Abstract
The notion of the “lighthouse” describes the crucial process of identification supporting the tasty affairs, the artist’s strict adherence to a set of controlling principles that take the form of an “ism”: the construction of an idealized figurehead or “star” with whom a group of artists can identify in order to become subjectively engaged in their work. Identification with the lighthouse ensures that the act of producing in line with a taste is firmly rooted in a fundamental psychological “need.” To make this explicit, Duchamp plays with his own role as lighthouse, first within the Surrealist group and, later, within the 1950s and 60s art scene where he became an idealized figurehead for a new generation of artists to follow.
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Notes
- 1.
At issue here is the notion of ideological “interpellation ,” first introduced by Althusser and then developed by Žižek along psychoanalytic lines: in essence, interpellation describes the mechanism through which the subject is made to submit to an “ideological command ” (Žižek, 2008, p. 43).
- 2.
This, for Lacan, is the final element in symbolic identification , what he terms the “Ego -ideal”: a personified , idealized gaze with which one identifies at the level of the ideal-ego, an imaginary place from where we see ourselves as being observed, “from where we look at ourselves so that we appear to ourselves likeable” (Žižek, 2008, p. 116).
- 3.
Kosuth , it should be noted, was developing a point made by Arturo Danto in his 1964 essay “The Artworld” where he described Fountain as opening up a new (non-visual) category of art (see Danto, 1964).
References
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Danto, Arturo. 1964. “The Artworld.” The Journal of Philosophy. Vol. 61, Issue 19, October 15, 571–584.
Duchamp, Marcel. 1973. “Collection of the Société Anonyme.” In The Writings of Marcel Duchamp. Edited by Michael Sanouillet and Elmer Peterson. New York: Da Capo Press.
Duchamp, Marcel. 1979. Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp. Translated by Ron Padgett. London: Da Capo Press.
Kosuth, Joseph. 1969. “Art after Philosophy.” In Studio International. Vol. 178, Issues 915–17, October, November, December.
Steegmuller, Francis. 1963. “Duchamp: Fifty Years Later.” Show 3, Issue 1, February.
Tomkins, Calvin. 1996. Duchamp: A Biography. New York: Henry Holt & Company.
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Kilroy, R. (2018). The Lighthouse. In: Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69158-9_11
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