JM: After sending a Nabokov
Sighting, extracted from a biography about Saul Steinberg, I googled
for more information concerning the relation bt both artists.
I was only motivated to add it now because
of Sam's reference to Duchamp's readymades and a note by Sarah
Bozer (see last entry below):
Christopheer Hawtree (May 14,1999) quoted
Nabokov when writing about "Saul Steinberg, his numbers, cats and brilliant
drawings changed American art": " 'We have just received your magic ledger, the New World,'
wrote Vladimir Nabokov to the cartoonist Saul Steinberg in 1965. 'Everything in it is a delight - the curlicues of genius, the
patch on the C of Etc in the lower queue, the wonderful balancing acts of
fractions, the performance of trained numerals, St George spearing the Missum or
attacking the attackers of his prey, the dreamlife of wayward cubes and circles,
chairs and dogs, the peacock arrows, the activities of speech balloons and
question marks... ' As an account of the essence of the art of
Steinberg, who has died aged 84, this can hardly be bettered.
A few days later, Tom Spurgeon (28 June
1999, "Saul Steinberg Dies") noted: "A barrage of obituaries in
national magazines and newspapers, including the front page of The New York
Times, lauded Steinberg as an artist on par with Picasso, Duchamp, and Daumier;
and as a social critic on the level of Pirandello, Chaplin, and
Nabokov."
Much later, in February 2007, there is an
article by Sarah Bozer ("Drawn from life"- Artforum
International): "One of the most moving works in the Morgan
show is a Steinberg bookshelf filled with wooden books ostensibly by Nabokov,
Gogol, and Stendhal, but, of course, constructed, decorated, and worn down by
Steinberg. The books are old-world Warhols, boxes without that fresh Brillo
script, cans without the Campbell's label. Yet they actually do have a
recognizable label: They are all Steinbergs. And, like all Steinberg
objects--maps, calendars, doodles, and passports--they are part of his
biography, part of who he was or, more precisely, the things you would put in
his tomb to show who he was."