ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG: A RETROSPECTIVE
Walter Hopps and Susan Davidson
Walter Hopps and Susan Davidson: ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG: A RETROSPECTIVE. New York: The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, 1997. First edition. Thick quarto. Black cloth. Blindstamped titles. Photo illustrated dust jacket. 632 pp. 490 color plates. 245 black and white illustrations. Multiple fold outs. Interior unmarked and very clean. Out-of-print. Jacket lightly rubbed [as usual] with trivial edge wear. A nice copy of this oversized, easily abused volume: a nearly fine copy in a very good or better dust jacket.
10 x 12 hardcover book with 632 pages and 490 full-color and 245 black and white reproductions. Published in conjunction with an exhibtion of the same name: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Guggenheim Museum SoHo, and Guggenheim Museum at Ace Gallery, NYC (Sept 19, 1997-Jan 7, 1998); The Menil Collection, Contemporary Arts Museum, and The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (Feb 13-May 17, 1998); Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (Nov 20-Feb 26, 1999).
This lavishly illustrated monograph addresses the full scope and complexity of Rauschenberg's work. Accompanying a major traveling retrospective organized by Walter Hopps and Susan Davidson, this catalogue is the definitive source on the artist, and it shows, for the first time in one volume, Rauschenberg's development of particular motifs over the course of his career. Five essays by the exibition's curators and other scholars interpret specific aspects of Rauschenberg's oeuvre while highlighting his unique contribution across disciplines. Three essays for former and current collaborators reveal the artist's working process in the fields of performance and technology-based art. Nine overviews to the full-color plate sections demonstrate how Rauschenberg's work falls into destinct artistic cycles. An exhaustive chronology, including scores of documentary photographs, examines the artist's life and career. Completeing the book are exhibition and performance histories and a bibliography, all reflecting the most current research on this major figure in American art.
- Introduction by Walter Hopps: Rauschenberg's Art of Fusion
- Rauschenberg's Everything, Everywhere Era by Charles F. Stuckey
- EARLY WORK, 1949-1954: Overview by Susan Davidson
- Perpetual Inventory by Rosalind Krauss
- PERFORMANCE, 1954-1994
- Rauschenberg and Performance, 1963-1967: A Poetry of Infinite Possibilities by Nancy Spector
- COLLABORATIONS
- Rauschenberg for Cunningham and Three of His Own by Steve Paxton
- Collaboration: Life and Death in the Aesthetic Zone by Trisha Brown
- CHOREOGRAPHY BY THE ARTIST
- ART AND TECHNOLOGY, 1959-1995: Overview by Susan Davidson
- Working with Rauschenberg by Billy Kluver with Julie Martin
- ASSEMBLED WORKS WITH CARDBOARD, PAPER, AND FABRIC, 1970-1976: Overview by Joan Young
- Writing on Rocks, Rubbing on Silk, Layering on Paper by Ruth E. Fine
- LARGE-SCALE PAINTINGS AND SCULPTURE, 1975-Present: Overview by Joan Young
- INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION, 1982-1995: Overview by Elizabeth Carpenter
- SCULPTURE AND PAINTINGS ON METAL, 1986-1995: Overview by Elizabeth Carpenter
- TRANSFER WORKS ON PAPER, FABRIC, AND FRESCO, 1992-1997: Overview by Julia Blaut
- Chronology by Joan Young with Susan Davidson
- Exhibition History by Mary Lynn Kotz
- Performance History
- Select Bibliography by Mary Lynn Kotz
- Index to Works Reproduced
From the Guggenheim's web site: In 1997, the Guggenheim Museum organized Robert Rauschenberg: A Retrospective, the most comprehensive exhibition of the artist’s work ever assembled. It featured nearly 300 works, including several of his newly-created Anagrams paintings from the mid- to late 90s that used digital photography transferred via vegetable dyes, exemplifying his inventive and ever-evolving approach to art and his embrace of new technologies and materials. The exhibition opened to universal acclaim and traveled to museums around the world, including the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. The 632-page catalogue is now a collector’s item.