Page 55 - Studio International - January February 1975

meaningless; the artistic form of the work
is lacking and its naturalism is in fact
amorphism. When, in a conversation in
1963, Duchamp spoke of his ready-mades,
he was probably thinking more of this
particular piece in progress : it is not,
he said, 'the act of an artist, but of a non-
artist, an artisan if you will'.80
Technically, Etant donnés is a very
difficult and elaborate work, but at the
same time, what is visible in it is
meaningless: the whole sense of the work
is relegated to the realm of the invisible.
I have never had the good fortune to
see the original Etant donna and I
probably never shall have. Nevertheless,
it seems that Paz has penetrated its
meaning more profoundly than anyone
else:
The silence is absolute. All is real and
verges on banality; all is unreal and
verges — on what ?
On a sacred silence: it urges one to
prayer.
The sacred place is the goddess . . . The
forces of Nature are concentrated in
the divine presence, and this presence
in its turn is diffused throughout the
physical surroundings. Imperceptibly
the sacred place moves from being
merely a magnetic and generally
secluded spot where ceremonies are
held, to being the centre of the world.
It then becomes detached from
earthly space and is transported into an
ideal place: Eden, Paradise."
Some of my friends, who are very
erudite in matters of art and who have
seen the work, talked to me about it as
though it were something nonsensical.
What confused them was probably their
very erudition. For this work manages to
escape entirely from the context of art;
even in the middle of modern art, which
has so many aspects and facets, it
remains entirely unique and alone. It has
turned so far away from our civilization
that it has turned away even from what
that civilization calls art, or even anti-art.

12. Ad Reinhardt was right when he
wrote that 'Every revolution in art turns
over Art from Art-as-something-else into
Art-as-only-itself.'83 The ultimate
function of art is to remind us, within our With my Tongue in my Cheek 1959
world, of what the world is not, and to do
this it must be 'Art-only-as-itself'. But darkness and the strangeness of the human significance.
for that very reason it is just as true that world, its meaning lies in the discovery of The reason for this lack may be found
every artistic revolution returns art to our the world in its brightness and nearness. in false generalization. These theories
world in a new way, makes it a part of The autonomy and newness of a treat artistic knowledge as though it were
that world. Art is always, at the same time, work of art are themselves the symbol scientific knowledge and therefore they
'Art-as-something-else'. of this very world. subject it to scientific interpretations.
The origin of a work of art can never At the beginning of this study Art, however, is an incomprehensible and
be anywhere else but in the world, inside Edmund Leach is quoted as saying that irregular exception in our scientific
human life, and it is the same with its present theories of anthropology, though world. Even the artist himself seems to
meaning. The reason for its origin lies in they provide 'fairly comprehensive defy adequate explanation. Marcel
an oppressive darkness and modern artists models' by which the internal and Duchamp was sometimes considered a
have shown again and again how the way external organization of any society may clown, sometimes a magician, sometimes
from this darkness leads to the experience be explained, they prove inadequate in the an alchemist, sometimes a linguist. Yet
of emptiness, non-being, nothingness. study of concrete societies. The same he never allowed himself to be
But the work of art is born precisely from holds true for present-day theories of art. pigeonholed. He was an artist.
that experience. It is a new world, We have a whole series of 'fairly Modern science deals with the world
created with its own laws. Words comprehensive models' to choose from, objectively and each human life, in its
themselves create the poem, forms some derived from psychoanalysis, some individuality and variety, is treated by
themselves create the picture; the artist from propositional logic, some from science as a mere statistic. But the real
should only obey their inner tendencies linguistics, some from information theory essence of human life is its unique and
and logic. Yet this autonomous order and or other disciplines that happen to be in unrepeatable subjectivity. Nor does art
this new creation are not limited to the vogue at the time. But such models begin with lectures in art history, nor with
autonomy and the newness of the work of always lack what makes art art : its experiments in the laboratories of
art. If the origin of a work of art is in the specific nature, its aestheticity, its aesthetic institutes. It begins in the

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