Found Object (Objet Trouvé): How Everyday Things Became Art

In April 1917, a porcelain urinal was submitted to the first exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists in New York. The submission came with a six-dollar membership fee and the signature "R. Mutt" painted on the side. The board voted to reject it. The object, titled Fountain, was almost certainly submitted by Marcel Duchamp, who had helped found the society on the principle that no artist's work could be refused. He resigned from the board in protest. The original urinal was lost. What survives are photographs taken by Alfred Stieglitz and a handful of authorized replicas made by Duchamp in the 1960s. Today, those replicas sit in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Tate Modern, and the Centre Pompidou, displayed behind glass on pedestals. A urinal became one of the most influential artworks of the 20th century.

A found object, or objet trouvé in French, is an everyday item that an artist selects and presents as art, either in its original state or modified in some way. The object is not made by the artist. It is found, chosen, and recontextualized. The artist's act is one of selection rather than fabrication. The term covers a spectrum from Duchamp's unaltered readymades to Picasso's modified bicycle saddle and handlebars assembled into a bull's head. What unites them is that the object retains traces of its original identity and function, even as it takes on new meaning within the context of art.

This entry covers the history of the found object, from its origins in Dada to its influence on contemporary art, the key artists who defined it, and how to understand it when you encounter it in a museum.

What Is a Found Object?

The found object is exactly what the name suggests: an object that already existed in the world, which an artist found and decided was art. The artist did not carve it, model it, paint it, or cast it. The creative act is the choice itself. Duchamp described this as "a reaction of visual indifference, with at the same time a total absence of good or bad taste." The object is selected not for its beauty or craftsmanship but for the intellectual provocation of placing it in a gallery.

The Tate defines a found object as "a natural or man-made object, or fragment of an object, that is found (or sometimes bought) by an artist and kept because of some intrinsic interest the artist sees in it." Read the full definition at Tate. The found object differs from traditional art materials because it was not manufactured to be art. A block of marble is a material. A bicycle wheel is a found object. The marble becomes art through carving. The bicycle wheel becomes art through designation.

There is an important distinction between the found object and the readymade. The readymade is a specific subcategory coined by Duchamp to describe completely unaltered manufactured objects. In its strictest sense, the term applies exclusively to Duchamp's works from 1913 to 1921. The found object is the broader category, encompassing readymades but also including objects that have been modified, combined, or partially transformed. A 2025 study published in the Journal of Shanghai University argues that readymades, as external forces residing within the museum institution, prompt a self-reflective mechanism that preserves their politically critical potential even after institutionalization. Read the study at Journal of Shanghai University.

Origins and History

Precursors and the Incoherents (1880s)

Before Duchamp, the Incoherents, a group of Parisian artists who exhibited between 1882 and 1893, produced works that anticipated the found object. Alphonse Allais exhibited Des souteneurs encore dans la force de l'âge et le ventre dans l'herbe, consisting of a green carriage curtain suspended from a wooden cylinder. The French expert Johann Naldi identified this work in a private collection and it was classified as a national treasure by the French Ministry of Culture on May 7, 2021. According to Naldi, this work, exhibited at the Incoherents exhibitions in Paris between 1883 and 1893, is the oldest known readymade and was a source of inspiration for Duchamp.

Picasso and Cubism (1912-1914)

Picasso first used the found object in Still Life with Chair Caning (1912), gluing a piece of oilcloth printed to simulate chair caning onto a canvas and wrapping the oval canvas with hemp rope. This is considered the first collage by a modern master, and it brought a real manufactured object into the space of painting. Picasso then built small three-dimensional constructions from cardboard and wood scraps, including Still Life (1914), made from wood fragments and tablecloth fringing. These works opened the door to using anything as art material.

Duchamp and the Readymade (1913-1921)

Duchamp coined the term "readymade" in 1915 while living in New York, borrowing the word from the clothing industry (French prêt-à-porter, meaning ready-to-wear). His first readymade was Bicycle Wheel (1913), a front wheel and fork mounted on a wooden stool. This was followed by Bottle Rack (1914), an unaltered bottle dryer purchased from a Paris department store, and In Advance of the Broken Arm (1915), a snow shovel inscribed with that title.

Fountain (1917) is the most notorious. In a letter to his sister Suzanne, Duchamp indicated that a female friend was centrally involved in the conception, writing: "One of my female friends who had adopted the pseudonym Richard Mutt sent me a porcelain urinal as a sculpture." Scholars have argued that the Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven or Louise Norton may have been the real author. The anonymous editorial published in the May 1917 issue of The Blind Man defended the work: "Whether Mr Mutt with his own hands made the fountain or not has no importance. He CHOSE it. He took an ordinary article of life, and placed it so that its useful significance disappeared under the new title and point of view, created a new thought for that object." Read the editorial and related documents at Tate's readymade page.

Dada and Surrealism (1916-1966)

Dada artists embraced the found object as part of their attack on traditional art. Kurt Schwitters assembled pictures from bus tickets, labels, and refuse collected from the streets of Hanover, calling his technique Merz. His Merzbau, a room-sized sculptural construction built into his house over many years, was the most ambitious found object artwork of the period before it was destroyed by Allied bombing in 1943. The Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven created assemblages from found objects in New York, establishing herself as one of the earliest women artists in the medium.

Surrealist artists used found objects to create surprising and unsettling combinations. Meret Oppenheim's Object (1936), a teacup covered in fur, transforms a familiar object into something disturbing. Man Ray combined found objects with photographic techniques. The surrealists drew on Freud's writings about the unconscious and dreams, combining unlikely objects to create what they called the "uncanny."

Postwar and Contemporary (1950s-Present)

In the 1950s, the found object became central to Neo-Dada and Pop Art. Robert Rauschenberg's Combines (1954-1964), such as Bed (1955), which incorporates a real quilt and pillow, and Monogram (1955-1959), which includes a stuffed goat with a tire around its middle, blur the line between painting and sculpture. The found object also influenced Arte Povera in Italy, where artists like Jannis Kounellis and Michelangelo Pistoletto used raw, industrial, and natural materials.

In the 1990s, the Young British Artists revived the found object. Tracey Emin's My Bed (1998), an unmade bed surrounded by condoms, cigarettes, and stained underwear, was exhibited at the Turner Prize exhibition at the Tate Gallery. Damien Hirst's shark in formaldehyde, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (1991), uses a found animal as the central object. Michael Landy's Break Down (2001) involved systematically destroying all his possessions in a former department store, turning the found object concept into an act of erasure.

Key Artists

Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968)

Duchamp invented the readymade and, with it, the concept that the artist's choice is itself a creative act. His readymades from 1913 to 1921, including Bicycle Wheel, Bottle Rack, In Advance of the Broken Arm, and Fountain, are the foundational works. Duchamp produced relatively few readymades, perhaps 20 to 30, and their scarcity is part of their power. He later referred to some as "assisted readymades," objects that required minor modification or combination. The Dieter Daniels study Readymade Century notes that there is no established definitive list of Duchamp's readymades. Read more at Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig.

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

Picasso's Still Life with Chair Caning (1912) and his constructed sculptures of 1912-1914 are the origin point of the found object in modern art. His Bull's Head (1942), made from a bicycle saddle and handlebars, is a concise demonstration of the principle: two ordinary objects, combined, become something else entirely. The saddle forms the bull's face, the handlebars form the horns. The transformation is minimal but the result is unmistakable.

Meret Oppenheim (1913-1985)

Oppenheim's Object (1936), a teacup, saucer, and spoon covered in gazelle fur, is the most famous surrealist found object. It was exhibited at the Charles Ratton Gallery in Paris and caused a sensation. The cup, a symbol of domestic civility, becomes animal and tactile. Oppenheim was 22 years old when she made it. The work is now in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Robert Rauschenberg (1925-2008)

Rauschenberg's Combines are the most famous American found object works. Monogram (1955-1959), with its stuffed Angora goat, tire, and painted platform, and Bed (1955), with its real quilt and pillow splashed with paint, challenged the distinction between painting and sculpture. Rauschenberg described his approach as operating "in the gap between art and life." His work is central to the assemblage tradition.

Tracey Emin (born 1963)

Emin's My Bed (1998) is the most discussed found object artwork of the late 20th century. The bed, with its sheets, pillows, and surrounding detritus, was exhibited as-is. The work was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1999 and purchased by Charles Saatchi for £150,000. It was later sold at Christie's in 2014 for £2.2 million. The work extends the found object tradition into deeply personal territory, where the object is not anonymous but biographical.

Found Object and Related Terms

The found object is the building block of assemblage, where multiple found objects are combined into three-dimensional works. It connects to Dadaism, the movement that first embraced found objects as an attack on traditional art, and to Surrealism, which used found objects to create uncanny combinations. The readymade is the specific, unaltered form of the found object, most associated with Duchamp. The found object also influenced Arte Povera, which used humble and throwaway materials, and environmental art, which incorporates natural found materials into site-specific works.

See Found Objects in Person

Duchamp's Fountain replicas are at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Tate Modern, and Centre Pompidou. Picasso's Bull's Head is at the Musée Picasso in Paris. Oppenheim's Object is at MoMA in New York. Rauschenberg's Monogram is at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm. Emin's My Bed is in a private collection but has been exhibited at the Tate and other major institutions.

When you encounter a found object in a museum, the first question to ask is not "is this art?" but "what does the choice of this object tell me?" The object's original function, its placement, its title, and its context all contribute to its meaning as art. For more on related practices, read our entries on assemblage and Dadaism, or explore our guide on how to read a painting for visual analysis skills that apply to any artwork, including those made from things you might find in a hardware store.