Barbara Visser

In 2004, a urinal was voted the most influential work ever in modern art. Famed artist and provocateur Marcel Duchamp claimed to have created “Fountain”—or rather, he bought the mass-produced product and signed it—but according to some, it is the lesser-known, flamboyant Dadaist artist Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven who should take credit for transforming this much-discussed porcelain “piss pot” into art.

Who is still afraid of red, yellow and blue? It is one of the most important abstract paintings of the twentieth century and has evoked more than just this provoking question. Fifty years after the event around the painting "Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue III" by Barnett Newman the question is asked: what is art?