It’s the thought that counts

During a panel discussion in 1949, Frank Lloyd Wright made an undiplomatic comment about Marcel Duchamp’s celebrated picture of 1912, ‘Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2’, in the presence of the artist. ‘I am sure he doesn’t himself regard it as a great picture now.’ At this Duchamp bridled, exclaiming in his excellent English, ‘I beg your pardon, sir!’ However, the architect had a point, as the exhibition Dalí/Duchamp at the Royal Academy bears out. I came away from it reflecting that Duchamp wasn’t a very good painter.

This is not the point, obviously, that the RA intended to make. The idea was to reveal how much this improbable pair — the progenitor of conceptual art and the flamboyant showman of surrealism — actually had in common. It’s true they were good friends. On show there are letters and photographs of Duchamp, clad less elegantly than usual in shorts, visiting Dalí in his Catalan coastal lair at Cadaqués.