Homage to Duchamp (Homage à Duchamp)
Emerson Woelffer
American, 1914–2003
1969–70, published 1970
A 1969–70 lithograph by Emerson Woelffer that presents a torn-paper silhouette in a stark black field punctuated by flat red and blue shapes as a visual homage to Marcel Duchamp.
You first notice a large, irregular white void with ragged, torn edges set against a dense black ground, while sharp, planar red forms on the left and a single blue wedge on the right make the negative space feel like a sculptural cutout.
The work links postwar American abstraction’s focus on shape and gesture with Duchampian ideas of found and readymade imagery, translating collage and rupture into a pared-down, conceptual language that helped shape later print and painting practices.
Medium
Lithograph
Dimensions
composition and sheet: 24 1/16 × 18 1/16" (61.1 × 45.8 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of Kleiner, Bell & Co.
Accession
379.1970
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
