Readymades of Marcel Duchamp to turn up any identical matches to photographs of the originals. However, there are accounts of Walter Arensberg and Joseph Stella being with Duchamp when he purchased the original "Fountain" at J. L. Mott Iron Works. Such investigations are hampered by the fact that few of the original "readymades" survive, having been lost or destroyed. Those that still exist are predominantly reproductions authorized or designed by Duchamp in the final two decades of his life. Shearer also asserts that the artwork "L.H.O.O.Q." which is recorded to be a poster-copy of the "Mona Lisa" with a moustache drawn on it, is
Readymades of Marcel Duchamp distinguish them from handmade goods. He selected the pieces on the basis of "visual indifference," and the selections reflect his sense of irony, humor and ambiguity: "...it was always the idea that came first, not the visual example," he said; "...a form of denying the possibility of defining art." The first definition of "readymade" appeared in André Breton and Paul Éluard's "Dictionnaire abrégé du Surréalisme": "an ordinary object elevated to the dignity of a work of art by the mere choice of an artist." While published under the name of Marcel Duchamp (or his initials, "MD," to be precise), André