Robert Rauschenberg

In the early 1970s, Rauschenberg moved his permanent studio from New York City to Captiva Island, off the Gulf coast of Florida (Today, this site is in use as the artists' residency program of the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation). This relocation marked a shift from the gritty urban detritus that had been the basis of much of the earlier work to a rhapsodic embrace of color and geometric abstraction in a wholly new vernacular language. The Jammers series (1975-76), its title a direct reference to the Windjammer sailing vessel, is Rauschenberg?s salute to his new island life. In 1975, he also went to India to investigate textiles and papermaking, and the inspiration of this new and exotic context is evident in the use of vivid colors and nuanced textures of cotton, muslin, and silk. For the most part, the Jammers comprise stitched fabrics in pure, solid colors, affixed to rattan poles or hung directly and loosely on the wall; whereas in works such as Sprout (1975) and Caliper (1976), the unadorned poles are the principal formal element, propped against the wall. Departing from Rauschenberg's densely collaged imagery or muscular, layered materials, the Jammers are simple and light, focusing on the transparency and seductiveness of veil-like fabrics, that are lent sculptural structure by the cloth-covered poles or other found objects. In Quarterhorse (1975), segments of blue, green, tan and yellow cloth evoke sandy beaches, palm trees, and bright sunshine. In Index (1976), widths of gleaming azure and white satin drape together, a diptych of clouds and sea. The hot, saturated hues of Pimiento III (1976) and Mirage (1976) attest to more exotic influences; while Coin (1976) incorporates found tin cans, stripped of their labels, gleaming mysteriously inside a gauze bag that sags under their weight.--Gagosian website.

In Albert Wendt's new poems, his first collection for over a decade, snapshots of the close and familiar contrast with strange and mythical sequences from a vast Pacific epic in progress and a vivid impressionistic montage of global travel in the late twentieth century. The rich diversity and range of Photographs is astonishing, as this complex writer moves with ease and fluency from ancient Polynesia to contemporary China to family celebrations in an Auckland garden, and through a variety of tones and voices. The collection celebrates grandchildren, family, ancestors and a heritage that stretches back to the atua; and shows a profound and compassionate understanding of the ways we now live in these islands.

This quirky collection of black-and-white photographs and static images by Rauschenberg taken in the Boston area. The text is written by Clifford Ackley.

A catalog of an international art project seven years in the making, ROCI documents an exhibition that traveled in many senses. Robert Rauschenberg, once the enfant terrible of the New York School, is now the Old Master journeying to disparate locales in Asia, Eastern Europe, and the Americas, salvaging found or discarded objects and imagery. The resulting ROCI exhibitions, held in each nation after intensely focused research trips by the artist, incorporate Rauschenberg's ability to accumulate the images and colors of a society--from the sacred to the banal--into a structure of cultural interchange and international diplomacy. The art inspired by each region is reproduced here in successive chapters introduced by local notables like Octavio Paz and Yevgeny Yevtushenko. The results are as bewilderingly varied and compelling as his travels must have been. Indeed, the book is splendid to behold, laconically emphasizing the work itself rather than allowing art jargon to overwhelm the lovely color reproductions. Highly recommended.