Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2

Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2
French: Nu descendant un escalier n° 2
ArtistMarcel Duchamp
Year1912
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions147 cm × 89.2 cm (57+78 in × 35+18 in)
LocationPhiladelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia

Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 (French: Nu descendant un escalier n° 2) is a 1912 painting by Marcel Duchamp. The work is widely regarded as a Modernist classic and has become one of the most famous of its time. Before its first presentation at the 1912 Salon des Indépendants in Paris it was rejected by the Cubists as being too Futurist. It was then exhibited with the Cubists at Galeries Dalmau's Exposició d'Art Cubista, in Barcelona, 20 April  10 May 1912. The painting was subsequently shown, and ridiculed, at the 1913 Armory Show in New York City.

Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 was reproduced by Guillaume Apollinaire in his 1913 book, Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques. It is now in the Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.