138. Object (Le Déjeuner en fourrure). Meret Oppenheim. 1936 CE. Fur covered cup, Saucer and spoon.

• Form
  • An assemblage
• Context
  • Said to have been done in response to Picasso’s claim that anything looks good in fur; Oppenheim said to respond, “Even this cup and saucer?”
  • Erotic overtones
  • Combination of unlike objects: fur-covered teacup, saucer, and spoon. The tea cup was purchased at a department store; the fur is the pelt of a Chinese gazelle
  • A contrast of textures: fur delights the touch, not the taste; cups and spoons are meant to be put in the mouth
  • Oppenheim did not title the work, nut the Surrealist critic, Andre Breton, called the piece Luncheon in Fur, a title that references Edourard Mantet’s Luncheon on the Grass as well as the erotic novel by Leopol von Sacher-Masoch called Venus in Furs
  • Chosen by visitors to a Surrealist show in New York as the quintessential Surrealist work of art
  • Because fame came to Oppenheim so young, it inhibited her growth as an artist