Eleftheria Tseliou Gallery is happy to present, for the first time in Greece, an exhibition of works by Marcel Duchamp. The exhibition is entitled Re(a)Duchamp and has been conceived and curated by Kyrillos Sarris. The exhibition opens on Wednesday, February 21st, and will continue until the 30th of March 2024. The works presented come from private collections and institutions in Europe and the US. Kyrillos Sarris’ book, Marcel Duchamp (28.7.1887 – 2.10.1968), will be released alongside the exhibition, published by Agra Publications and the Eleftheria Tseliou Gallery.
As he collects and processes a series of notes and studies on glass, he conceives of the idea to place painting in the service of cognition. The strategy for achieving this purpose is to shift from the aesthetic allure of the object of art to the allure of philosophical engagement with the ontology of the work. What follows, without going into details, opens up two routes with a defining impact on contemporary art. Firstly, the rediscovery, in the late 1950s, of Marcel Duchamp as a maker of objects rather than a member of the group of surrealists who had sought refuge in America, by the Rauschenberg – Johns, and the involvement of the British Richard Hamilton in the study and typographical reproduction of his notes, lead to neo-Dadaism and pop art. Secondly, the end of the 1960s and a fresh interpretation of Duchamp’s work by the “gang of wizards who make objects disappear” (Kosuth, Huebler, Weiner, et al.) brings the movement known as conceptual art to the forefront of the art world.
Kyrillos Sarris, Marcel Duchamp (28.7.1887 – 2.10.1968), Agra / Eleftheria Tseliou Gallery, Athens 2024
translated in English by Daphne Kapsali
Finally, we would like to give special thanks to Daniel Marzona, Stavros Petsopoulos, George Hadjimichalis and, of course, everyone who entrust us with works from their collections.