gallery 43    
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Mara Vekarić (1835-1907), 2020, oil on canvas, 20×29 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Caterina Petean (1855-1940), 2020, oil on canvas, 18×26 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Epaminonda Bigliardi (1832-1908), 2020, oil on canvas, 13×18 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Maria Paltauf (1873-1968), 2020, oil on canvas, 22×30 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Elisabeth Höber (1963-1996), 2020, oil on canvas, 18×23 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Edith Block (1930-2015), title of painting not created yet
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Magdalena Techt (1923-2015), 2020, oil on canvas, 20×27 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Ivan Gregorič (1867-1953), 2020, oil on canvas, 19×23 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Victor Nickerl (1858-1946), 2020, oil on canvas, 18×13 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Aleksander Leskovar (1973-1978), 2020, oil on canvas, 13×18 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Danilo Mihalič (1933-1938), 2020, oil on canvas, 21×18 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Issak Shevts (1913-1997), 2020, oil on canvas, 13×18 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Ernst Trattner (1909-1910), title of painting not created yet
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Marija Čandek (1929-2020), 2020, oil on canvas, 19×29 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Wolfgang Suschitzky (1912-2016), 2020, oil on canvas, 18×27 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Sophie Henriette Elisabeth von Hosstrup (1789-1837), 2020, oil on canvas, 23×32 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Ivo Ivčević (1888-1944), title of painting not created yet
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Enrico Frizzarin (1917-1939), 2020, oil on canvas, 18×25 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Argia Gulinati (1854-1939), 2020, oil on canvas, 18×24 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Johann Großschedl (1924-2006), 2020, oil on canvas, 22×20 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Barbara Pucher (1990-2018), 2020, oil on canvas, 20×25 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Goran Žižek (1970-2014), 2020, oil on canvas, 22×33 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Adijan Karaibrahimović (2020-2020), 2020, oil on canvas, 29×29 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Malka Vončina (1938-2019), 2020, oil on canvas, 20×30 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Alexandra Wallner (1972-2020), 2020, oil on canvas, 25×29 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Max Atzenhofer - Baumgartner (1906-1907), 2020, oil on canvas, 29×35 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Ivo Skaramuča (1926-1967), 2020, oil on canvas, 25×35 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Franz Unger (1953-1978), 2020, oil on canvas, 26×31 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Johann Friedrich Anton Wüpperrmann (1790-1879), 2020, oil on canvas, 22×33 cm
  • © MILAN GOLOB: Franz Mathias Mutzenbecher (1779-1846), 2020, oil on canvas, 26×37 cm
Mara Vekarić (1835-1907), 2020, oil on canvas, 20×29 cm

 



 

Marcel Duchamp: Étant donnés



Michael R. Taylor
The Genesis, Construction, Installation, and Legacy of a Secret Masterwork
Chapter 3

INSTALLATION (Part 4)*

* Taylor, Michael R.; Marcel Duchamp: Étant donnés, Philadelphia Museum of Art & Yale University Press, 2009, pp. 161-169, pp. 186-187. (Published on the occasion of an exhibition held at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Aug. 15 - Nov. 1, 2009.)
© 2009 Philadelphia Museum of Art

 

Part 1   Part 2   Part 3   ---- Part 5

 

 

INSTALLATION AT THE PHILADELPHIA MUSEUM OF ART

The unanimous decision on January 15, 1969, by the Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees of the Philadelphia Museum of Art to accept the Cassandra Foundation’s gift allowed Turner to move forward with the transport and installation of Duchamp’s sculpture-construction, even as final details of the contract were hammered out by Bill Copley, Teeny Duchamp, and Barnet Hodes. In addition, the question of insurance remained a serious obstacle, due to the exceptional nature of Étant donnés and the risks of fire, flood, and theft while the piece remained in the Eleventh Street studio. After protracted negotiations, a certificate of insurance, underwritten by Lloyd’s of London, was issued on February 12, shortly before the assemblage was moved to the Museum.[161] According to Copley, Huntington T. Block, the broker in charge of the work’s insurance, remained concerned about vandalism once the work was installed in Philadelphia, a threat “that could be solved only by constant surveillance which calls so much attention to the piece as to encourage over interest in it and thus might encourage the tendency to vandalism we wish to discourage.”[162]

---- Étant donnés was insured for $150,000, an appraisal figure that had been supplied by the Danish-born art dealer Arne Ekstrom, whose Cordier & Ekstrom Gallery had shown Duchamp’s works in New York in 1965.[163] On January 27,1969, Ekstrom had visited the Eleventh Street studio with Bill Copley to see the tableau-construction and determine its value.[164] The certificate of insurance covered the work’s transit from New York and its installation at the Museum.[165] This standard all-risk policy excluded theft and burglary and called for the Museum to transport the work to Philadelphia as soon as possible, where it was to be stored in a lockable, humidified storeroom or gallery.

---- In late January 1969, Copley delivered to Anne d’Harnoncourt his key to room 403,[166] and two weeks later, on February 16, she and Paul Matisse worked through the night to dismantle the entire piece in the Eleventh Street studio. The Museum’s Conservator, Theodor Siegl, arrived the next morning with two art handlers to help pack the individual elements and load them onto the Museum’s truck—a laborious, time-consuming process that took an entire day to complete due to the fragile nature of the materials involved.[167] According to Matisse’s inventory, the shipment consisted of a large number of crates, boxes, and other materials: two large wooden crates made to his specifications (one for the landscape backdrop, which was to travel upright, and one for the mannequin, which was to travel flat); fourteen cardboard boxes, many of which could be stacked and contained loose elements, such as the detachable arm, leg, and head of the mannequin, several bundles of twigs and branches, the motor and perforated disk for the waterfall, the erotic objects, the plaster and parchment body fragments, and the seventy-five bricks (one of which had broken) that made up the interior wall, each wrapped individually in newspaper; the four panels that made up the wooden door, each wrapped in polyethelene; the wooden table used to support the mannequin and her bed of twigs and branches; two loose fluorescent lights; the preliminary study for the landscape backdrop, mounted on wooden supports; a wooden panel with a large hole; three faux-brick linoleum panels, tied together; several bundles of long sticks, struts, and metal bars; a box of brackets and several envelopes containing screws and nails; a small box of extra leaves; and the two pieces of checkered linoleum that were to sit under the wooden table on the floor.[168]

---- On the morning of February 18, the Museum’s truck containing the crates, cartons, and loose items related to Étant donnés left New York around 8:00 AM—with Matisse, d’Harnoncourt, and Siegl following directly behind in Matisse’s car—and arrived at the Museum around midday.[169] That night, Evan Turner hosted a celebratory dinner at his home in Philadelphia, and the next day the trio completely unloaded the truck. All of the elements that make up Étant donnés were temporarily stored in Gallery 16119, a humidified room with a specially fitted lock, while awaiting the construction of the work’s final resting place in Gallery 1759, which had been emptied of its paintings by Kandinsky and Jawlensky in anticipation of the installation (see FIG. 3a.14). The crates were opened and unpacked on the afternoon of February 19, the condition of the contents was recorded, and the work was partially assembled in Gallery 16119 by Matisse and d’Harnoncourt, before being covered with sheets of polyethylene. The room was then sealed against dust and locked, since construction work in Gallery 1759 had been delayed due to the late arrival of the bricks for the archway surrounding the wooden door.[170]


Gallery 1759, with works by Wassily Kandinsky and Alexey von Jawlensky, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1954.

FIG. 3a.14
Gallery 1759, with works by Wassily Kandinsky and Alexey von Jawlensky
Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1954


---- The next day, Turner sent a letter to Huntington Block, the U.S. agent for the insurance of the work, stating that “the Duchamp has been safely transferred to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and ... has now been locked in a special room which can only be entered by specific persons; it will stay there until the final installation is achieved in May. The piece has been carefully examined and the move has not affected its condition.”[171] On the same day, a much relieved Turner informed Teeny Duchamp, “The piece has safely reached Philadelphia—but, nonetheless, we do breathe a sigh of relief which I share with you. The vividness of our first impression of the piece is so intent that seeing the piece again was startling—one forgets there cannot ever be a second view, and I suppose the distinction of the piece is such that there never really is a second view.”[172] Teeny responded by thanking Turner for “keeping me au courant of everything that has been happening in the Museum in relation to Marcel. I am greatly pleased and relieved to know that the work is safely under your care. You have been so understanding and helpful that it has made it all a pleasure.”[173]

---- Following the work’s arrival at the Museum, d’Harnoncourt and Siegl concentrated on preparing Gallery 1759 for its installation, while Turner worked closely with Hodes and Copley to address several new issues, including how to handle future loan requests for Étant donnés from other institutions and scholarly interest in access to primary materials. In a letter dated April 28, 1969, Hodes suggested to Turner that they work together on a formal document that would address areas of concern in order to prevent possible misunderstandings.[174] For the record, Hodes noted that he and Copley were in favor of granting “recognized and earnest scholars of Marcel Duchamp” full access to “any and all documents,” but forbade lending the work to any future exhibition or any other museum, due to its “physical nature.”

---- Turner agreed to the loan restrictions and the need to provide “reputable scholars” the opportunity to examine, under the Museums supervision, a copy of Duchamp’s Manual of Instructions, but he requested that the manual “not be released for publication during the same fifteen-year period placed as a restriction on the photography of the work.”[175] As the copyright holder, Teeny Duchamp agreed to Turner’s restrictions on the notebook’s publication, but offered an incentive to publish the manual in the future by waiving “any and all publication rights that I may have in the notebook, and [agreeing] that, if the notebook is published after the fifteen-year period mentioned in your letter, all of the profits of publication will inure to your Museum.”[176]

---- Having agreed to Turner’s suggestion that the manual’s publication fall under the same restrictions as photography of the interior, Hodes requested that the Museum’s Director “prepare the necessary draft of an agreement incorporating our complete understanding regarding Étant donnés.”[177] Hodes’s proposal caught Turner by surprise, since he was expecting a protracted legal discussion regarding the contract, but he immediately asked the Museum’s lawyer, George B. Clothier, to draw up a document, with the proviso that it be simple and direct.[178] On June 23,1969, Clothier presented Turner with a draft agreement that after some minor adjustments was signed by the Director and George Cheston, the Museum’s President, and then sent to Copley and Hodes for their signatures. The legally binding, eight-point memorandum of agreement between the Cassandra Foundation and the Philadelphia Museum of Art confirmed the moratorium on photography of Étant donnés, and the document was returned to the Museum on July 1, 1969—just one week before Étant donnés went on public display—with a single additional stipulation: that “the Museum [would] respect the firm wishes of William N. Copley to avoid any personal publicity in this matter.”[179]

---- Once Étant donnés was finally in the Museum’s “custody,” to use Hodes’s loaded turn of phrase,[180] d’Harnoncourt and Matisse began what Turner described as the “inevitably awesome”[181] task of assembling and installing Duchamp’s work. On March 13, 1969, Matisse created an installation plan for Project 403 that determined the location of the tableau-construction within Gallery 1759 (fig. 3.28). Drawn to scale, this detailed plan also provided the blueprint for the construction of the freestanding, plaster-covered wall that eventually would house the Spanish wooden door and the brick archway. The Museum’s Director had hoped that the pair would be able to install the work by late spring, so that Teeny Duchamp, who had agreed to check the completed installation before it opened to the public, could do so before departing for her annual vacation in Europe on June 16.[182] While Turner quickly expressed to Teeny his concern that meeting the May deadline might not be possible due to the mechanical, electrical, and construction work needed to prepare Gallery 1759, he assured her that he would strive to meet that goal.[183] In a letter to the Director dated May 5, Teeny expressed her hope that “Marcel’s work will really be visible (for me) soon after June 1st.”[184]


Paul Matisse’s installation plan for Étant donnés.

Fig. 3.28
Paul Matisse’s installation plan for Étant donnés

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Archives, Anne d’Harnoncourt Records


---- The brick archway that framed the Spanish wooden door was to be assembled by Museum craftsmen and set with plaster and mortar into a specially constructed cinderblock wall covered with roughly stuccoed plaster. In the summer of 1968, Duchamp had personally selected 150 bricks for this purpose from Puignau Llach, a building contractor in Cadaqués, and had requested that they be shipped to New York later that year so that he could determine their configuration in his studio, although he intended for the wall and archway to be built in Philadelphia. Duchamp’s datebook for 1968 includes an entry for October 18 that reads “Phila? in the morning,” while the following day’s page contains a drawing of a brick, with its measurements written in inches, above which the artist wrote “Briques: Budworth.”[185] Duchamp had earlier accepted Bonnie Wintersteen’s invitation to attend the opening of the International Festival of Short Films in Philadelphia on October 18, but these notations suggest that the artist may have planned to install the brick archway at the Museum on the same trip. The reference to “Budworth” suggests that Duchamp planned to arrange the shipment of bricks through W. S. Budworth and Son, Inc., a New York shipping company located at 424 West Fifty-second Street, although we must assume that he never placed the order.

---- In an interview with Anne d’Harnoncourt on January 24,1969, Teeny Duchamp confirmed that her husband indeed had planned to carry out the permanent installation of the tableau-construction, including the brick archway framing the old Spanish door, at the Museum.[186] Following the artist’s death, however, payment was not forwarded to the contractor, and consequently the bricks had not been shipped. When the Museum learned of Duchamp’s secret work and made plans for its reassembly in Philadelphia, the outstanding invoice of 32,500 Spanish pesetas (approximately $468) was quickly paid and preparations were made for the bricks to be shipped from Cadaqués to Barcelona, then via air to the United States.[187]

---- Peter Graham Harnden, director of Harnden and Bombelli, a firm of architectural and industrial designers in Barcelona, was contracted to secure an export license, arrange for transportation of the bricks, and track the shipment through customs. According to Harnden, the bricks were ready to ship during the first week of February 1969,[188] since the necessary paperwork had been completed, but a dock strike coupled with an overload of air-freight schedules delayed shipment until February 26.[189] Anxious to begin work on the installation but “helpless without the bricks,” on March 24 a frantic d’Harnoncourt told Harnden that the shipment still had not arrived in Philadelphia.[190] On the same day, she informed Bill Copley that, “except for the mysterious non-appearance of those elusive bricks, which are being hotly pursued both from Barcelona and from the Museum’s end, all goes swimmingly.”[191] In the end, Pan American Airlines was able to locate the seven cases of bricks after discovering they had been misaddressed to “Turner Museum,” based on the name of the Director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art,[192] and subsequently were confused with a shipment to Davies Turner, a London freight and transportation company.[193] Even after the cases were located, d’Harnoncourt chose to wait until the bricks were in the Museum building before notifying Paul Matisse, Teeny Duchamp, Bill Copley, and other interested parties, including Peter Graham Harnden. On April 11 an overjoyed d’Harnoncourt informed Harnden that “the bricks are here and everyone—the museum, Madame Duchamp—is delighted. Many thanks for your great co-operation in the transaction, and please forgive the barrage of telegrams.”[194]

---- Of the 150 bricks that Duchamp had personally selected, a total of 149 arrived in the shipment from Barcelona, of which 28 were broken in transit, leaving just enough to build the archway.[195] The bricks varied in width from 5¼ to 5¾ inches, and in length from 10¾ to 11½ inches. According to Theodor Siegl’s rough calculations—based on an archway constructed of single-spaced bricks, with the narrow side facing the viewer—the doorway would require 46 bricks for each side and 27 for the arch, totaling 119. As Siegl’s proposal did not allow for further accidental breakage of the bricks, Paul Matisse offered an elegant and highly practical alternative solution in a beautifully rendered sketch that called for 106 bricks, 53 of which would be split in half (fig. 3.29).[196] The bricks would be installed lengthwise, so that the narrow end would be visible both in the recessed space of the doorway and the stucco surface of the adjacent cinderblock wall, with the proviso that the bricks would project about three-quarters of an inch from the latter (FIG. 3a.15). “I am sure you will find no difficulties in bringing about its realization,” Matisse wrote to d’Harnoncourt, “and I am always on the other end of the telephone within moments.”[197] Following Matisse’s designs, which were modified slightly, the Museum’s masons built the brick archway around a wooden frame that was placed in the surrounding wall and removed after the mortar had dried. In the end, the arched doorway consisted of 50 full bricks and 114 half-bricks, which were arranged in a repeating pattern pleasing to the eye and thoroughly in keeping with the Spanish architecture that initially had inspired Duchamp to order the wooden door of the tableau-construction. Photographs taken by the artist in and around Cadaqués show similarly recessed doors surrounded by brick archways and roughly stuccoed plaster walls (see FIG. 3a.16 and FIG. 3a.17a,b).


Paul Matisse’s drawing for the installation of the brick archway surrounding the Étant donnés door.

Fig. 3.29
Paul Matisse’s drawing for the installation of the brick archway surrounding the Étant donnés door

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Archives, Anne d’Harnoncourt Records


Marcel Duchamp; Étant donnés: 1° la chute d'eau, 2° le gaz d’éclairage … (Given: 1. The Waterfall, 2. The Illuminating Gas … ), 1946-66. Exterior of Étant donnés, as installed at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Mixed-media assemblage.

FIG. 3a.15
Marcel Duchamp
Étant donnés: 1° la chute d'eau, 2° le gaz d’éclairage …
(Given: 1. The Waterfall, 2. The Illuminating Gas … ), 1946-66
Exterior of Étant donnés, as installed at the Philadelphia Museum of Art
Mixed-media assemblage
Exterior: wooden door, iron nails, bricks, and stucco. Interior: bricks, velvet, wood, parchment over an armature of lead, steel, brass, synthetic putties and adhesives, aluminum sheet, welded steel-wire screen, and Peg-Board, hair, oil paint, plastic, steel binder clips, plastic clothespins, twigs, leaves, glass, plywood, brass piano hinge, nails, screws, cotton, collotype prints, acrylic varnish, chalk, graphite, paper, cardboard, tape, pen ink, electric light fixtures, gas lamp (Bec Auer type), foam rubber, cork, electric motor, and cookie tin
242.6 × 124.5 × 177.8 cm (9512 × 70 × 49 inches)

Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gift of the Cassandra Foundation


Marcel Duchamp, Exterior door of Étant donnés in its original setting, with Teeny Duchamp, La Bisbal, early 1960s.

FIG. 3a.16
Marcel Duchamp
Exterior door of Étant donnés in its original setting, with Teeny Duchamp, La Bisbal, early 1960s

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Archives, Alexina and Marcel Duchamp Papers. Gift of Jacqueline, Paul, and Peter Matisse in memory of their mother, Alexina Duchamp




Marcel Duchamp; Photographs of additional doors in La Bisbal, early 1960s.

FIG. 3a.17a

Marcel Duchamp; Photographs of additional doors in La Bisbal, early 1960s.

FIG. 3a.17b

FIG. 3a.17a - FIG. 3a.17b
Marcel Duchamp
Photographs of additional doors in La Bisbal, early 1960s

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Archives, Alexina and Marcel Duchamp Papers. Gift of Jacqueline, Paul, and Peter Matisse in memory of their mother, Alexina Duchamp


---- The brick archway, which was formed with 107 of the 149 bricks that had arrived from Cadaqués, was placed in the center of the cinderblock wall that the Museum’s masons had constructed in early April 1969. This solid wall effectively cut Gallery 1759 in half and created a room within a room—measuring fourteen feet, six inches from the back wall to the cinderblocks—in which to house the artist’s tableau-construction. The wall was roughly plastered by the Museum’s craftsmen to give it an intentionally coarse appearance that again corresponded to the photographs of similar doorways that Duchamp and Teeny had discovered during their summer vacations in Cadaqués in the late 1950s and 1960s. The cream-colored plaster was chosen to approximate the color of the stuccoed surfaces of these buildings. Completed by mid-April, the brick archway eliminated the need for the three vinyl sections of imitation brickwork that Duchamp had used as a temporary frame for the Spanish door while awaiting the arrival of the real bricks from Spain (see FIG. 3D.1).


Étant donnés in the Eleventh Street Studio. A Photographic Portfolio by Denise Browne Hare, 1968. The photographer Denise Browne Hare documented Étant donnés as it appeared in Duchamp's studio on East Eleventh Street in a series of twenty-seven black-and-white photographs that were taken during the last week of December 1968. This portfolio, which is published here in its entirety for the first time, was commissioned by the photographer's close friend, Alexina “Teeny” Duchamp, who felt it was important to capture for posterity the ambience of the artist’s cramped and sparsely furnished studio. Like Duchamp’s own images in the Manual of Instructions, Browne Hare's evocative photographs offer new insights into the hidden mechanisms of Étant donnés, including its eccentric lighting system, as well as the artist's dexterity in creating a nearly flawless visual illusion in the finished diorama. According to her recollection, the scene beyond the two peepholes was “indescribable,” although the photographs she took would provide eloquent testimony to the work’s arresting visual power and poetic mystery.

FIG. 3D.1
Étant donnés in the Eleventh Street Studio
A Photographic Portfolio by Denise Browne Hare, 1968
The photographer Denise Browne Hare documented Étant donnés as it appeared in Duchamp's studio on East Eleventh Street in a series of twenty-seven black-and-white photographs that were taken during the last week of December 1968. This portfolio, which is published here in its entirety for the first time, was commissioned by the photographer's close friend, Alexina “Teeny” Duchamp, who felt it was important to capture for posterity the ambience of the artist’s cramped and sparsely furnished studio. Like Duchamp’s own images in the Manual of Instructions, Browne Hare's evocative photographs offer new insights into the hidden mechanisms of Étant donnés, including its eccentric lighting system, as well as the artist's dexterity in creating a nearly flawless visual illusion in the finished diorama. According to her recollection, the scene beyond the two peepholes was “indescribable,” although the photographs she took would provide eloquent testimony to the work’s arresting visual power and poetic mystery.

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Archives, Anne d'Harnoncourt Records


---- Once the exterior facade was completed, the next stage of the project was the installation of an electrical supply panel to time and operate the nine circuits used to power the tableau-construction, as well as electrical equipment designed to control the temperature and humidity in the room housing Étant donnés.[198] This work took place in late April and early May 1969 under the ongoing code name Project 403, which the Museum used to ensure that word of the installation of Duchamp’s final creation did not reach the public or the press.

---- In spite of these efforts at subterfuge, in March 1969 Henry Gardiner, an assistant curator at the Museum, received a telephone call from a representative of Art News asking him to confirm rumors about a secret work by Marcel Duchamp. This press inquiry, the first the Museum had received concerning the existence of Étant donnés, led Evan Turner to revise the wording of the statement he had prepared earlier for Barnet Hodes as follows: “The late Marcel Duchamp worked steadily from 1946 to 1966 on a large composition which has been acquired by the Cassandra Foundation. The piece has been presented to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.” Turner also instructed Museum staff on how to handle inquiries from curious journalists and critics. “Should anyone ask when it is being shown publicly,” he wrote in an internal memorandum, “the answer should be that work is underway on its installation but the date of public exhibition is not yet known.”[199]

---- This summary response was indeed used on numerous occasions, as news of Duchamp’s secret work began to spread. For example, in May 1969 the Milan-based design magazine Domus notified the Museum that it intended to publish an article on Étant donnés in its summer 1969 issue. The essay was to be written by Giulia Virmercati Ponti, the wife of the magazine’s founder, Gio Ponti, and required new photography by the end of the month. In response to a request from Harry Shunk and Janos Kender, the New York-based photographers who had been assigned to photograph the work for Domus, Anne d’Harnoncourt responded that “the permanent installation of the work in the Museum is a rather elaborate process now under way, and no photograph can be taken until this is completed.”[200] The article on Étant donnés did not materialize, and was replaced by an interview with Arturo Schwarz that appeared in the September 9, 1969, issue of the magazine, accompanied by a photograph of the wooden door and a detail of the peepholes.[201]

---- Once the mechanical and electrical work was finished, Gallery 1759 was thoroughly cleaned and dustproofed, and a half-inch-thick plywood floor panel was laid down to support the tableau-construction. The final installation of Étant donnés took place on June 11, 1969, under the supervision of Paul Matisse, who had returned to Philadelphia the previous day. Working in close collaboration with d’Harnoncourt and Theodor Siegl, Matisse instructed the art handlers and construction staff as they began the complex process of reassembling the work. Black ring-binder in hand, d’Harnoncourt made continual reference to Duchamp’s exacting yet matter-of-fact directions in the Manual of Instructions, while Matisse preferred to solve problems without recourse to Duchamp’s notes. D’Harnoncourt later recalled that the “instruction manual proved essential to the task of moving the assemblage,”[202] and described her relief at having such a detailed notebook to follow during the tense moments “when what to do next [in the installation at the Museum] was not immediately apparent.”[203]

---- Prior to the installation, Matisse had told Siegl that he had found the photographic notebook to be “a great help, very clear, and very well done,” and was optimistic “the move will reflect the clarity of these remarkable instructions.”[204] Shortly before the move to Philadelphia, however, Matisse revised his estimation of the manual’s usefulness after encountering technical difficulties associated with the complex wiring and lighting systems, as well as the hanging arrangement for the wooden door. Unable to find solutions to these problems in the Manual of Instructions, Matisse began making his own detailed notes, sketches, and diagrams for dismantling and packing Étant donnés in New York and reassembling it at the Museum. These included the installation plan that Matisse drew up on March 13, 1969, to determine the location of the tableau-construction within Gallery 1759 (see fig. 3.28). Drawn to scale, this detailed plan also provided the blueprint for construction of the solid wall that housed the wooden door and the brick archway, as well as the track above the four-panel door, which helped to support the latter’s weight while also allowing its individual components to move to one side. The inclusion of this hanging device was intended to give future photographers complete access to the scene beyond the peepholes, allowing them to slide the panels apart and fully document the work without the encumbrance of the wooden door.[205]

---- Despite the different approaches adopted by Matisse and d’Harnoncourt, or perhaps because of them, the installation of Étant donnés on June 11, 1969, went smoothly and was completed in a single working day (fig. 3.30a-d). Three days later, Teeny Duchamp visited the Museum to inspect the installation[206] and was so pleased with the work carried out by d’Harnoncourt, Matisse, and Siegl that she marked the occasion by donating to the Museum the artist’s erotic etchings, which had been published by Arturo Schwarz in the second volume of The Large Glass and Related Work;[207] as discussed in chapter two, this group of etchings included imagery directly related to the genesis and iconography of Duchamp’s secret work. In a letter, Turner thanked Teeny for her generosity in presenting this important suite of prints to the Museum, adding, “It was really a very great pleasure indeed to see you just before you departed and to learn that you were satisfied with the installation. I must say I do think the whole thing is splendidly achieved.”[208]


The installation of Étant donnés at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 196. 9The landscape backdrop and linoleum with wires.

Fig. 3.30a


The installation of Étant donnés at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1969. The open doors.

Fig. 3.30b


The installation of Étant donnés at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1969. The view from the other side of the bricks.

Fig. 3.30c


The installation of Étant donnés at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1969. The mannequin.

Fig. 3.30d

Fig. 3.30a - Fig. 3.30d
The installation of Étant donnés at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1969
- the landscape backdrop and linoleum with wires
- the open doors
- the view from the other side of the bricks
- the mannequin

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Archives, Anne d’Harnoncourt Records


---- According to Turner, there remained some “technical complexities” to be resolved, related to the installation of light-triggering sensor pads, but d’Harnoncourt and Siegl were able to address them after Teeny’s visit.[209] On June 10, 1969, the Museum ordered a large, sisal Zuider carpet from a supplier in Seattle.[210] This heavy floor covering, which was not part of Duchamp’s original plan, was fitted on top of a rubber mat in the space in front of the stuccoed wall where visitors approached the work to view the interior. The carpet was laid from wall to wall in the anteroom to conceal a hidden device that was activated by pressure-sensitive electronic pads when visitors entered the room. This electrical mechanism, which regulated illumination of the interior, was designed to enhance the life expectancy of the work’s numerous lightbulbs, thus cutting down on maintenance and costs. The sisal carpet was the final component of the work to be installed, and a delighted Turner wrote to Matisse on June 17, 1969, thanking him for his patience and “cooperation at every point in this endeavor. How we should have done it without you I cannot imagine. The pleasantest part of the whole thing was your cool and your calm at every point.”[211]

---- In August 1998, the pressure-sensitive electronic pads were replaced with a motion sensor, linked via a camera installed in the ceiling of the anteroom to a computer that turned on the lights whenever a visitor approached the peepholes. On Matisse’s advice, the motion detector’s circuit also incorporated a time-delay mechanism, so the lights would remain illuminated for a period of five minutes, “even if there was no further movement in the room, due either to the absence of visitors or the continuing presence of a particularly motionless Duchampian.”[212]

---- The installation of the motion-detection system is one of only a handful of changes to the work since its installation on June 11, 1969. The vast majority of these modifications—such as the sisal matting in the anteroom, which must be replaced on a frequent basis due to wear and tear, and the air-conditioning system, which has since been upgraded—do not affect the artist’s dioramic scene. Indeed, the only significant alteration to the tableau-construction came in 1970, when Teeny Duchamp noticed that the blue sky above the landscape had faded since the work had gone on public display. During a visit to the Museum on February 12, 1970, she expressed her concern to Evan Turner, who agreed to investigate the matter after she showed him an earlier sample that contained a more intense and saturated blue than the bleached-out sky then on view through the peepholes.[213]

---- On March 6, 1970, Teeny returned to the Museum with Paul Matisse to discuss the matter with Theodor Siegl, who agreed that the original box, which Duchamp had spray-painted and illuminated with a fluorescent light to create the luminous blue sky, had indeed faded and needed to be replaced immediately.[214] Following this meeting, Matisse made a detailed drawing for a replacement box measuring 43 by 26 by 7 inches, which was built out of plywood and clear pine by Museum carpenters on March 20. On April 7, the box was spray-painted in the Museum’s Conservation Laboratory with Magna paints to match the deep-blue color of the original sky, using a combination of white, Bocour green, and Bocour blue, mixed with toluol. Siegl deliberately chose Magna paints for the box, since they contained fast drying, fade-resistant phythalocyanine pigments. On April 14, 1970, Teeny Duchamp and Paul Matisse returned to the Museum to install the new box behind the landscape backdrop, and during the same visit they slightly altered the arrangement of the fleecy cotton clouds, using one of Duchamp’s color photographs as a guide.


THE DUCHAMP COMMITTEE

Evan Turner continued to be concerned about the ramifications for the Museum were Duchamp’s erotic assemblage to produce a scandal following its installation. The work inevitably would invoke a negative reaction from some visitors, perhaps resulting in letters of complaint and public protests, but the Museum’s Director was determined to meet any criticism head on and not allow the press to transform a minor controversy into a national or even international story. At the suggestion of Trustee and Vice President William T. Coleman, Jr., Turner asked various Philadelphia cultural leaders to view Étant donnés before it opened to the public, so their arguments and reactions would be formulated should they be called on to defend the work.[215] These cultural dignitaries included two representatives from the University of Pennsylvania—Richard Brilliant, chair of the graduate department of the history of art, and Stephen Prokopoff, director of the Institute of Contemporary Art—as well as George D. Culler, president of the Philadelphia College of Art.

---- Culler was preparing to leave town for a summer vacation, but he wrote an impassioned letter of support to Turner. Drawing on his own experience as an artist, educator, and former director of the San Francisco Museum of Art, Culler described Étant donnés as:

a fine and impressive work, admittedly frank, but in a way which I think is quite acceptable these days. I am sure that any person of intelligence and judgment will be aware immediately that here is a superlative work of art conceived in honesty and sincerity by one of the few really great and innovative artists of our century. But what—I must confess—impressed me almost more than the work itself, is the tremendous coup in obtaining for Philadelphia a work that every other major museum across the country would have given almost anything to acquire. This time Philadelphia comes in first! And how fine it is to have scored with this particular acquisition, which everyone will recognize belongs exactly where you have now so perceptively installed it, as the final work in the great sequence by Duchamp in the Arensberg Collection. In common with almost everyone else I assumed that Duchamp’s artistic career ended years ago—a career that could be studied properly only here in Philadelphia in your collections. To find that his work continued another twenty years is to say the least a revelation—the last chapter in a volume we thought complete. Not to have that last and completing chapter here in Philadelphia would have been a tragedy; to have it is a major accomplishment.[216]

---- Art historian Richard Brilliant also was invited by Turner to see the work at the Museum in order “to judge its aesthetic worthiness, and thereby justify its inclusion in the collection.”[217] As Brilliant recalled:

I was taken to the alcove where the work was located, and was left there alone near the “barn door” without any further explanation; it took a few minutes for me to find the two small holes drilled in the door at eye-level, and then, quite naturally and very curious, I went over to the door and looked through the eye-holes to see... what appeared to be the partly concealed body of a nude woman, lying close to the other side of the door in a thicket, and beyond a “landscape” with a turning waterwheel. My first reaction was to look away, and then to look around in the alcove to see whether I had been observed, acting like some Peeping Tom, seeing something close-up that I should not have. The sense of the voyeur-voyant was strong, as if the illusion was so powerful that the boundary between the artwork and the real world of my personal space had been breached, something consistent with Duchamp’s apparent intention.[218]

Following this visit, Brilliant informed Turner that he approved of the work’s acquisition and display, and offered to speak out in defense of it, if necessary.

---- At the suggestion of George Cheston, the Museum’s President, Turner assembled a five-person “Duchamp Committee,” led by himself in his role as Director and including Cheston; William T. Coleman, Jr., Vice President; William P. Wood, Treasurer; and Mrs. Albert M. Greenfield, Trustee and a prominent collector of modern and contemporary art. The committee’s charge was “to deal with this piece if it presents any problems,” and to swiftly and effectively counter any negative publicity surrounding the presentation of Étant donnés at the Museum by clearly stating the institution’s position on the historical importance of the work.[219] Based on his experience with the Muhlstock scandal in Montreal, Turner believed that the press was likely to attempt to manufacture a controversy by interviewing Museum trustees and staff members about the sexual content of the work in the hope of obtaining sensational quotes, or suggesting a division in Museum ranks over acceptance of the gift.[220] The Duchamp Committee, which Turner “could call on at the shortest possible notice,” was thus organized to present a unified front on behalf of the Museum and to defuse any public outcry.[221] Buoyed by the strong support of Philadelphia cultural leaders as well as the Board of Trustees, Turner invited the entire staff of the Museum to see the finished installation during the first three days of July, before the work opened to the general public on Monday, July 7, 1969.[222]

 

Part 1   Part 2   Part 3   ---- Part 5

 

* Taylor, Michael R.; Marcel Duchamp: Étant donnés, Philadelphia Museum of Art & Yale University Press, 2009, pp. 161-169, pp. 186-187. (Published on the occasion of an exhibition held at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Aug. 15 - Nov. 1, 2009.)
© 2009 Philadelphia Museum of Art



Notes:

[161] Barnet Hodes, letter to Evan H. Turner, July 28, 1969, EHT Records.
[162] William Nelson Copley, letter to Evan H. Turner, January 30, 1969, EHT Records.
[163] Duchamp’s work had been shown at the Cordier & Ekstrom Gallery in Not Seen and/or Less Seen of/by Marcel Duchamp/Rrose Sélavy, 1904-64, which consisted of works from the Mary Sisler Collection and was open from January 14 to February 13, 1965; ibid.
[164] D’Harnoncourt, “Notes on the History of the Tableau,” p. 3, ADH Records.
[165] Aetna Insurance, Hartford Fire Insurance, and Lloyd's of London each assumed a one-third share of the risk; Huntington T. Block, Certificate of Insurance, February 14, 1969, EHT Records. The insurance policy was scheduled to terminate on March 15, 1969, by which time the title of the work was expected to have passed to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and would thus be covered under the Museum's general insurance policy; see Huntington T. Block, letter to Evan H. Turner, March 5, 1969, EHT Records. However, Barnet Hodes was out of the country at that time, and the title to the Duchamp work did not pass to the Museum until April 30, 1969; see Huntington T. Block, letter to Evan H. Turner, March 14, 1969, EHT Records.
[166] William Nelson Copley, letter to Evan H. Turner, January 30, 1969, EHT Records.
[167] Anne d’Harnoncourt, interview with the author, Philadelphia, June 28, 2007.
[168] Paul Matisse, letter to Anne d’Harnoncourt, February 6, 1969, AdH Records.
[169] Anne d’Harnoncourt, interview with the author, Philadelphia, June 28. 2007.
[170] Paul Matisse, letter to Anne d’Harnoncourt, February 6, 1969, AdH Rcrords.
[171] Evan H. Turner, letter to Huntington T. Block, February 20, 1969, EHT Records.
[172] Evan H. Turner, letter to Alexina Duchamp, February 20, 1969, EHT Records.
[173] Alexina Duchamp, letter to Evan H. Turner, February 25, 1969, EHT Records.
[174] Barnet Hodes, letter to Evan H. Turner, April 28, 1969, EHT Records.
[175] Evan H. Turner, letter to Barnet Hodes, May 19, 1969, EHT Records.
[176] Alexina Duchamp, letter to Evan H. Turner, May 29, 1969, EHT Records.
[177] Barnet Hodes, letter to Evan H. Turner, June 3, 1969, EHT Records.
[178] “The simplier the better I’d say”; Evan H. Turner, letter to George B. Clothier, June 9, 1969, EHT Records.
[179] Barnet Hodes, letter to Evan H. Turner, July 1, 1969, EHT Records. Turner replied that “he can be guaranteed that we will honor his filings”; Turner, letter to Barnet Hodes, July 3, 1969, EHT Records.
[180] Barnet Hodes, letter to Evan H. Turner, February 26, 1969, EHT Records.
[181] Evan H. Turner, letter to Barnet Hodes, May 19, 1969, EHT Records.
[182] Evan H. Turner, letter to Alexina Duchamp and William Nelson Copley, January 28, 1969, EHT Records.
[183] Evan H. Turner, letter to Alexina Duchamp, January 28, 1969, EHT Records.
[184] Alexina Duchamp, letter to Evan H. Turner, May 5, 1969, EHT Records.
[185] Marcel Duchamp, datebook entries for October 18 and 19, 1968. I am extremely grateful to Jacqueline Matisse Monnier for sharing this information with me.
[186] D’Harnoncourt and Siegl, “Notes on the History of the Tableau,” p. 3, AdH Records.
[187] F. B. Vandegrift and Company acted as customs brokers in Philadelphia; Peter Graham Harnden, letter to Anne d’Harnoncourt, March 11, 1969, AdH Records.
[188] Peter Graham Harnden, letter to Alexina Duchamp, January 31, 1969. Philadelphia Museum of Art, Archives, Alexina and Marcel Duchamp Papers.
[189] Peter Graham Harnden, telegram to J Evan H. Turner, February 26, 1969, EHT Records.
[190] Anne d’Harnoncourt. letter to Peter Graham Harnden, March 24, 1969, AdH Records.
[191] Anne d’Harnoncourt, letter to William Nelson Copley, March 24, 1969, AdH Records.
[192] G. Pearson, secretary of Peter Graham Harnden, letter to Anne d’Harnoncourt, April 8, 1969, AdH Records.
[193] Anne d’Harnoncourt, internal memorandum to Evan H. Turner, March 25, 1969, AdH Records.
[194] Anne d’Harnoncourt, letter to Peter Graham Harnden, April 11. 1969, AdH Records.
[195] Theodor Siegl, letter to Paul Matisse, March 28, 1969, AdH Records.
[196] Paul Matisse, letter to Anne d’Harnoncourt, April 1, 1969, AdH Records.
[197] Ibid.
[198] The electrical work was carried out by Gordon Desmond of Leonard Weger Associates in Philadelphia: Carl A. Colozzi, Assistant Services, Philadelphia Museum of Art, letter to Gordon Desmond, director, Leonard Weger Associates, March 5, 1969, AdH Records.
[199] Evan H. Turner, internal memorandum to Ralph Collier, Henry Gardiner, Anne d’Harnoncourt, George Cheston, Theodor Siegl, and Gertrude Toomey, March 7, 1969, EHT Records.
[200] Anne d’Harnoncourt, letter to Harry Shunk and Janos Kender, May 27, 1969, AdH Records.
[201] See Trini, “Duchamp dall’oltreporta” pp. 45-47.
[202] Anne d’Harnoncourt, preface to Duchamp, Manual of Instructions, p. iii.
[203] Anne d’Harnoncourt, interview with the author, Philadelphia, June 28, 2007.
[204] Paul Matisse, letter to Theodor Siegl, January 6, 1969, AdH Records.
[205] Paul Matisse, interview with the author, Groton, MA, January 23, 2007.
[206] Alexina Duchamp, letter to Evan H. Turner, May 29, 1969, EHT Records.
[207] Evan H. Turner, letter to Alexina Duchamp, June 23, 1969, EHT Records; see also Arruro Schwarz, The Large Glass and Related Works, 2. vols. (Milan: Schwarz Gallery, 1967-68).
[208] Evan H. Turner, letter to Alexina Duchamp, June 23, 1969, EHT Records.
[209] Evan H. Turner, letter to Alexina Duchamp, June 26, 1969, EHT Records.
[210] The carpet was purchased from Alison T. Seymour, Inc., in Seattle, and was shipped on June 11, 1969, by Pacific Intermountain Express; Theodor Siegl, request for material and services, The Philadelphia Museum of Art, June 17, 1969, invoice #13232, $67.20; AdH Records.
[211] Evan H. Turner, letter to Paul Matisse, June 17, 1969, EHT Records.
[212] Paul Matisse, letter to Anne d’Harnoncourt, August 27, 1998, AdH Records.
[213] Evan H. Turner, internal memorandum to files, February 16, 1970, EHT Records.
[214] Ted Siegl, notes on the replacement of the Étant donnés sky, AdH Records.
[215] Evan H. Turner, internal memorandum to William T. Coleman, Jr., Mrs. Albert M. Greenfield, and William P. Wood, July 7, 1969, EHT Records.
[216] George D. Culler. letter to Enn 1-1. Turner. July 3, 1969. EHT Records.
[217] Richard Brilliant, letter to author. October 21, 2008.
[218] Ibid.
[219] Evan H. Turner, letter to George B. Clothier, July 3, 1969, EHT Records.
[220] Evan H. Turner, interview with the author, Philadelphia, July 8. 2008.
[221] Evan H. Turner, letter to William P. Wood, July 3, 1969, EHT Records.
[222] Evan H. Turner, internal memorandum to department heads, June 30, 1969, EHT Records.


BIBLIOGRAPHIES