Marcel Duchamp quotes

Marcel Duchamp was a French-American artist and influential figure in 20th-century modern art. His work challenged traditional notions of art through provocative concepts like the "readymade." He remains a key inspiration for avant-garde and conceptual artists around the world. Here are 76 of his quotes:

I don't believe in art. I believe in artists.

Marcel Duchamp

I have forced myself to contradict myself in order to avoid conforming to my own tastes.

Marcel Duchamp

I am still a victim of chess. It has all the beauty of art - and much more. It cannot be commercialized. Chess is much purer than art in its social position.

Marcel Duchamp

In French there is an old expression, 'la patte', meaning the artist's touch, his personal style, his 'paw'. I wanted to get away from la patte and all that retinal painting.

Marcel Duchamp

I like living, breathing better than working... my art is that of living. Each second, each breath is a work which is inscribed nowhere, which is neither visual nor cerebral, it's a sort of constant euphoria.

Marcel Duchamp

I wanted to kill art for myself.... a new thought for that object.

Marcel Duchamp

I was interested in ideas - not merely in visual products. I wanted to put painting once again at the service of the mind.

Marcel Duchamp

Chess can be described as the movement of pieces eating one another.

Marcel Duchamp

There is no solution because there is no problem.

Marcel Duchamp

I realized very soon the danger of repeating indiscriminately this form of expression and decided to limit the production of 'ready-mades' to a small number yearly. I was aware at that time, that for the spectator even more than for the artist, art is a habit forming drug and I wanted to protect my 'ready-mades' against such contamination.

Marcel Duchamp

Consequently, in the chain of reactions accompanying the creative act, a link is missing. This gap which represents the inability of the artist to express fully his intention, this difference between what he intended to realize and did realize, is the personal 'art coefficient', contained in the work.

Marcel Duchamp

A point which I want very much to establish is that the choice of these 'Readymade' was never dictated by aesthetic delectation. This choice was based on a reaction of visual indifference with at the same time a total absence of good or bad taste.... in fact a complete anesthesia. One important characteristic was the short sentence which I occasionally inscribed on the 'readymade'. That sentence instead of describing the object like a title was meant to carry the mind of the spectator towards other regions more verbal.

Marcel Duchamp

Another aspect of the 'readymade' is its lack of uniqueness.... the replica of a 'readymade' delivering the same message; in fact nearly every one of the 'ready-made's existing today is not an original in the conventional sense. Since the tubes of paint used by the artist are manufactured and ready made products we must conclude that all the paintings in the world are 'ready-made's aided' and also works of assemblage.

Marcel Duchamp

To be looked at [from the other side of his art-work 'The Glass'] with one eye, close to, for almost an hour.

Marcel Duchamp

This long preamble just to tell you not to judge your own work as you are the last person to see it (with true eyes) – What you see neither redeems nor condemns it – All words used to explain or praise it are false translations of what is going on beyond sensations. You are, as we all are, obsessed by the accumulation of principles or anti-principles which generally cloud your mind with their terminology and, without knowing it, you are a prisoner of what you think is a liberated education – In your particular case, you are certainly the victim of the 'Ecole de Paris' [French abstract art movement which developed after world War 2. ], a joke that's lasted for 60 years.

Marcel Duchamp

.. paint was always [in history of painting] a means to an end, whether the end was religious, social, decorative or romantic. Now it's become an end in itself..

Marcel Duchamp

I have impressed upon you my preoccupation with earning money so as to have a secure existence over there. That's the way it have to be... I am very happy to hear that you [ Walter Pach ] sold these canvasses for me and thank you very sincerely for your friendship. But I am afraid of getting to the stage of needing to sell canvases, In a word, of being a painter for a living. – So I'll be leaving probably on the 22nd or rather 29th May [1915], if the police authorities allow me to take the steamer.

Marcel Duchamp

You [ Katherine Sophie Dreier; director of the Art Center in New York City; she co-founded with Duchamp and Man Ray the 'Sociéte Anonyme' in Manhattan in 1920] must understand: My attitude toward the book is based upon my attitude towards 'Art' since 1918 – so I am furious myself that you will accept only partly that attitude [in a new publication by Katherine Dreier]. It can be no more question of my life as an artist's life: [because] I gave it up ten years ago; this period is long enough to prove that my intention to remain outside of any art manifestation is permanent... The third question is that I want to be alone as much as possible. This abrupt way to speak of my 'hardening process' is not meant to be mean, but is the result of '42 years of age'....10 000 apologies for this rough letter and affectueusement Dee.

Marcel Duchamp

The creative act is not performed by the artist alone; the spectator brings the work in contact with the external world by deciphering and interpreting its inner qualifications and thus adds his contribution to the creative act.

Marcel Duchamp

Destruction is also creation.

Marcel Duchamp

As soon as we start putting our thoughts into words and sentences everything gets distorted, language is just no damn good-I use it because I have to, but I don't put any trust in it. We never understand each other.

Marcel Duchamp

Art is not about itself but the attention we bring to it.

Marcel Duchamp