Let’s begin with the obvious: Duchamp’s Fountain really was a urinal. Not a painting or sculpture of a urinoir – though the latter might raise interesting philosophical questions – but the real thing, a token of a particular type – there were many visually indistinguishable urinals that came off the same production line. And just as importantly, Duchamp had no involvement whatsoever in designing or making the urinal that was the raw material for his artwork. His contribution was to sign the urinal, and exhibit it as art.
Couldn't agree with you more. But In the last 1007 posts or ever since the community's been founded, I've only noticed people getting confused 6-7 times in total. Here's to hoping the sidebar + the pinned post in the top is good enough to prevent further confusion. I suspect most of it comes from people who are seeing posts from this community on the all section for the first time.