ABSTRACT
Although Marcel Duchamp is central to most histories of modern art, his engagement with geography has received limited scholarly attention. Yet Duchamp offers an ideal case study of the modern artist as traveller and geographer. At the heart of this study is the physical format of the case or valise that Duchamp chose as a central aspect of his work. In both senses, then, ‘The case of Marcel Duchamp’ points to the interwoven relationships between geography and modernism. This essay analyses three major stages in Duchamp’s ideas: first, his early focus on specific places as the subjects of his art; second, his broader consideration of geography and its attendant techniques; third, the significance of modern travel in Duchamp’s works, culminating in his Box in a Valise (Boîte-en-valise) (see figure 9.1).
