Bal Harbour

© R O B E R T R AU S C H E N B E R G FO U N DAT I O N A R C H I V E S , N E W YO R K ( P O R T R A I T ) ; © R O B E R T R AU S C H E N B E R G FO U N DAT I O N ( M E N I L ) ; P H OTO BY R O N A M S T U T Z , C O U R T E S Y O F T H E WA L K E R A R T C E N T E R ; © R O B E R T R AU S C H E N B E R G FO U N DAT I O N Trisha Brown and Robert Rauschenberg's Glacial Decoy at the Walker Art Center If you are looking for more Brown and Rauschenberg content, look no further than the Walker in Minneapolis, for a screening of Glacial Decoy (1979). It is a work that reflects on their foray into the medium of the moving image, which, thanks to technological innovations likethe Sony Portapak, was becoming increasingly accessible to artists. "Robert Rauschenberg: Fabric Works of the 1970s" at The Menil Collection Another under-recognized aspect of Rauschenberg's practice was his relationship with fabric—a medium he treated with the same irreverent inventiveness as paint or print. "Robert Rauschenberg: Fabric Works of the 1970s" at the Menil Collection in Houston rights this historical oversight, gathering more than 45 sail-like assemblages that flutter, fold, and glow. "Robert Rauschenberg's New York: Pictures from the Real World" at the Museum of the City of New York Long before smartphones and digital cameras, Rauschenberg roamed New York with his 35mm lens, photographing sidewalks, shadows, and fleeting encounters with equal wonder. This fall, the Museum of the City of New York celebrates this lesser-known side of his practice in "Robert Rauschenberg's New York: Pictures from the Real World." Featuring early portraits, street photography, and works that merge image with object, the show captures a city—and an artist—in constant motion. Across the country, cultural institutions are paying homage to the great American artist. Here, three standout exhibitions to consider: A Rauschenberg Road Trip In short, Rauschenberg's instinct for assemblage grew out of his love of movement. And nowhere is this more palpable than in Travelogue, created in 1977 after a 13-year break in his relationship with Cunningham. The piece marked a reconciliation—and a shift. Gone was the austere minimalism of their early work; in its place came a sense of play and theatricality. Rauschenberg's sets and costumes for Travelogue are uncanny and vaudevillian: tin cans, bicycle wheels, and sculptural props that render the dancers at once graceful and absurd. Staged at the American Dance Festival for the first time in nearly five decades, Travelogue feels less like a revival than an excavation. Its inclusion in the program points to the deeper goal of the centennial: to reexamine not just the canonical works, but the ones lost to time. The second half of "Dancing with Bob" is devoted to Set and Reset, the result of a years-long collaboration with Brown. If Travelogue shows Rauschenberg leaning into the maximal, Set and Reset reveals his gift for lyrical atmosphere and translating choreographer intentions into environments. The piece unfolds in gauzy layers: transparent, newsprint-patterned costumes, floating scrims, and overlapping film projections that create a dense yet porous world. Brown's choreography— fluid, loosely structured, deceptively improvised—plays with the flickering nature of visibility. Set and Reset is perhaps Brown's most iconic work, and it stands as a testament to the alchemy between her compositional restraint and Rauschenberg's layered sensibility. As with Cunningham, he wasn't brought in to illustrate her vision—he helped shape its contours alongside her. That is perhaps the clearest throughline in all of Rauschenberg's performance collaborations: a refusal to treat disciplines as separate or hierarchical. His contributions grew from the same urban, improvisational logic that drove his paintings and sculptures—chance, texture, juxtaposition—but with one crucial difference: onstage, the work lived. "Dancing with Bob" returns us to the body—to the stage, where his ideas once leapt, spun, and sweated into being. It restores to view one of the most ephemeral, and most essential, aspects of Rauschenberg's legacy. In that sense, it is not a memorial but a living archive—a reminder that collaboration remains one of the most radical acts of all. The throughline in all of R auschenberg's performance collaborations is a refusal to treat disciplines as separate or hierarchical. Rauschenberg with Stripper, 1962, in his Broadway studio, 1962. FROM ABOVE Rauschenberg's Mirage (Jammer), 1975; costumes for Trisha Brown Dance Company's Glacial Decoy, 1979, Walker Art Center; Rauschenberg's New York City, 1983 BALHAR B O U RSH O P S .CO M

• Cover