RIP Robert Rauschenberg

Last night, I was in a really rotten mood and watching a twenty-four hour news channel. I find that when I am feeling intensely angry at life for being so consistently unfair, the most reasonable coping tactic is to channel my rage into an over-the-top parody of spite and indignation. On this particular occasion, I did so by feigning profound horror and revulsion at every single item that popped up on the news ticker. Actor James Garner suffers minor stroke, a headline read. "OH MY GOD," I yelled, "THAT IS SO HORRIBLY TRAGIC. WHAT THE HELL. LIFE IS EVIL THIS IS A TRAVESTY!" punctuating my routine with some fake sobs.

After ten or twelve rounds of unsubtle though hilarious pantomime, good old life threw me quite the case of "Boy Who Cried Wolf" syndrome when the crawler announced, "Artist Robert Rauschenberg dies at age 82," and I gasped, genuinely upset by that slice of news. In actuality, it is in no way tragic or even sad that Robert Rauschenberg died. Eighty-two is a pretty respectable age to live to, and he certainly aced life compared to the vast majority of human beings. But Rauschie and I go back a long way, so it hit harder than it might've otherwise.

I spent three years of my life interning and/or working at a nonprofit arts organization that Rauschie founded in 1963 with two other mid-century art world heavy-hitters, Jasper Johns and John Cage. The absolute best part of that legendarily killer job was the fact that the door to our office was not only a functioning door, but also a Rauschenberg sculpture constructed from cardboard boxes and mailers. It was beautiful, and scrappily so. Opening a door that was also a one of a kind Rauscenberg certainly added an element of flutter and intrigue to one of the most boring and unexceptional actions of all life. It was hard not to think about what a very lucky girl I was when opening the Rauschie door, even though I lived in constant fear of tripping into it, ruining it forever and being $500,000 in debt to Jasper Johns.

Anyway, everybody and their brother loves Robert Rauschenberg. He's a real artist's artist- you could never look at a Rauschenberg and boringly ask, "Why is this art?"; more than most, it just obviously is. His work is aesthetically awesome in a way that would be as appealing to a four-year-old as it would be to a gutter-punk or my grandmother, but simultaneously cerebral enough to get Clement Greenberg all in a dither over it. He'll be remembered forever, so goody goodbye to you, sweet Rauschie.

Oh, and look what a darling little chicken wing he was in his youth!

Posted by Laura in In Memoriam
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