Painting blank

"airports for the lights, shadows and particles"
______John Cage about Rauschenberg's «White painting»

I should say that Robert Rauschenberg died this week, but yet there will never be way to forget all that he has not shown us. In his completely white paintings, in his erased de Kooning's drawing, this man of Berliner and Cherokee origins who caught emptiness on canvas and then return it to water, so that it could turn back to everyday life, the one of his «combines», or the one of his bicycles (unforgettable the ones in Potzdamer Platz)... that's it: in all these works he never tried to show us anything.
In the middle of this never-ending variety which forces us to be amazed, we'll miss him.

On top: Rauschenberg next to «White painting», 1951, oil on canvas, 182,9 x 182,9 cm, four panels, artist's collection


Originally posted in Italian on May 13, 2008 at 23:19