Marcel Duchamp in Perspective

Best known for cheeky conceptual works—like his signed urinals ("R. Mutt") and his graffitioed Mona Lisa—Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968) was also an extraordinary painter and sculptor (Nude Descending a Staircase) who changed the language of twentieth-century art and reigns with Picasso and Matisse as one of its greatest influences. Joseph Masheck has compiled a sampler of the best writing on Duchamp, with pieces that include Duchamp's obituary from Artforum, written by Jasper Johns; Octavio Paz on the ready-mades; a Duchamp post-mortem by Hans Richter; Donald Judd's investigation of Rrose Sélavy; a "Counter-Avant-Garde" by Clement Greenberg; a consideration by Guillaume Apollinaire; and John Cage's "26 Statements on Marcel Duchamp." Illustrated with photographs of Duchamp's seminal pieces, and updated with a substantial preface that offers new scholarship as well as a fascinating consideration of why Duchamp's popularity has exponentially increased since this book first appeared, this is an essential volume for the Duchamp devotee.

Joseph Masheck has served as editor-in-chief of Artforum, contributing editor of Art in America, and as a professor of art history at Barnard, Harvard, and Hofstra. An artist himself, and the author of many books (among them Van Gogh 100, Building-Art, and Modernities), he lives in New York City.