Pop Art icon Robert Rauschenberg (1925 – 2008), defied artistic convention by producing “combines” such as “Rebus,” which integrates paint with three-dimensional objects. “Rebus” is constructed from layers of comic strips, political posters, fabric and drawings that Rauschenberg found on the streets near his lower Manhattan studio. This piece also contains contemporary painting, dripped paint and strong rectangles of color. For Rauschenberg, “Rebus” was “a record of the immediate environment and time.” He designed the work on a flatter, sparser surface than most of his combines, in the hopes of compelling viewers to look closely, to contemplate the relationships between words and images, beauty and ugliness, and art and non-art.

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