I have found myself unable to give you any other advice than this one: inspect yourself, search the depths where your life takes its source. That is where you will find the answer to the question: must you create. Catch the sound of this answer without forcing a meaning out of it. The outcome may be that Art is calling you. If so, accept this destiny, bear it, with all its weight and dimension, without ever demanding a reward which could come from outside. A creator must be a whole universe to himself, he must find everything within himself and within that part of Nature which he has joined.’ Lettres à un jeune poète, Rainer-Maria Rilke, Grasset, 1937, pp. 23-24.

13. German historian Hans Belting: ‘Nowadays artists coincide with historians in revising the role played by art and questioning traditional pretensions on aesthetic autonomy. In the past, artists studied masterpieces at the Louvre. Now, they go to the British Museum to consider the entire history of mankind, to recognise the historicity of past cultures, thus becoming aware of their own historicity. The anthropological aspect takes precedence on the purely aesthetic one. The old antagonism between art and life is fading away because the clear limits which separated art from other visual and linguistic media have disappeared.’ Is the history of art over? Editions Jacqueline Chambon, 1989, p. 5.

14. During the 19th century, the Salon welcomed up to 25,000 visitors. It was a major international event. Its repercussion on the audience and the art circles of the time was even confirmed, in 1878, by painters like Renoir: ‘In Paris, there are barely 15 art lovers able to like a painter without the Salon. There are 80,000 who won’t buy a thing if the painter is not at the Salon.’

15. Such as the recent Vitry-sur-Seine museum, in the Parisian suburbs (in the Val de Marne department).

16. ‘Like international display cabinets accessible to the general public, contemporary art museums all have some very similar collections. Very often, the same artists can be found from one museum to the other.’ Le Monde Diplomatique, Aurélien Gaborit, October 2006, supplement.

17. See Patrick Barrer, Le double jeu du marché de l’art contemporain, Editions Favre, 2004.

18. ‘If spectators are not aware of the artist’s approach, they are likely to feel at a loss in front of the work, if not excluded.’ Nathalie Moureau, Dominique Sagot-Duvauroux, Le marché de l’art contemporain, La Découverte, 2006, p. 38.

19. ‘Millionaires, publicity agents or business men, a selection of ten collectors who call the shots on the market. Between themselves, they beat the largest museums in the world: François Pinault (France), Guy Ullens (Belgium), Eli Broad (the United States), Charles Saatchi (Great Britain), Hans Rasmus Astrup (Norway), Jean Pigozzi (France), Uli Sigg (Switzerland), Friedrich Christian Flick (Germany), Dakis Joannou (Greece), Anton Herbert (Belgium).’ Beaux Arts Magazine, August 2006.

20. Nowadays, artists are asking themselves again what their task is, what the remaining possibilities for media like painting and sculpture are – and they are doing so in the light of the artistic heritage of art. Art historians, for their part, are trying out various ways of telling the history of art, not the history of a successful evolution, but that of solutions, forever new, to the constant problem of what constitutes an ‘image’ and what makes it a convincing vision of ‘reality’ at a given time.’ Hans Belting, op.cit.

21. Without mentioning the selection of historical artists.