1911

Nude Descending a Staircase (No. 1)

American (born France), 1887 - 1968

Addressing what he later called “the problem of motion in painting,” Marcel Duchamp here repeats elements of the nude’s body in her final steps down a precipitous spiral staircase. This evocation of elapsed time in a static composition resonates with the Futurist works of Giacomo Balla, Gino Severini, and others. However, by 1911 Duchamp was closely involved with the circle of artists gathering regularly in the Paris suburb of Puteaux. Other artists who belonged to the Puteaux Group included Fernand Léger, Robert Delaunay, and Josef Csaky.