À Table with Marcel Duchamp

Two seemingly abstract scribbles – one on the front, one on the back – when held up to a light source they reveal legible names: Carlo for Carl Van Vechten, Fania for Fania Marionoff (Van Vechten’s wife), Picabia for Francis Picabia, and Roché for Henri-Pierre Roché, who later gained fame for his novel »Jules et Jim«, adapted into a film by Truffaut. And just like that, the place cards were born. What makes these small paper works so extraordinary is not just their context but also Marcel Duchamp’s signature approach. Guests had to hold the cards up to a light source to decipher their names, and some could only be read at a specific angle, in keeping with the principles of anamorphic vision. This party trick seamlessly aligned with the optical experiments Duchamp conducted in the 1910s, which he himself considered preliminary studies for his most famous work, »The Large Glass«. By the time Marcel Duchamp arrived in New York in 1915, he was already a celebrity. His painting »Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2« had caused a scandal at the 1913 Armory Show, earning him immense admiration in artistic and intellectual circles. Duchamp was welcomed as a celebrity and introduced to New York high society, staying with the Arensbergs, who most nights hosted artist salons. The daughters of the wealthy Stettheimer family organized Duchamp’s 30th birthday party and reportedly asked him to create the place cards in question for his friends. Three of these place cards – for Van Vechten, Marionoff, and Picabia – were already part of the Staatliches Museum Schwerin’s collection, which, with 90 works by Duchamp, ranks among Europe’s largest and most significant Duchamp holdings. The fourth and final surviving card – for his closest friend and companion, Henri-Pierre Roché – was acquired by the museum in 2024, completing a globally unique ensemble. For the first time since their creation, all four cards are reunited and presented to the public at the museum’s reopening in Schwerin. Kerstin Krautwig has meticulously researched the history of these remarkable place cards.