The Drawing room is quiet, save the steady ticking of the clock and the occasional crackle from the fire. A small table is set with an old chessboard, and on either side sit the two players. Look closely, and you will see that the old man is the renowned artist Marcel Duchamp. His opponent is none other than the sometimes beautiful Rrose Sélavy- Duchamp’s alter ego and collaborator. There is a sense that they have been in this room for ages (maybe forever)? Their game is slow…Precise. Neither seems concerned with the passage of time. Their shadows dance on the wall behind them. Duchamp scratches his nose and eyes his knight: He plays black.

“Perhaps," he muses, “you think I am a fool?” 

There is a gleam in his eyes that might be a smile, but his face remains inscrutable. The game has begun.

  “Perhaps”, comes the reply, from underneath a rather wide hat.

 Rrose Sélavy is poised on the edge of her chair.  She wears a fox stole and a great deal of lipstick.  Her gaze is steady.  

  “Some say, my dear Marcel, that art should be a beacon of inspiration, a champion of the transformative power of beauty. I wonder, should it not riddle us to higher plains, should it not excite in us the passion of Eros?” 

She draws out her last word, and moves her pawn forward seductively.  There is a slight twitch in the muscles around her opponent’s eyebrow.   He rubs his hands together, considers his move and, after a moment, brings a pawn to life.  It comes face to face with its white twin. 

“Ah yes, Eros”, Duchamp replies, as Rrose moves another pawn into place.   “She is always there, wrapping her voluptuous arms about me like a nymph.    I seem never to be able to pry myself free from her arms.”  He pauses.  “But beauty? No.  I am no longer interested in the retinal art.  You see?  Mademoiselle Rrose, the world does not need more paintings, more sculptures.  Beauty has played its hand and lost.” He moves his knight again to capture.

  The heat of the fire is drowsy, and Rrose’s next words come slowly.  “Surely, even you cannot deny the elemental power of the beautiful?”

 “Ah! What kind of a man is he who does not believe in beauty?  But that is not really the question, n’est-ce pas?   You see to me, my dear, Eros lives in here.” He taps a finger on his brow.  “It is the inspiration of perception, or the perception of inspiration. That is the most beautiful of all.  This is why I prefer chess to art.  It is pure: there is no ego, no repetition.  The mind can dance.” 

   Duchamp, his mind (and attention) dancing away from the game, begins to hum softly to himself and wave his arms about in stunted imitation of a waltz.  Rrose is silent. She strokes the rusty fur of her wrap and shifts her gaze out of the window.  It is winter, and snow has dusted the trees.  A garbage can has fallen into the drifts and spilled its contents in an unsightly sprawl.   She smiles and looks up, whispering,

“Mots êtes-vous des mythes et pareils aux myrtes des morts?"  (Words, are you myths which match the myrtles of death?)[1]  

Duchamp gives the expected reply, 

”L’argot de Rrose Sélavy, n’est-ce pas l’art de transformer en cigognes les cygnes?”  (Can Rrose Sélavy’s artful talk turn a swan into a stork?)[2] 

 Rrose is examining the board carefully. 

 “I had forgotten that you lost interest in art.”

This is obviously a lie, and they both know it.  They are also both aware that, despite outward appearances and feigned indifference, Duchamp is utterly incapable of abandoning art. It is their secret. Duchamp flicks a piece of dust impatiently from his cuff, and Rrose’s fingers linger on her rook. 

"You know, dearest Marcel, that some believe that you have destroyed art with your ready-mades.  You say they were a joke, but were they?  Were you careless in thinking about what they might do to the art world?  Are you responsible for the Art world’s tower of babel…the end of art?[3]

 The reply comes quickly with a hint of impatience:

“But I have said myself that it is the end of art! The ready-mades were meant to break this interminable line that divides life from art, to bring art back to the people.  Now you see, we can make the art that matters; the life that is lived, the game of chess that is played…no?  At least, you see, that was what I thought then…but now…I do not know.”  An uncharacteristic sigh escapes. “The Art world’s tower was there before the ready-mades.  Now I read that they encase Fountain in glass, and a man pays one million dollars to own it.”  He pauses for a moment, and adds with a slight grin, “It would have been nice if he had not waited until I was dead.”

  Rrose fastens her intense gaze upon Duchamp.

“You think it is strange, then, that Fountain is still a part of the museum world, that it is still exhibited?”

“Yes,” (a pause) “I suppose I do.  It was, as you say, a joke of sorts; perhaps a serious joke, but it said what it needed to. Why persist with it?”

 “Perhaps it was a joke… but remember Marcel that a work of art has infinite possibility.  It’s meaning can change.  We said so ourselves.” 

Duchamp smiles and adds,

“Indeed, because the work is incomplete without the spectator’s contributions.”[4] Rrose nods her head. 

She jumps in again:

 “and when the spectator becomes part of the artwork, so to speak, a new experience is created.” 

They finish the thought together:

“And through that experience they understand that this reality…it is only one scenario.  If people can see an object in a new way, they can see might also begin to see reality in a new way.” 

There is a moment of silence, and then Rrose asks

“But can they?”

“I don’t know, my dear.  I can’t seem to make up my mind," Duchamp replies.

“Remember, dear Marcel, that your mind is one I share.”

   There is silence now, and then from Duchamp’s side of the table there is a soft gurgling sound that could be a sigh…or perhaps a laugh.   Duchamp exclaims softly in a sing-song voice

“Jeux des mots jets mous, Rrose Sélavy (Wordplay, wet spray, Rrose Sélavy.)”[5]

He nods to himself, shifts to sit upright, and exclaims: 

“Play.”

  Both players return to their game.  The pace has picked up, and now there are a series of swift captures; a devastated board. The players lapse back into silent contemplation, listening to the clock as it steadily marks time. The question (if there is a question) hangs in the air, and there doesn’t seem to be anything else to say…at least for the moment.

  It is Rrose’s turn to play, and she observes the board.   Duchamp is winning, but this does not perturb her: she has known the artist for many years, and she knows that, in the final moments, the tide may turn. [6]  A mangled black cat has appeared out the window.   Perhaps he is perusing the garbage on the ground.  Rrose stretches her legs out in front of her, and gets up to put another log on the fire.  She stands for a moment and watches Duchamp hunched gently over the chessboard, and then pours herself a drink and returns quietly to her seat.   When she looks out the window again, the cat has gone.  

  The soft sound of snoring drifts across the table: Duchamp has fallen asleep.  This is not unusual, and Rrose takes advantage of his nap to sip at her drink and study the game.  She thinks, “Is it not the most fundamental human task to create beauty through art?”  She wonders.  What if all of the great masterpieces, the great paintings, were replaced by urinals and bicycle wheels. Wouldn’t something irretrievably precious be lost? Still, there is no denying that the way the art world has co-opted the aesthetic is deeply disturbing.  She may agree with Duchamp after all, but she isn’t about to back away from her game (This would be a disappointment to them both.)  No, Rrose enjoys playing the opponent, and so she makes her next move and brings her queen to life.  At this, Duchamp drowsily opens his eyes, smiles, and mumbles:

 “Don’t just play your side of the game; play both sides.”

She nods, and deliberately, carefully removes her hat and places it on her lap.  She positions her pawn in front of Duchamp’s bishop and says slowly, 

“Perhaps art needs to be used as a social interstice.”[7]

There is a pause.  Duchamp sits up and examines the board with renewed interest.

“You presume too much” he replies, as he captures the misplaced pawn with one of his own.

  Together, their minds dart and duck, and Rrose reminds Duchamp that the ready-mades turned the proletariat object into an aristocratic one.[8]  Looking up at Rrose, Duchamp exclaims

“I believed, ma chère, we all did, that the re-evaluation of everyday objects could serve to oppose the cultural hierarchy.”[9]

Rrose laughs.

“But people, they don’t pay attention!  No?  Now your ready-mades, they are part of that same system that you worked to oppose.” 

“But I paid attention, Rrose… I was not trying to change the world.”

There is another pause.

“Weren’t you?”

“All right then, you are right. Perhaps I was, at least for a moment. Yes, but you see I was always moving and changing; I would not have been able to focus on the conception, the ideas, if I allowed myself to fall in to the role of the martyr.  The artist does not change the world; it is the mind that he changes.”

   Duchamp leans back in his seat and rests his gaze on the fire: a retreat.  Rrose, however, is in the game of it; she enjoys provoking him, and for that matter he enjoys it as well.  She leans forward, purses her painted lips and drawls,

“But if art cannot change the world, then what can?  Dear Marcel, what of genius, what of inspiration, and what of the muse?”

Duchamp looks pointedly at Rrose. 

“Indeed, my dear, what of the muse?” 

   The game has ended. It is a draw, and both kings remain unchecked.  Rrose winks at Duchamp, and both players pick up their pieces and return them to their starting positions on the board.

 

Duchamp scratches his nose and eyes his knight: He plays black.

“Perhaps,” he muses, “you think I am a fool?”

There is a gleam in his eyes that may be a smile, but his face remains inscrutable.   The game has begun.

 

 

 

[1] Rrose Sélavy, pg. 8, Papers of Surrealism, Issue 9, Summer 2011: line from a series of short poems written by Robert Desnos; who was channeling Rrose Sélavy during early surrealist hypnosis sessions.  Translated by Timothy Ades.

[2] Ibid

[3] In the End of Art, Donald Kuspit credits Duchamp and his ready-mades with heralding the “end of art”.

[4]Duchamp, Marcel, The Creative Act, address: “The spectator brings the work in contact with the external world by deciphering and interpreting its inner qualifications and thus adds his contributions to the creative act" .

[5] Rrose Sélavy, pg. 10, #149

[6] A reference to the fact that, that, after years of proclaiming that he had given up art, it was discovered (after his death) that Duchamp had been secretly working on his final masterpiece: Étant donnés.

[7] In Relational Aesthetics (pg. 16), Nicholas Bourriaud borrows a term from Marx and describes relational art as social interstice, suggesting an environment of new possibilities of human interactions.  Duchamp may well have been interested in this idea, given his views about the role of the viewer.

[8] Remark made by Andre Breton

[9]Bishop, Claire, Artificial Hells, Dada