Readymade

Marcel Duchamp was the first to use the word for works of art made from manufactured items. “Readymade” was already a common word by the late nineteenth century for factory-made goods, as opposed to handmade ones, so his choice of term was itself a readymade. His examples include a bicycle wheel mounted on a wooden stool (1913), a snow shovel with an inscription (1915), and Fountain (1917), a men's urinal signed with a false name and shown lying on its back; the Fountain at Tate is a replica from 1964. Later, more elaborate works he called assisted readymades. An early Surrealist dictionary defined it as an everyday object that becomes art simply because an artist picked it. In Taipei, the statement for the solo show of 李兆起 at the Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts lists 現成物 among its methods, beside grafted cacti and succulents, flat painting, and video.

Notice where the object sits: on a plinth, on a wall, or on its back, as Duchamp showed Fountain. What can it no longer do there?