Duchamp's Erotic Stereoscopic Exercises

Authors

  • Gavin Adams University of São Paulo; Escola de Artes, Comunicação e Humanidades

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1590/1982-02672015v23n0206

Abstract

This article explores certain links between medicine and art, with regard to their use of stereoscopy. I highlight a work by the artist Marcel Duchamp (the ready-made Stéréoscopie a la Main) and stereoscopic cards used in ophthalmic medicine. Both instances involve the drawing of graphic marks over previously existing stereoscopic cards. This similarity between Stéréoscopie a la Main and stereoscopic cards is echoed in the form of "stereoscopic exercises." Stereoscopic exercises were prescribed by doctors to be performed with the stereoscope as early as 1864. Stereoscopic cards were widely diffused in the 19th century, often promoted as "stay-at-home travel." It was over such kinds of materials that both Marcel Duchamp and doctors of ophthalmic medicine drew their graphic marks. I explore Duchamp's Stéréoscopie a la Main as a hypothetical basis for stereoscopic exercises of different types, proposing that this rectified ready-made is the locus for erotic stereoscopic exercises.

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Published

2015-12-01

Issue

Section

Material Culture Studies

How to Cite

ADAMS, Gavin. Duchamp’s Erotic Stereoscopic Exercises . Anais do Museu Paulista: História e Cultura Material, São Paulo, v. 23, n. 2, p. 165–185, 2015. DOI: 10.1590/1982-02672015v23n0206. Disponível em: https://revistas.usp.br/anaismp/article/view/109637.. Acesso em: 19 jun. 2024.