ABSTRACT
Salvador Dali opens a brief dedication to the artist Marcel Duchamp in the preface to a collection of interviews conducted by Pierre Cabanne, with an ironic quip on poetic licence. Those familiar with Duchamp's work will recognise in Dali's comment a reference to Rrose Selavy, a feminine nom de plume that Duchamp adopted in 1920. In 1921, masquerading as a woman, Duchamp posed as Rrose for a series of photographic portraits produced by Man Ray. Whereas the identity of Rrose Selavy initiated a type of masquerade, her conception can also be read as an act of nomination that was deadly serious. Anticipated in the spirit of eros as an error, and distinguished by the repetition of the letter, her name can be understood as carrying the mark of a desire, which shows itself in the work of Duchamp in a series of returns.
