Object to Be Destroyed

Object to Be Destroyed is a work by American artist Man Ray, originally created in 1923. The work, destroyed in 1957, consisted of a metronome with a photograph of an eye attached to its swinging arm. It was remade in multiple copies in later years, and renamed Indestructible Object. It is considered a "readymade", following in the relatively new tradition established by Marcel Duchamp of employing ordinary manufactured objects that usually were modified very little, if at all, as works of art.

The work consists of two elements. One element is a metronome manufactured by the Qualite Excelsior company. The other element is a small cutout of a black-and-white photograph of a woman's eye. The particular metronome is a mass-produced product that might be commonly found in many homes. It was probably secondhand when Man Ray reconfigured it as an art object, as it is marred, worn, missing minor parts and stands on mismatched feet, though its mechanism is in fair working order. Its box is made of wood, but its internal elements are made of metal. (Illustration here.) Its front door was removable.

The original Object to Be Destroyed was created in 1923. (See Readymades of Marcel Duchamp.) According to Man Ray, the piece was originally intended as a silent witness in his studio to watch him paint. In 1932 a second version, called Object of Destruction, was published in the avant-garde journal This Quarter, edited by André Breton. This version featured an ink drawing of the Object To Be Destroyed with the following instructions;

Cut out the eye from a photograph of one who has been loved but is seen no more. Attach the eye to the pendulum of a metronome and regulate the weight to suit the tempo desired. Keep going to the limit of endurance. With a hammer well-aimed, try to destroy the whole at a single blow.

1932 was the year Man Ray's lover, Lee Miller, left him to return to New York. To make the connection to Miller more explicit, the object's original eye was replaced with a photo of hers. This metronome was exhibited for the first time at Galerie Pierre Colle, Paris, as Eye-Metronome in 1933.

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