1913issue6online

11 But our subject died just as this science of friction emerged, redirecting attention from shapes to surfaces and interfaces— and of course the kinetics of what was once retinal—those interacting surfaces becoming third bodies (children or feelings)—their friction, lubrication and wear. God made solids, but surfaces were the work of Devil, Wolfgang Pauli warned, but surfaces are how objects communicate with the outside world. <<<<<< COMB A painter uses a brush. Duchamp favored the comb. There is a clew to unravel and it is made of hair. Hair grows but does it live? A hair senses movements of air as well as touch; it can bend the light, forcing a man ray to split (rendez- vous with a readymade). His praise for his first wife: “Elle se coiffe avec un clou.” A bride to turn around swings on hinges, slides or spins; a double-door of two leaves just as a shim ultrathins between objects or a bachelor oscillates. Without the liberty of indifference, a hungry-thirsty donkey dies.* Rendez-vous with a ready-made. 16 II 16, 11 am. The “timing” is the important thing, the “snapshot effect, like a speech delivered on no matter what occasion but at such and such an hour.” In the file we have only an ordinary metal dog comb—the only “original” readymade that survives. It was never stolen since it was chosen in 1916, and retains the characteristics of a true readymade: no beauty, no ugliness, nothing particularly esthetic about it… “Classify combs by the number of their teeth,” Duchamp proposed, and while comb-teeth, like bridges, have harmonic qualities of their own, they are not both cutouts for the operation.

1913issue6online

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