Pop Art: The Ready-Made Revisited
Pop Art is a movement that started in the late 1950s which has similar aspects to Dadaism as it challenges traditional conventions of art.

Artists, who were involved also created works that can be considered in relation to the concept of the ready-made.
The idea of the ready-made was created by Marcel Duchamp and it came to be known as ‘a work of art without the artist to make it’. Duchamp took manufactured objects and changed their meanings which made them works of art. I am going to look at how the concept of the ready-made is linked to the Pop Art movement.
Soft Medicine Cabinet by Claes Oldenburg is identified as a soft sculpture that Oldenburg created by choosing a manufactured object and recreating it with different materials. The object he chose for this piece was a medicine cabinet. Both the cabinet and the medicines inside would normally feel cold and hard, however, Oldenburg gave his version a deflated look. He replaced the medicines with acrylics and the cupboard with vinyl which are softer than what’s expected when we touch a medicine cabinet. This clearly contradicts the idea of a medicine cabinet as it is a hard solid.
Oldenburg’s way of representing the object emphasizes Duchamp’s ready-made as both change the function of an object.
In the case of the ready-made, an object is taken and put in another context, and similarly, creating soft sculptures includes a change of context. Soft Medicine Cabinet strongly relates to the concept of the ready-made also in the sense that it is a representation of a manufactured object. When the object lost its function as a result of being recreated, it only became something to be looked at as an art form. Oldenburg said ‘I like to take an object and deprive it of its function completely.’ As we can see from Soft Medicine Cabinet, the final product cannot be used. The ready-made were based on the idea of providing an object a new destination so we can suggest that Oldenburg’s work was inspired by the notion of the ready-made.
Duchamp used objects that we would recognise very easily to create his ready-made. His use of everyday objects made it more obvious that he was changing the context of an object as the audience knew what the object was actually used for. Similarly, Oldenburg uses objects the audience can recognise instantly because he wants to emphasize the difference between the original and his version. In the case of Soft Medicine Cabinet, one can identify the differences easily by thinking about how we use the original object and how it would feel to use his one.
The soft sculpture would be pretty much useless seeing that it destroys the whole meaning of a cabinet.
There is no point in having a cabinet if its door doesn’t function properly. To emphasize this Oldenburg took the materials he used into consideration. He explained; ‘They were first made in muslin and then redone in vinyl because I wanted to get a yielding surface. That was one of the ways I felt I could remove the object from its context, I mean to individualise it.’ In relation to Soft Medicine Cabinet, by yielding surface Oldenburg was referring to the fact that he got rid of the object’s original function. Also, by individualising it, he was able to remove it from its context and create an entirely different meaning for the object.
Brillo Boxes by Andy Warhol is another example of Pop Art that deals with ready-made and mass reproduction. Brillo Boxes are empty wooden boxes painted in the style of Brillo Soap which can be seen as replicas of a manufactured object. The way they are displayed is a reminder of how products are presented in shops however they can no longer function as a product. They cannot be ‘used’ and are only seen as a form of art. Duchamp also aimed to remove an object from its original context by destroying its function which shows that the ideas associated with Pop Art were inspired by the ready-mades.
Brillo Boxes makes reference to how everything is becoming something to be looked at because of mass reproduction. Photographs are printed out again and again for magazines and newspapers to the point where the products are no longer seen within their original contexts. Just like Duchamp’s ready-mades, these boxes simply became something to be observed. They have no use other than being treated as an art form.
Many critics suggested that Brillo Boxes shouldn’t be considered art as they resemble the actual object exactly.
George Dickie, the author of Aesthetics: An Introduction suggested that such objects are classified as art because art is an artifact ‘which has had conferred upon it the status of candidate for appreciation by some person or persons acting in behalf of a certain social institution.’ Judging from this quote, we can claim that Dickie is referring to the idea that Brillo Boxes are art only because of Warhol’s status in the art world. He is a famous artist and therefore any work done by him will eventually be presented in a gallery. When the work enters the gallery it gets promoted to the status of art.
The same argument could be applied to Marcel Duchamp’s ready-mades seeing as their concept is very similar to Brillo Boxes. One being an identical representation and the other the object itself, we can suggest that both works are only looked at as art because they are displayed in a gallery. Also, displaying an object that is easily recognisable is different than having it at home or seeing it in a shop. This is because when they, or an exact representation, is displayed in a gallery, a close analysis is forced and therefore a new meaning is added to the work.
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