Marcel Duchamp's Boîte-en-valise: The Museum of MetamorphosisMain MenuIntroductionThe Museum of MetamorphosisCatalogue essayThe Seven Series of BoîtesBoîtes in Museum Collections around the World…and OnlineFurther Reading[bibliography page]Lauren Rooney597ff088ef1db884d9e8445c7e06bd004b6c1250
Frederick Kiesler's Viewing Device
12023-06-20T14:48:13-07:00Lauren Rooney597ff088ef1db884d9e8445c7e06bd004b6c1250427003plain2023-06-20T14:54:21-07:00Lauren Rooney597ff088ef1db884d9e8445c7e06bd004b6c1250When Duchamp exhibited the Boîte at Peggy Guggenheim's Art of This Century Gallery in 1942, it appeared in a case alongside a special contraption designed by Frederick Kiesler, then Duchamp's close friend and roommate, that allowed one viewer at a time, peering through a peephole, to cycle through fourteen feuilles libres by turning a wheel.1 This early installation of the Boîte, with its "peepshow effect,"2 thematized the distance established by the context of exhibition at an art gallery between the portable, collectible object and its beholder.
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1media/1981.98.1_thumb.png2023-06-20T14:45:48-07:00Lauren Rooney597ff088ef1db884d9e8445c7e06bd004b6c1250Kiesler's Viewing Device1Berenice Abbott (Springfield, Ohio, 1989-1991), Kinetic Gallery: Viewing Mechanism for Marcel Duchamp's Boîte-en-valise, Designed by Frederick Kiesler, 1942, Gelatin Silver Printmedia/1981.98.1.pngplain2023-06-20T14:45:49-07:00The Fralin Museum of Art at the University of VirginiaLauren Rooney597ff088ef1db884d9e8445c7e06bd004b6c1250