Bateau-Tableau

1973

Bateau-Tableau, 1973. Marcel Broodthaers (Belgian, 1924–1976). Projector, Slides; The Cleveland Museum of Art, Purchased with funds donated by Scott Mueller 2016.300 © Marcel Broodthaers Bateau-Tableau’s object of study is a 19th-century naval painting that the artist purchased in a Paris antiques shop. After the first slide displays the artwork, the following slides explore the painting through a series of successive close-ups. As the recognizable picture dissolves, we focus instead on the varied textures of paint on the work’s surface, the weave of the canvas, and the nails that hold the canvas to the wooden stretcher bars. An image becomes an object. Working primarily as a poet until the age of 40, Marcel Broodthaers often incorporated language and word play into his visual art.