La Distruzione come Creazione Artistica: Problemi Legali e Filosofici dell'Arte Contemporanea

Pierre Pinoncelli peed in one of Duchamp’s Fountain ready-mades, and later struck it with a hammer. He did it in the name of art, as a controversial, but recognized performance artist. However, the tribunal de grande instance de tarascon found that he had to pay damages for the restauration of the artwork Fountain. His paternity rights over the performance were denied in the name of a strict definition of “integrity rights” recognized to Duchamp’s work. The relationship between the law and art which causes destruction is very complex: in this essay we’ll look at some cases and we’ll see the history of both destruction art and of artists’ moral rights, and how the latter are considered, by some scholars, constricting to the freedom of artistic creation.