Objet Trouvé – Found Objet

No, this entry is not about the water bottle your daughter left at the last drawing class!I thought I might show you how some artists have been re-using objects in their sculptures way before he word “recycling” had ever been invented. It’s about serendipity. The most famous sculptures that come to mind are Picasso‘s Bull Head and Marcel Duchamp‘s Bicycle wheel. Marcel Duchamp even coined the term “Objet Trouvé“.

In his website “Understanding Duchamps”, Andrew Stafford explains that Duchamp was making a new kind of art: one that engages the mind rather than the eye.

I don’t think the artists new what their sculpture was planned. It’s an example of “top-down” design: you do with what you have. I enjoy working with recycled objects, and using them in children’s workshop. The difficulty is that you cannot really plan the workshop…. things just happen. But things really happen when you put unlikely objects next to each other. You see the world differently. You might want to go and see what children do with clay and found objects. It is one of my favorite workshops because it’s all in the hands of the children. The clay is really just coloured plasticine and can be used as “cement” or “glue” as well as bona fide material to build with.

I urge you to try this at home! Put objects together that don’t usually belong. And if you think you might need a little help, why not sign up for the Easter workshop.