An abstract painting need in 50 years by no means look "abstract" any longer.
Marcel DuchampRead
A painting that doesn't shock isn't worth painting.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Art should provoke thought and evoke strong emotions.
Marcel Duchamp emphasizes the idea that true art must challenge viewers and stir a reaction. If a painting doesn't elicit strong feelings or provoke critical thinking, it fails to fulfill its purpose in stimulating dialogue and reflection about society and the human experience.
Themes
ArtShockProvocationEmotionExpression
In practice
Example use cases
In an art class, to inspire students, one might say, 'Remember, a painting that doesn't shock isn't worth painting.'
More from Marcel Duchamp
All quotes βAll this twaddle, the existence of God, atheism, determinism, liberation, societies, death, etc., are pieces of a chess game called language, and they are amusing only if one does not preoccupy oneself with 'winning or losing this game of chess.
Marcel DuchampRead
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 DuchampRead
I never finished the 'Large Glass' because, after working on it for eight years, I probably got interested in something else; also, I was tired. It may be that, subconsciously, I never intended to finish it because the word 'finish' implies an acceptance of traditional methods and all the paraphernalia that accompany them.
Marcel DuchampRead
It's a product of two poles - there's the pole of the one who makes the work, and the pole of the one who looks at it. I give the latter as much importance as the one who makes it.
Marcel DuchampRead
I became a librarian at the Sainte-Genevieve Library in Paris. I made this gesture to rid myself of a certain milieu, a certain attitude, to have a clean conscience, but also to make a living. I was twenty-five. I had been told that one must make a living, and I believed it.
Marcel DuchampRead
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