Marcel Duchamp

French artist Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) is known as a key leader of the surrealist and Dada movements. He began his career as a painter in 1908, but moved on to sculpture relatively early in his career. He pioneered both kinetic art and ready-made art two innovations that would prove seminal to surrealism and Dada art. His ready-made works were constructed of simple everyday objects taken out of context as art, most famously his Fountain, a urinal signed by the artist and mounted on a gallery wall. The work was even voted the most influential modern art work of all time. Duchamp did not leave a large body of work, and was actually quite content to see his ideas taken on and further developed by other artists.