The term found art—more commonly found object (French French is a Romance language spoken as a first language by about 136 million people worldwide. Around 190 million people speak French as a second language, and an additional 200 million speak it as an acquired foreign language. French speaking communities are present in 57 countries and territories. Most native speakers of the language live in: objet trouvé) or readymade—describes art Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging symbolic elements in a way that influences and affects the senses, emotions, and/or intellect. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, photography, sculpture, and paintings. The meaning of art is explored in a created from the undisguised, but often modified, use of objects that are not normally considered art, often because they already have a non-art function. Marcel Duchamp Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art. He advised modern art collectors, such as Peggy Guggenheim and other prominent figures, thereby helping to shape the tastes of Western art during this period was the originator of this in the early 20th century.

Found art derives its identity as art from the designation placed upon it by the artist. The context into which it is placed (e.g. a gallery or museum) is usually also a highly relevant factor. The idea of dignifying commonplace objects in this way was originally a shocking challenge to the accepted distinction between what was considered art as opposed to not art. Although it may now be accepted in the art world as a viable practice, it continues to arouse questioning, as with the Tate Gallery The Tate is an institution that houses the United Kingdom's national collection of British Art, and International Modern and Contemporary Art. It is a network of four art museums: Tate Britain, London , Tate Liverpool (founded 1988), Tate St Ives, Cornwall (founded 1993) and Tate Modern, London (founded 2000), with a complementary website, Tate's Turner Prize The Turner Prize, named after the painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist under the age of 50. Awarding the prize is organised by the Tate gallery and staged at Tate Britain. Since its beginnings in 1984 it has become the United Kingdom's most publicised art award. Although it represents all media, and exhibition of Tracey Emin Tracey Karima Emin RA is a British artist and part of the group known as Britartists or YBAs (Young British Artists)'s My Bed My Bed is a work by the British artist Tracey Emin. It was exhibited at the Tate Gallery in 1999 as one of the shortlisted works for the Turner Prize. It consisted of her bed with bedroom objects in an abject state, and gained much media attention. Although it did not win the prize, its notoriety has persisted, which consisted literally of her unmade and dishevelled bed. In this sense the artist gives the audience time and a stage to contemplate an object. Appreciation of found art in this way can prompt philosophical reflection in the observer.

Found art, however, has to have the artist's input, at the very least an idea about it, i.e. the artist's designation of the object as art, which is nearly always reinforced with a title. There is mostly also some degree of modification of the object, although not to the extent that it cannot be recognised. The modification may lead to it being designated a "modified", "interpreted" or "adapted" found object.

Origin: Duchamp

Marcel Duchamp Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art. He advised modern art collectors, such as Peggy Guggenheim and other prominent figures, thereby helping to shape the tastes of Western art during this period coined the term readymade in 1915 to describe his found art. Duchamp assembled the first readymade, entitled Bicycle Wheel A bicycle wheel is a wheel, most commonly a wire wheel, designed for a bicycle. A pair is often called a wheelset, especially in the context of ready built "off the shelf" performance-oriented wheels in 1913, the same time as his Nude Descending a Staircase was attracting the attention of critics at the International Exhibition of Modern Art Many exhibitions have been held in the vast spaces of U.S. National Guard armories, but the Armory Show refers to the International Exhibition of Modern Art that was organized by the Association of American Painters and Sculptors and opened in New York City's 69th Regiment Armory, on Lexington Avenue between 25th and 26th Streets, on February 17, 1. His Fountain Fountain is a 1917 work by Marcel Duchamp. It is one of the pieces which he called readymades , because he made use of an already existing object—in this case a urinal, which he titled Fountain and signed "R. Mutt". The art show to which Duchamp submitted the piece stated that all works would be accepted, but Fountain was not actually, a urinal which he signed with the pseudonym "R. Mutt", confounded the art world in 1917. His Bottle Rack The Bottle Rack (Egouttoir or Porte-bouteilles or Hérisson) is an artwork created in 1914 by Dada artist Marcel Duchamp. Duchamp labeled the piece a "readymade", a term he used to describe his collection of ordinary, manufactured objects not commonly associated with art. The readymades did not have the serious tone of European Dada is a bottle drying rack signed by Duchamp, and is considered to be the first "pure" readymade.^[1]

Research by Rhonda Roland Shearer indicates that Duchamp may have fabricated his found objects. Exhaustive research of mundane items like snow shovels and bottle racks in use at the time failed to reveal identical matches. The urinal, upon close inspection, is non-functional. However, there are accounts of Walter Arensberg Walter Conrad Arensberg was an American art collector, critic and poet. His father was part owner and president of a crucible steel company. He majored in English and philosophy at Harvard University. With his wife Louise (1879-1953), he collected art and supported artistic endeavors and Joseph Stella Joseph Stella was an Italian-born, American Futurist painter best known for his depictions of industrial America. He is associated with the American Precisionism movement of the 1910s-1940s. He was born in Muro Lucano, Italy but came to New York City in 1896. He studied at the Art Students League of New York under William Merritt Chase. His first being with Duchamp when he purchased the original Fountain at J. L. Mott Iron Works.^[2]

Development

The use of found objects was quickly taken up by the Dada movement, being used by Man Ray Man Ray , born Emmanuel Radnitzky, was an American artist who spent most of his career in Paris, France. Perhaps best described simply as a modernist, he was a significant contributor to both the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal. Best known in the art world for his avant-garde photography, Man Ray produced and Francis Picabia Francis Picabia was born in Paris of a French mother and a Spanish-Cuban father who was an attaché at the Cuban legation in Paris. His mother died of tuberculosis when he was seven. Some sources would have his father as of aristocratic Spanish descent, whereas others consider him of non-aristocratic Spanish descent, from the region of Galicia who combined it with traditional art by sticking combs onto a painting to represent hair. [1] A well-known work by Man Ray is Gift (1921), [2] which is an iron with nails sticking out from its flat underside, thus rendering it useless.

The combination of several found objects is a type of readymade sometimes known as an assemblage. Another such example is Marcel Duchamp's Why Not Sneeze, Rose Sélavy?, consisting of a small birdcage containing a thermometer, cuttlebone, and 151 marble cubes resembling sugar cubes.

By the time of the Surrealist Surrealist works feature the element of surprise, unexpected juxtapositions and non sequitur; however, many Surrealist artists and writers regard their work as an expression of the philosophical movement first and foremost, with the works being an artifact. Leader André Breton was explicit in his assertion that Surrealism was above all a Exhibition of Objects in 1936 a whole range of sub-classifications had been devised — including found objects, readymade objects, perturbed objects, mathematical objects, natural objects, interpreted natural objects, incorporated natural objects, Oceanic objects, American objects and Surrealist objects. At this time Surrealist leader, André Breton André Breton (February 19, 1896 – September 28, 1966) was a French writer, poet, and surrealist theorist, and is best known as the principal founder of Surrealism. His writings include the Surrealist Manifesto of 1924, in which he defined surrealism as "pure psychic automatism", defined readymades as "manufactured objects raised to the dignity of works of art through the choice of the artist."

Pablo Picasso Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish-born painter, draughtsman, and sculptor who lived most of his adult life in France. He is best known for co-founding the Cubist movement and for the wide variety of styles embodied used found objects as the basis for Baboon and Young, and joined a "bicycle saddle" with "handle bars" to make a bull's head.

In the 1960s found objects were present in both the Fluxus Fluxus—a name taken from a Latin word meaning "to flow"—is an international network of artists, composers and designers noted for blending different artistic media and disciplines in the 1960s. They have been active in Neo-Dada noise music and visual art as well as literature, urban planning, architecture, and design. Fluxus is often movement and in Pop art Pop art is an art movement that emerged in the mid 1950s in Britain and in the late 1950s in the United States. Pop art challenged tradition by asserting that an artist's use of the mass-produced visual commodities of popular culture is contiguous with the perspective of fine art. Pop removes the material from its context and isolates the object,. Joseph Beuys Joseph Beuys was a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art exhibited modified found objects, such as rocks with a hole in them stuffed with fur and fat, a van with sledges trailing behind it, and a rusty girder.

In 1973 Michael Craig Martin Michael Craig-Martin RA is a contemporary conceptual artist and painter. He is noted for his influence over the Young British Artists, many of whom he taught, and for his conceptual artwork, An Oak Tree claimed of his work An Oak Tree An Oak Tree is an iconic conceptual artwork created by Michael Craig-Martin RA in 1973. The piece consists of two units; an object, a glass of water on a glass shelf, and a text. The text takes the form of a Q&A about the artwork, in which Craig-Martin describes changing "a glass of water into a full-grown oak tree without altering the, "It's not a symbol. I have changed the physical substance of the glass of water into that of an oak tree. I didn't change its appearance. The actual oak tree is physically present, but in the form of a glass of water.^[3]"

Commodity sculpture

In the 1980s, a variation of found art emerged called commodity sculpture where commercially mass-produced items would be arranged in the art gallery as sculpture. The focus of this variety of sculpture was on the marketing, display of products. These artists included Jeff Koons Jeff Koons is an American artist known for his reproductions of banal objects—such as balloon animals produced in stainless steel with mirror finish surfaces, Haim Steinbach Haim Steinbach is a contemporary artist who lives and works in New York City. He has been an influential exponent of art based on already existing objects, and Ashley Bickerton Ashley Bickerton is a contemporary artist living in Bali. A mixed-media artist, Bickerton often combines both photographic and painterly elements with industrial and found object assemblages. He is associated the early 1980s art movement Neo-Geo, which includes artists such as Jeff Koons and Peter Halley (who later moved on to do other kinds of work).

One of Jeff Koons Jeff Koons is an American artist known for his reproductions of banal objects—such as balloon animals produced in stainless steel with mirror finish surfaces' early signature works was Two Ball 50/50 Tank, 1985, which consisted of two basketballs floating in water, which half-fills a glass tank (an influence on Damien Hirst Damien Steven Hirst is an English artist and the most prominent member of the group known as "Young British Artists" (or YBAs), who dominated the art scene in Britain during the 1990s. He is internationally renowned, and has been claimed to be the richest living artist to date. During the 1990s his career was closely linked with the).

Trash art

A specific sub-genre of found art is known as trash art or junk art.^[4]. These works are primarily comprised from components that have been discarded. Often they come quite literally from the trash. Many organizations sponsor junk art competitions.

Contemporary

Throughout the 1990s, the Young British Artists Young British Artists or YBAs is the name given to a group of conceptual artists, painters, sculptors and installation artists based in the United Kingdom, most (though not all) of whom attended Goldsmiths College in London. The term Young British Artists is derived from shows of that name staged at the Saatchi Gallery from 1992 onwards, which (YBAs) made extensive use of found "objects", often with very strong press reaction. Damien Hirst exhibited a shark preserved in formaldehyde in a glass tank and called it The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living. He has taken this to extremes by presenting in the same way a cow and calf cut into sections, and, in A Thousand Years, a rotting cow's head, maggots and flies. Tracey Emin Tracey Karima Emin RA is a British artist and part of the group known as Britartists or YBAs (Young British Artists) exhibited a tent covered with appliquéd names, and then her own unmade bed with sweat-stained sheets, surrounded by items such as her slippers, period-stained underwear and drink bottles. Sarah Lucas Sarah Lucas is a British artist. She is part of the generation of Young British Artists who emerged during the 1990s. Her works frequently employ visual puns and bawdy humour, and include photography, collage and found objects enlarged to a giant size a lurid tabloid press cutting; she also exhibited a mattress with two melons, a bucket and a cucumber, representing female and male genitalia.

Found art can also occur on the internet, where an image found on the internet can become the core component of a larger artwork made by modifying the image through basic computer graphic tools.

Historical precedents

Gold, when used in art, as in Medieval altar pieces, is present for its own innate quality, and is therefore a found object, as are precious jewels used in artworks. The essential difference is that these materials were already considered precious, whereas modern art's use of found objects has mostly been of mundane items, which are then deemed to be elevated into a special status.

An exception in 2003 was the Chapman Brothers Jake Chapman and Dinos Chapman (born 1962) are brothers and English conceptual artists known as the Chapman Brothers, who work almost exclusively in collaboration with each other. They came to prominence as part of the Young British Artists movement promoted by Charles Saatchi in the early-1990s use of a set of Francisco Goya Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker regarded both as the last of the Old Masters and as the first of the moderns. Goya was a court painter to the Spanish Crown and a chronicler of history. The subversive and subjective element in his art, as well as his bold handling of paint, provided a model for the prints, The Disasters of War The Disasters of War are a series of 82[a 1] prints created between 1810 and 1820 by the Spanish painter and printmaker Francisco Goya (1746–1828). Although he did not make known his intention when creating the plates, art historians view them as a visual protest against the violence of the 1808 Dos de Mayo Uprising, the subsequent Peninsular, which they "adapted" by collaging clown and puppy faces onto the figures. The prints were valuable already in their own right as art.[3]

Like Marcel Duchamp before him, Damien Hirst has suggested that a painting can be considered an adapted found object (the object being paint), i.e. the whole history of art is based on the found objects.

In the 19th century, the French writer Comte de Lautréamont Comte de Lautréamont was the pseudonym of Isidore Lucien Ducasse (4 April 1846–24 November 1870), an Uruguayan-born French poet had drawn attention to the possibilities of transforming the otherwise mundane object the now famous phrase, "Beautiful as the chance encounter of a sewing machine and an umbrella on a dissecting table."

Criticism

The modern use of found objects aroused hostility from the start, when Duchamp's urinal, titled Fountain Fountain is a 1917 work by Marcel Duchamp. It is one of the pieces which he called readymades , because he made use of an already existing object—in this case a urinal, which he titled Fountain and signed "R. Mutt". The art show to which Duchamp submitted the piece stated that all works would be accepted, but Fountain was not actually, was rejected by the "unjuried" 1917 Society of Independent Artists Based on the French Société des Artistes Indépendants, the goal of the society was to hold annual exhibitions by avant-garde artists. Exhibitions were to be open to anyone who wanted to display their work, and shows were without juries or prizes. In order to enter, one had to pay a six-dollar membership and entry fee. Founders of the Society on the basis that it was not art.

The found object in art has been a subject of polarised debate in Britain throughout the 1990s due to the use of it by the Young British Artists Young British Artists or YBAs is the name given to a group of conceptual artists, painters, sculptors and installation artists based in the United Kingdom, most (though not all) of whom attended Goldsmiths College in London. The term Young British Artists is derived from shows of that name staged at the Saatchi Gallery from 1992 onwards, which. It has been rejected by the general public and journalists, and supported by public museums and art critics. In his 2000 Dimbleby lecture, Who's afraid of modern art, Sir Nicholas Serota Sir Nicholas Andrew Serota is a British art curator. He was director of the Whitechapel Gallery, London, and The Museum of Modern Art, Oxford, before becoming director of the Tate, the United Kingdom's national gallery of modern and British art in 1988. He was awarded a knighthood in 1999. He has been the chairman of the Turner Prize jury. He was advocated such kinds of "difficult" art, while quoting opposition such as the Daily Mail The Daily Mail is a British, daily middle market tabloid newspaper. First published in 1896 by Lord Northcliffe, it is the United Kingdom's second biggest-selling daily newspaper after The Sun. Its sister paper, The Mail on Sunday was launched in 1982. Scottish and Irish editions of the paper were launched in 1947 and 2006 respectively. The Daily headline "For 1,000 years art has been one of our great civilising forces. Today, pickled sheep and soiled beds threaten to make barbarians of us all". A more unexpected rejection in 1999 came from artists—some of whom had previously worked with found objects—who founded the Stuckists Stuckism is an international art movement that was founded in 1999 by Billy Childish and Charles Thomson to promote figurative painting in opposition to conceptual art. The first group of thirteen British artists has since expanded, as of May 2010, to 209 groups in 48 countries group and issued a manifesto denouncing such work in favour of a return to painting with the statement "Ready-made art is a polemic of materialism". [4]

Other art forms

"Other People's Mail", was a zine A zine is most commonly a small circulation publication of original or appropriated texts and images. More broadly, the term encompasses any self-published work of minority interest usually reproduced via photocopier on a variety of colored paper stock first published in 1995 by Abby Bridge. The photocopied publication contained found documents including: "lists found in the pockets of thrift-store clothes, notes passed in coffee shops or left on windshields, school work left in textbooks, postcards and photos from junk stores, letters left at bus stops, rants posted on power boxes, writings left in photocopiers, and so on."^[5]. It was resurrected on openletters.com in 2000 and also inspired an episode of This American Life This American Life is a weekly hour-long radio program produced by Chicago Public Radio and hosted by Ira Glass. It is distributed by Public Radio International on PRI affiliate stations and is also available as a free weekly podcast. Primarily a journalistic non-fiction program, it has also featured essays, memoirs, field recordings, short. Found Magazine Found Magazine, created by Davy Rothbart and Jason Bitner and based in Ann Arbor, Michigan and New York City, collects and catalogs found notes, photos, and other interesting items, publishing them in an irregularly-issued magazine, in books, and on its website. Items found and published have ranged from love letters to homework assignments, and, based in Ann Arbor, Michigan Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County. As of the 2000 Census, the city had a population of 114,024, of which 36,892 are university or college students. The 2008 Census Bureau Estimate places the population at 114,386, making it the fifth largest city in Michigan. The city is part of the Detroit â€, first published in 2004,^[6] collects and catalogs found notes, photos, and other "interesting" items. Music composers use found sound in their compositions. Examples include John Cage John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, philosopher, poet, music theorist, artist, printmaker, and amateur mycologist and mushroom collector. A pioneer of chance music, electronic music and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde. Critics have lauded him as one of the most, Nicolas Collins Nicolas Collins is an composer of mostly electronic music and former student of Alvin Lucier, Art of Noise, The Slant (band) and The Books. In British experimental music, Christopher Hobbs was the foremost proponent of the 'musical readymade', a concept named by John White.^[7] Hobbs used chance operations, systems and other 'dislocating procedures'^[8] on works by Tchaikovsky, John Bull, Bach, and others to create new pieces, including using a readymade or 'found' system (a knitting pattern for an Aran sweater) to create Aran (1972). Writers Brion Gysin and William Burroughs pioneered "cut ups", which was the random assembling of cut-up pre-existing text. This has also been employed by David Bowie, Kurt Cobain, Ted Milton and Thom Yorke for lyric writing. Poets, too, create art out of non-literary writing, such as vocabulary books, adverts or newspaper articles. Adrian Henri made the poem On the Late Late Massachers Stillbirths and Deformed Children a Smoother Lovelier Skin Job (and the title) by combining found text from John Milton's "Sonnet XVIII", the TV Times and a CND leaflet. Cordelia McGuire turned a funeral home classified advertisement into a poem entitled Embalmer by adding line breaks. Found art features in Jean-Pierre Jeunet's film Amélie and the 2001 independent comedy, Ghost World.

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