Touching

Last night there was a panel discussion we were part of on Marcel Duchamp in New Zealand at the Adam Art Gallery. A lot of the talk was around the Duchamp exhibition that came to New Zealand in 1967. It famously got some older members of the art museum (the director of the Robert McDougall Art Gallery at the time was a tortoise inspiring 74 years old) profession extremely agitated. The fuss ended up with two of Duchamp’s works - Please touch, a false breast made by Duchamp to stick on the cover of a book and Fountain his famous readymade urinal, being removed from the exhibition at the Robert McDougall Art Gallery in Christchurch. The director allowed 'artists' and arts students to view them in his office and queues formed in protest with students returning to the back of the queue after they had had a look in an attempt to keep the director fully occupied showing Fountain and Please touch to 'artists' every waking minute of his day.

In memory of all this Duchamp history action here are some latter day tributes to Fountain. They range from a sticker you can use to convert your own toilet into a Duchampian gesture to a remote-controlled urinal signed R (the R was for Richard) Mutt.

Images: Top to bottom, left to right. Sherrie Levine’s Fountain (After Marcel Duchamp), Michael Parekowhai’s Mimi, R Mutt sticker from Thwart Design, Fountain parade float, cake by Hannah Hull, R Mutt figures and Raphael Rogenmoser’s remote-controlled Fountain (you can see it in action here)