"The individual, man as a man, man as a brain, if you like, interests me more than what he makes, because I've noticed that most artists only repeat themselves"
About this Quote
Duchamp is baiting the entire cult of “the work” with the calm audacity of someone who already walked away from it. By saying the individual interests him more than what he makes, he’s not offering a warm, humanist toast to personality. He’s taking a scalpel to the romantic story that art is an endless river of originality. Most artists, he shrugs, “only repeat themselves” - a line that lands like a polite insult in a world built on the myth of perpetual reinvention.
The subtext is pure Duchamp: if repetition is inevitable, then the fetish for production starts to look like an industrial routine dressed up as genius. He pivots attention from objects to cognition: “man as a brain.” That phrase does heavy lifting. It reframes creativity as a mode of thinking rather than a portfolio, and it also smuggles in skepticism about style as identity. If the artist keeps making “more Duchamp,” maybe the only truly new terrain is the shifting mind behind the gesture.
Context matters. Duchamp’s readymades and his retreat from conventional artmaking weren’t just provocations; they were experiments in relocating art from the studio to the idea, from craft to choice, from aura to attitude. This quote functions as an alibi and a manifesto: stop demanding output as proof of value. Pay attention to the person who can change the rules, not the person who can keep decorating the same rulebook.
The subtext is pure Duchamp: if repetition is inevitable, then the fetish for production starts to look like an industrial routine dressed up as genius. He pivots attention from objects to cognition: “man as a brain.” That phrase does heavy lifting. It reframes creativity as a mode of thinking rather than a portfolio, and it also smuggles in skepticism about style as identity. If the artist keeps making “more Duchamp,” maybe the only truly new terrain is the shifting mind behind the gesture.
Context matters. Duchamp’s readymades and his retreat from conventional artmaking weren’t just provocations; they were experiments in relocating art from the studio to the idea, from craft to choice, from aura to attitude. This quote functions as an alibi and a manifesto: stop demanding output as proof of value. Pay attention to the person who can change the rules, not the person who can keep decorating the same rulebook.
Quote Details
| Topic | Art |
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