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Minor Canon

Broodthaers This Is Not a Work of Art tee

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In an essay titled "10,000 Francs Reward," Broodthaers wrote, "'This is not a work of art' is a formula obtained by the contraction of a concept by Duchamp ["this is a work of art"] and an antithetical concept by Magritte ["this is not a pipe"]." Broodthaers affixed a label with that same disclaimer to every object in his installation Musée d’Art Moderne, Département des Aigles, Section des Figures (Der Adler vom Oligozän bis Heute) (Museum of modern art, Department of Eagles, figures section [The eagle from the Oligocene to the present.]) 

Here the artist-as-museum-director gathered over 300 objects containing images of eagles—some of them artworks, some ancient images, some commercial objects, packaging, etc. Broodthaers' fictive "museum" and its paradoxical system of labels extend Duchamp and Magritte's ironic questioning of how language and authority confer (or deny) the aura of uniqueness and value that accrues to objects judged to be "art."

• 100% combed and ring-spun cotton (Heather colors contain polyester)
• Fabric weight: 4.2 oz/yd² (142 g/m²)
• Pre-shrunk fabric
• Side-seamed construction
• Shoulder-to-shoulder taping
• Blank product sourced from Guatemala, Nicaragua, Mexico, Honduras, or the US