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’s Turner Prize exhibition of Tracey Emin’s My Bed, 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.

Assemblage is an artistic process in which a three-dimensional artistic composition is made from putting together found objects.

The origin of the word (in its artistic sense) can be traced back to the early 1950s, when Jean Dubuffet created a series of collages of butterfly wings, which he titled assemblages d’empreintes. However, both Marcel Duchamp and Pablo Picasso had been working with found objects for many years prior to Dubuffet. They were not alone, alongside Duchamp the earliest woman artist to try her hand at assemblage was Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven, the Dada Baroness, and one of the most prolific, as well as producing some of the most exciting early examples, was Louise Nevelson, who began creating her sculptures from found pieces of wood in the late 1930s.

In 1961, the exhibition “The Art of Assemblage” was featured at the New York Museum of Modern Art. The exhibition showcased the work of early twentieth century European artists such as Braque, Dubuffet, Marcel Duchamp, Picasso, and Kurt Schwitters alongside Americans Man Ray, Joseph Cornell and Robert Rauschenberg, and also included less well known American West Coast assemblage artists such as Wallace Berman, Bruce Conner and Edward Kienholz. William C Seitz, the curator of the exhibition, described assemblages as being made up of preformed natural or manufactured materials, objects, or fragments not intended as art materials.^[1]

Marcel Duchamp coined the term readymade in 1915 to describe his found art. Duchamp assembled the first readymade, entitled Bicycle Wheel in 1913, the same time as his Nude Descending a Staircase was attracting the attention of critics at the International Exhibition of Modern Art. His Fountain, a urinal which he signed with the pseudonym “R. Mutt”, confounded the art world in 1917. Bottle Rack 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 and Joseph Stella being with Duchamp when he purchased the original Fountain at J. L. Mott Iron Works.^[2]

Floating toxic plastic garbage island twice the size of Texas

Sculpture made from recycled materials on display at library
January 6, 2010 in Library, Mission Viejo, News | Tags: city of mission viejo, mission viejo life, mission viejo news, mission viejo official blog, recycled, Sculpture

A sculpture created from cans, plastic bottles, broken toys and other recycled materials is now on display at the Mission Viejo Library.

Sculptor Richard J. Hinger donated a piece of artwork that spells out the word “Read” to the library, after a resident and fan of his work suggested it. The colorful and inventive sculpture is one in a series of works Hinger created for libraries.

The series is entitled “Lehighton Letters” and is made of discarded and recycled materials that usually end up in landfills. The found objects are then assembled and covered with brightly colored paints.

The “Read” sculpture is on display in the library’s Young Adult area for all patrons to enjoy. The Mission Viejo Library is located at 100 Civic Center.

More of Hinger’s work can be seen on his Web site at www.richardjhinger.com.

Sculpture Quotes
Where the material ends, art begins. (Etienne Hajdu)

A sculptor is a person obsessed with the form and shape of things. (Henry Moore)

Sculpture is the art of the hole and the lump. (Auguste Rodin)

The people who really took off and were empowered by [Newman and Pollock] - particularly in this country - were the sculptors and not the painters… there hasn’t been any great American painting [since] that challenged abstraction in the way they did. (Richard Serra)

It is a great privilege to be able to work with, and I suppose work off, my feelings through sculpture. (Louise Bourgeois)

The art of sculpture is long ago perished to any real effect… it is the game of a rude and youthful people, and not the manly labour of a wise and spiritual nation. (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

When an artist signs work he never touched is when the work should be left alone as well. (Preston Fillmore)

RJH