Perpetual Inventory
Author(s): Rosalind Krauss
Source: October, Vol. 88 (Spring, 1999), pp. 86-116
Published by: The MIT Press
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PerpetualInventory*
ROSALINDKRAUSS
I wentin formyinterview
forthisfantastic
had
a
The
...
job.
job
greatname-I might
useitfora painting-"Perpetual
Inventory."
-Rauschenberg to Barbara Rose
1. Here are threedisconcertingremarksand one document:
The firstsettles out from a discussion of the various strategies Robert
Rauschenbergfound to defamiliarizeperception,so that, in Brian O'Doherty's
terms,"the citydweller'srapid scan" would now displace old habitsof seeing and
"the art audience's stare" would yield to "the vernacularglance."I With its voraciousness,its lack of discrimination,its wanderingattention,and its equal horror
of meaningand of emptiness,thislevelingformof perception,he wrote,not only
accepts everything-every
piece of urban detritus,everyhomeyobject,everyoutr6
the
image-into
perceptualsituation,but its logic decrees thatthe magnetforall
theseelementswillbe the picturesurface,itselfnow definedas the antimuseum.2
This conceptual context, made newlyprecise by O'Doherty in 1974 but
nonethelessfamiliarbythattimeto Rauschenberg'saudience, does not prepareus
forO'Doherty'sadditionalavowalthatthereis "somethingthat,forall his apparent
clowning,he [Rauschenberg]believes in profoundly:the integrityof the picture
plane."3 Comingas itdoes fromthe aestheticvocabularythatRauschenberg'sproject
would seem to have made defunct, this notion of the picture plane and its
integrity,coupled with the idea that they inspire "belief,"sounds verystrange
*
ed. Walter Hopps and Susan
Originally published in RobertRauschenberg:A Retrospective,
Davidson (New York:Solomon R. GuggenheimMuseum,1997). Reprintedwithpermission.
1.
Brian O'Doherty,American
Masters:TheVoiceand theMyth(New York:Random House, 1974), p.
198. An excerpt of this textwas published earlier as O'Doherty, "Rauschenbergand the Vernacular
Glance,"ArtinAmerica
61, no. 5 (September-October1973), pp. 82-87.
2.
Masters,
O'Doherty,American
pp. 188-225.
3.
Ibid., p. 204.
OCTOBER88, Spring1999,pp. 87-116. ? 1999 RosalindKrauss.
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444'
,,,
K
Robert
Rauschenberg
looking
through
thearchiveoftheMiamiHerald. 1979.
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'41
OCTOBER
88
linkedto a definitionofthe pictorialitselfas irreducibly
indeed. For thisvocabulary,
illusionistic-an illusionismthatwas thoughtbysuch criticsas ClementGreenberg
to be residual withineven the most abstractand flattenedpainting4-evokes a
is constantlybreached and just as continuallyresecured.
plane whose integrity
If by the mid-1960sthe pictureplane was somethingto whichDonald Judd
was eager to say good riddance, declaring the canvas fieldas nothingmore than
one side ofa "specificobject,"5thatexperienceof theimpenetrability,
theliteralness,
of the two-dimensionalsurfacehad been made possiblelargelybyRauschenberg's
workitself.The stuffedgoat that stands astride the floor-boundpicturefield in
ofvisualsurface
(1955-59), placidlybearingwitnessto the transformation
Monogram
into-as Rauschenberg put it--"pasture,"or the eagle that projects from the
solidlywall-likeCanyon(1959), had in Judd's eyes written"finis"to centuriesof
pictorialillusionismwithits littledance of opening and closing,its performance
of a kindof transcendentaltwo-step.
The arthistorythatRauschenberg,as well as O'Doherty,knewonlytoo well,
the lessons thatJosefAlbers had afterall drilled at Black Mountain College,
of the picture
turnedon the yield of meaningto be harvestedfromthat fertility
plane. Althoughstillschematicallypresentin the reversiblegeometriesof Albers's
squares, the model of thisfieldas the ground of meaningis perhaps mostclearly
demonstrated in the kind of Renaissance painting in which a tunnel of deep
perspective-an allke of trees,say--isjust about to arriveat its destinationin the
horizon'svanishingpoint,when somethingat the veryforefront
of the picturethe lilythe angel of theAnnunciationis handingto theVirgin,forexample-blocks
thatwhoosh into depth. All the pressureof the paintingnow convergeson this
object,since it must"hold"the surface,preventingits"violation"byan unimpeded
emblematic
spatial rush.Because this"holding"is perforceof a two-dimensional,
kind,it standsin utmostcontrastto the illusionisticvista'sofferof a real stage on
whichimaginatively
to projectreal bodies. But thensuch "holding"becomes a way
of holding up two conflictingmodes of being forcomparison-real versusideal,
secularversussacred,physicalversusiconic,deep versusflat-all the whileperforming the magic trickof turningthe one into the other,since it is the deep space
that is the illusion, and the flattenedwaferof the surface-boundicon that is
of transposition,
in thiscrossoverbetweenflesh
touchablyreal. It is in thismystery
and idea, that the meaning of a picture plane that has sealed over its spatial
announces itselfas both the source and
puncture,thus reassertingits "integrity,"
of
"belief."
expression
4.
See, forexample,ClementGreenberg'sstatement,"The firstmarkmade on a canvasdestroysits
literaland utterflatness,and the resultof the marksmade on it byan artistlike Mondrianis stilla kind
of illusion that suggests a kind of third dimension" (Greenberg, "Modernist Painting" (1960), in
ed. John O'Brian, vol. 4, Modernismwitha Vengeance,
Greenberg, The Collected
Essaysand Criticism,
1957-1969 [Chicago: The University
of Chicago Press,1993], p. 90).
5.
8 (1965), pp. 74-82.
DonaldJudd, "SpecificObjects,"ArtsYearbook
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Inventory
Perpetual
89
FraFilippo
Lippi.
Annunciation.
Circa1440.
All this seems worlds away,of course, from the goat calmlygrazing the
feetof unmitigated
or the tread marksassertingtwenty-two
pastureof Monogram,
TirePrint(1953), the pointofwhichseems to be thatalong
literalnessin Automobile
of
thisstretchof road thereis no breakthatwould allow the old-timemetaphysics
in
for
humanist
thiswork
tension and release to occur. Where is there a place
painting's notions of "belief" suspended and refound in a reconfirmed
And yetO'Dohertywas notjust a consummately
intelligentcriticbut
"integrity"?6
In his extremelyimportantessay"Other Criteria,"Leo Steinbergquoted Greenbergin taking
6.
issuewithhis prejudicialcontrastbetweenOld Masterart-"Realistic,illusionistarthad dissembledthe
which"used art to call attentionto
medium,usingart to conceal art"-and the Modernistalternative,
art."Insistingthatanyart,Old Masterand Modernistalike,uses "artto call attentionto art"and thereby
of the pictureplane, Steinbergcalled fora taxonomyofspaces opened up within
preservesthe integrity
thatplane by different
typesof painting.His textthen develops the oppositionsbetweennatureand
of the flatbedpicture
culture(or opticaland mental) and, in relationto the latter,the characterization
plane in Rauschenberg'sworkforwhich the essayis so widelyknown.But in thisassociationof the
terms"flatbed"and "pictureplane," it is importantto see that the flatbeddoes not preservethe old
"Ifsome collage element,such as a pasted-downphotograph,
metaphysicalimplicationsof "integrity":
threatenedto evoke a topical illusionof depth, the surfacewas casuallystainedor smearedwithpaint
to recall its irreducibleflatness.The 'integrityof the pictureplane'-once the accomplishmentof
good design-was to become thatwhichis given.The picture's'flatness'was to be no moreofa problem
than the flatnessof a disordereddesk or an unsweptfloor.AgainstRauschenberg'spictureplane you
can pin or projectanyimage because itwillnotworkas the glimpseof a world,but as a scrapof printed
Art[New
withTwentieth-Century
material"(Steinberg,"Other Criteria,"in OtherCriteria:
Confrontations
York:OxfordUniversity
Press,1972], pp. 55-91; quoted materialfrompp. 68, 88).
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OCTOBER
90
also someone who engaged personallywith Rauschenberg,both at those places
where theywould have intersectedin the 1960s artworldand in the "morgue"of
the New YorkTimes,where the two examined old photoengravingplates together
forRauschenberg's1962 initialforayinto printmaking.7
2. My second example is not, perhaps,as counterintuitive
as the first,but it
nonethelessstrikesthe same kind of discordantnote fromwithinSusan Sontag's
"One Culture and the New Sensibility,"her report fromthe frontlines of the
1960s.8Taking issue withC. P. Snow's notorious two-cultureargument,in which
science and humanismhave driftedinto two separate worlds,withthe occupants
of the one regardingthe occupants of the otheras a set of unrecognizable,nearly
inhuman mutants,Sontag claimed a single "advanced" culturefor both science
and art, with their common enemy now in literature.If electronicmusic is the
model forthis "one culture,"she argued, so is the practice of a kind of painting
and sculpture made collectively on the principles of industrial fabrication
(Minimalism,Pop), as is the understandingshared by both science and art that
theirhigh degree of specialization(the twelve-tone
row,abstraction)willdemand
a certainperiod of apprenticeshipon the partof theiraudiences.
It is in such a contextthatSontag then drewup a listof textualsources that
she saw as basic to thisnew nonliteraryculture:AntoninArtaud,Roland Barthes,
Andre Breton, Norman O. Brown,John Cage, R. BuckminsterFuller,Siegfried
Gidieon, Claude Levi-Strauss,Marshall McLuhan, FriedrichWilhelmNietzsche,
and Ludwig Wittgenstein.9Most of the names-the obvious phalanx of 1960s
intellectualrealignments-are expected,of course. Breton'sis somehowaberrant,
however,strikingone as it does as lyingat an oblique angle to theline thatconnects
Artaudto Nietzscheor Fuller to Levi-Strauss.Breton'scommitmentto poetry,his
insistentliterariness,and the fastidiousnessof his tastesall seem to drivea wedge
betweenhim and thiscompany.Even thoughBarthes's1967 enunciationof "The
Death of theAuthor"includesthe Surrealists'attackson meaningand thecollective
natureof theirpracticeas importantsteps along the path leading awayfromthe
writeras the focus of meaning to the reader as its new locus of unity,10
Breton's
seems to put him specifically
out of play.
allegiance to psychoanalysis
For the psychoanalyticseems not only to cling to the importance of the
source of emission (the writer)but also to privilegechains of associationthat,in
theirdependence on furtherassociationsto decode them,continue to assertthe
7.
Brian O'Doherty,Objectand Idea: An ArtCritic's
Journal1961-1967 (New York:Simon & Schuster,
1967), p. 115.
8.
Susan Sontag, "One Culture and the New Sensibility,"in Sontag, AgainstInterpretation
(New
York:Farrar,Straus& Giroux,1966), pp. 293-304.
9.
Ibid., p. 298.
10.
Roland Barthes, "The Death of the Author" (1967), in Barthes, Image,Music, Text,trans.
Stephen Heath (New York:Hill & Wang, 1977), p. 144. This textwas firstpublishedin AspenMagazine,
nos. 5-6 (Fall-Winter1967), an issue edited byO'Doherty.
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Inventory
Perpetual
91
privatedepths of experience underwritingthese connections.Furthermore,it is
the verynatureof such connectionsas metaphoricthatmakes them alien to the
of deadpan, of the ruthless
"newsensibility"
Sontaginvoked.The ideas of literalness,
"cool" thatled FrankStella to declare, "Mypaintingis based on the factthatwhat
can be seen there is there.... What you see is whatyou see,"11seems to join the
whole post-AbstractExpressionistcohort in its rejection of psychologicaldepth
and emotiveness.
Rauschenberg's own distaste for such qualities can be summed up in his
frequentlyrepeatedinstanceof "the sad cup of coffee,"his emblemforthe endless
psychologizing of the artist's means and hence the promiscuous spread of
metaphor withinthe older (Surrealist-influenced)generation. Speaking of the
talkat the Cedar Bar or the Club, he complained,"Theyeven assignedseriousness
to certaincolors,"and then,turningto the waythe NewYorkartistshad infected
Beat poetry:"I used to thinkof thatline in Allen Ginsberg'sHowl,about 'the sad
cup of coffee.'I've had cold coffeeand hot coffee,good coffeeand lousycoffee,
but I've neverhad a sad cup of coffee."12
Indeed, Rauschenberghad been verytroubledby the receptionof his black
paintings (1951-53), which criticsand viewersalike assumed were to be understood at thatemotivelevel. "Theycouldn't see black as pigment,"he complained.
"They moved immediatelyinto associationwith'burned-out,''tearing,''nihilism'
and 'destruction.'.. . I'm never sure what the impulse is psychologically,
I don't
mess around withmysubconscious."For good measure, he added, "If I see any
thatI'm familiarwith-clichesofassociationsuperficialsubconsciousrelationships
I change the picture."'3
3. This bringsme to my thirdexample, dropped by Rauschenberghimself
when speakingof his silkscreenpractice in the early1960s. He was addressinga
paintingthatjuxtaposes photoreproductionsof an armytruck,mosquitoes,and,
in a somber banner along the midsection, Diego Velhizquez'sVenusand Cupid
Venus)(1650), an aggressiveX-markthicklypainted in whiteovera partof
(Rokeby
it. Explainingwhyhe called the pictureCrocus(1962), he said, "Because the white
X emergesfroma grayarea in a ratherdarkpainting,likea new season."14
"Like a new season" comes strangelyfromthe lips of someone who cannot
imaginea "sad cup of coffee."But then bythe early1960s,Rauschenbergwas also
the artistwho quite astonishingly
had alreadydecided to devotea good partof two
11.
Bruce Glaser,"Questions to Stella and Judd,"ed. Lucy R. Lippard, in MinimalArt:A Critical
ed. GregoryBattcock(New York:E. P. Dutton,1968), p. 158. ReprintedfromArtnews
65, no.
Anthology,
5 (September1966), pp. 55-61.
12.
and theArtWorldofOur Time(Garden
Quoted in CalvinTomkins,OfftheWall:Robert
Rauschenberg
City,N.Y: Doubleday,1980), p. 89.
13.
Quoted in DorothyGees Seckler,"The ArtistSpeaks: RobertRauschenberg,"Artin America54,
no. 3 (May-June1966), p. 76.
14.
Quoted in Tomkins,OfftheWall,p. 201.
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Rauschenberg.
DetailofCrocus. 1962.
a
illustrationof Dante's Inferno,
and a halfyearsof his life to the canto-by-canto
workwhose veryfabricis woven fromthe rich strandsof multipleassociations,
one famousbranch of whichinvokesjust thisfigureof renewal:"In the turning
season of the youthful year when the sun is warming his rays beneath
Aquarius/and the daysand nightsalreadybegin to near theirperfectbalance; the
hoar-frost
copies/thenthe imageofhiswhitesisteron theground."Rauschenberg's
devoted to Canto XXIV respondsto this
astonishingly
aqueous transfer-drawing
tells
of
"a compartment,sealed awayfromthe
Dore
Ashton
us,
by
way
image,
snakes and electric eels below, to house a tender painting of the hoar-frosted
trees."15
That Dante's textservedas a motivatingforcebehind the X metaphorically
The same allegoricaluse oftheseasons
is likelybutnotnecessary.
fecundatingCrocus
stretchesfromone end of English poetryto another,fromGeoffreyChaucer's
evocation of the showersof Aprilpiercingthe droughtsof March,to T. S. Eliot's
15.
Illustrationsfor Dante's Inferno,"Metro(Milan) 2
Dore Ashton,"Rauschenberg'sThirty-four
(May 1961), p. 58. In preparing to writean extended commentaryfor the deluxe edition of the
drawings,publishedby HarryN. Abrams,Ashtonspent "hours and hours ... in his [Rauschenberg's]
studio readingoverJohn Ciardi's translationand gazingat the drawings.... Rauschenbergand I read
his digs at his artistic
the poem together,speakingabout Dante's ineffablepride, his slywitticisms,
rivals... his lyricalabandon, his extraordinary
language,and
feelingforthe particular,his forthright
above all, his greatartisticinconsistencies."
Quoted in Dore Ashton,"Art:The CollaborationWheel: A
Commenton RobertRauschenberg'sCommenton Dante,"Artsand Architecture
80, no. 12 (December
1963), pp. 10, 37.
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93
Inventory
Perpetual
"Aprilis the cruellestmonth,breeding/Lilacsout of the dead land...." Crocusis
quite a metaphoricthoughtforsomeone who does not wantto accept the connotationsspun offfromthe color black.
4. The document I want to inserthere comes fromaround the time when
Rauschenberg was making Crocus,for it includes a reproduction of Renascence
silkscreenserieshe
(1962), anotherof the veryfirstworksin the black-and-white
it
in
is
the
fall
of
Called
"Random
1962.
Order,"
began early
partmanifesto,part
in
the
It
five
the
first
issue
of
consists
of
magazineLocation,
diary,partpoem.
pages
in
in
handed
to
the
Thomas B. Hess
but
editors,
1963,
published spring
probably
and Harold Rosenberg,in late winter.The "coverpage" (p. 27) givesthe titleand
reproducesSundog(1962). The nexttwosheets (pp. 28-29) showan assortmentof
photographstaken by Rauschenbergand affixedwithmaskingtape to a paper
f
t-D ij bfr
Order."
"Random
Location1,no.1
(Sping1963),p. 27.
w
m-.
a are v t
u si
Random
Order
by Ro PTR RA )S
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A
Nt IRP(.
"LocationI, no.I (Sprng1%963),
"Random
Orde.r
p. 30.
support to present a messygrid of vignettesbetween which Rauschenberg's
These are followedby
dyslexicletteringmeanders in a complex of affirmations.
on
the
left (p. 30), and a
the
Renascence
almost
two
painting
full-pageimages:
on the right
from
artist's
studio"
the
"View
Rauschenbergphotographcaptioned
a
of
notions
two
different
seeingthrough window,these
(p. 31). Representing very
of perspective, signaled by
Alberti's
model
Leone
Battista
pages juxtapose
like
a
window
a
is
volumetriccube (if picture
Renascence's
throughwhichwe look
on the stage of
is
contained
itself
at whatis painted,the viewedmaterial
tightly
the
the pictorialconstructionl6),
with
photographedwindowpaneas surrogatefor
16.
The analysis of Leone Battista Alberti's and Piero della Francesca's model of perspective
foreconceivedas a closed,volumetricbox, constructedwithitssides as absolutelimitsand specifically
space, is made in HubertDamisch, TheOrigin
closinganythingthatcould be thoughtof as "off-stage"
trans.JohnGoodman (Cambridge,Mass.:The MIT Press,1994), pp. 350-52.
ofPerspective,
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Inventory
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95
the camera's aperturein whatseems to invokethe indiscriminateappetite of the
"vernacularglance."
If I have called thisdocumenta manifesto,thisis because it made its appearance at the timeRauschenberg'sworkwas undergoinga shift,one thatmarkedall
his immediatelysucceedingworkand the vastmajorityofwhathe wenton to do in
the followingyears.This was a shiftto photographynot onlyas the image bank on
which his pictorial practice would then rely-whether in the form of the
silkscreenedpaintingsof the early1960s,or theirrenewedversionin the veil-like
Hoarfrosts(1974-76), or in the guise of audience-activated works, such as
(1967)-but as a new conception of the pictorial
Soundings(1968) and Revolvers
The ground for thisshiftwas obviouslyprepared in Rauschenberg'slong
itself.17
apprenticeshipto the media image via the Dante drawings.But since the solventtransfertechnique of those drawingsmaintainsthe actual scale of theiroriginal
media sources, photographic informationcould not be married to the greatly
increasedsize and mode of address of Rauschenberg'spainterlypracticeuntil he
gained access to the photomechanicalsilkscreenprocess.This, then,providedthe
possibilityboth of greatlyenlargingthe scale of his source materialand of making
that material's photographic nature far more obvious than it had been in the
Dante series,where,due to the vagariesof the transfertechnique,it had largely
been muted by the veil-likecharacterof the image. Furthermore,Rauschenberg
seems to have wanted the continuityof the mirrorlikephotographicsurfaceto
stamp its characteron his newlyrevisedsense of his medium, therebyreplacing
the collage condition of his Combines withthe seamlessnessof the photographic
print.
This was the departure,at the opening of the 1960s,thatseemed to call for
some kind of acknowledgment. If "Random Order" is such a declaration of
Rauschenberg'snewly"photographic"medium,contrastingit and (Renaissance)
paintingwould seem entirelyin order,so thatits contingencycould be compared
to painting'scompositionalprogram,and itsframe,a chance cutfromthe ongoing
fabricof the whole world,could be set against painting'scontractionaround a
gravitationalcenter.
17.
Settingaside the factthatRauschenberghad begun a serious practiceof photographyitselfin
the late 1940s and would continue to make photographsthroughouthis career,a reconsiderationof
the medium of paintingas "photographic"involvesa particularleap, which this essay is involvedin
exploring.Rauschenberg'sfewblueprintphotographicworksof 1950-51 mightseem to have performed
thisleap, and, indeed, the greatinterestin themmightelicitthe response thathe was not startingout
in a new directionat the outset of the 1960s but ratherreturningto one he had initiatedearlyin his
career.I should say here that the statusof these worksin Rauschenberg'soeuvre is not clear to me.
They do signal the kind of reorientationof the workto the horizontalitythat Steinbergnamed "the
flatbed picture plane"; thus, they team up with Bed (1955), Erasedde KooningDrawing(1953), and
Automobile
TirePint. And like the lattertwo works,or, for that matter,the White
Paintings,theysignal
(or maybeinitiated) Rauschenberg'spursuitof the index as a wayof marking.But Rauschenbergdid
not returnto the photogramtechnique as a strategyforfusingthe photographicindex withpainting's
scale and pictoriallogic,perhapsforthe veryfactthathe made these collaborativeworkstogetherwith
Susan Weil,then his wife.
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96
OCTOBER
But, as we willsee, of the variousoppositionsset up within"Random Order,"
the obviousone betweenphotography
and painting,or ratherbetweenphotography
and Renaissancepainting,does not seem to apply.Instead,one of the major oppositionsseems to be betweenthe aural and the visual,withsound annexingitselfto
languageand thusyieldinga further
oppositionbetweenspeech and vision.
This occurswiththe two-pagespread'sfirsttextualgrouping,whichis written
above and along the side of itsopeningphotograph-a truckseen head-on,looming
out of the night.In it we read: "Withsound scale and insistencytrucksmobilize
words,and broadside our cultureby a combination of law and local motivation
whichproduces an extremelycomplex random order thatcannot be describedas
accidental."18
In the contextof all the otherimages-the twoviewsout the window
to facingbuildingsand a roofscape;the kitchenarea witha glimpseof paintings
lyingon the studio floor beyond; the toilet; the stairs;a potted plant19-which
continuallyplace us inside Rauschenberg'sBroadwayloft,thisidea thatthe truck
deliversboth noise and wordssets up another opposition: that betweenexterior
and interior,public and private.Even ifwe had not read CalvinTomkins'sdescription of Rauschenberg'sloft--"Tall,grimywindowslet in the distinctively
white
lightof downtownNew York-also the roar of truckson Broadway"20-wewould
feelthe intimacyand interiority
of the space of thesepages,whichonlythe auditory
aggressionof the truckas signifierof the outsideviolates.
If thissense of privacypromotesthe conditionsof a diary,theyare invoked
even more bythe associativeprogressionof the textitself,as one thoughtseems to
suggestthe next,withoutanyauthorialplan or argumenthavingbeen established
beforehand.To have pronounced "randomorder"nextto the truckseems to have
provokedRauschenbergto writeon the oppositeside: "Everystepis change,"which
in turncalled forclose-upsof stairsand theirrisers.That, then,broughton a commentabout the volumetricqualityof a stairwell-"a sculpturalmasterpiececlearly,
economicallyand dramaticallydefiningspace"-which then moved the author's
thoughtsto otherspatialvolumes.And the one thatcame immediatelyto his mind,
view,is the following:
providedin turnwithitsown photograph,an out-the-window
An air-filledsense of volume can be had by looking out one window,
throughthe space, to anotherwindowand intoit. This can be amplified
18.
This head-on shot of the truckmade its wayinto at least two of the black-and-white
silkscreens:
land Overcast
Buffalo
II (both 1962). (The spellingin all quotesfrom"RandomOrder"is Rauschenberg's.)
19.
Of these images, two were made into screens. The roofscape with water tanks appears in
II (all 1962), and Barge(1962-63), Die Hard, Shaftway,
and
Almanac,Overcast
I, and Overcast
Transom,
Windward(all 1963). The potted plant can be seen in Almanac. Speaking with Barbara Rose,
Rauschenbergsaid of these photographs:"I needed some verysimple images,like perhaps a glass of
water,or a piece of string,or the bathroomfloorwitha roll of toiletpaper on it. They didn't need to
have anyimmediateemotionalcontent.I needed themto dull the social implications,to neutralizethe
calamities thatwere going on in the outside world" (Rose, Rauschenberg
[New York:Vintage Books,
1987], p. 74).
20.
Tomkins,OfftheWall,p. 211.
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97
by realizing the source of this vision is at a differenttemperature,
brightnessand willbe subjectto change as it moveson. Airvolume can
be compressed and flattenedto the extent that a brushload of paint
can hold it to a picturesurface.
The frame,the piercing vista, and the "integrity"of the original surface
restoredby a brushload of paint have landed us, then, in the midstof the very
"picture plane" in which O'Doherty would so counterintuitivelyclaim that
Rauschenbergbelieves.And when Rauschenberg'sstatementitselfyieldsin turnto
the photographicmetaphorwrittenon the otherflankof the image-"A dirtyor
foggywindow makes what is outside appear to be projected on to the window
plane"-what we have is not the opposition between the indexicallyproduced
image (the photograph,onto the surfaceof which thingsfall like cast shadows)
and the iconicallyconstructedone (the painting),but, somehow,magically,their
conflation.And whatremainsas wellis the oppositionannounced at theveryoutset
of the text:the difference
betweenthe delicatelysilentvisualspaces and the brassily
verbalone of the flowofwords.
5. It is this opposition between silence and sound, vision and speech, that
this essay is, I suppose, circlingaround. For the silence of the visual was what
Rauschenberghad been insistingon in his resistanceto the metaphoricexpansion
of the color black, that is to say the transformationof it froma physical and
unarticulated material ("they couldn't see black as a pigment") to an invisible
networkof language. It is also thissilence thatconnectsthe understandingof the
White
Paintings(1951) as screenson whichto "trap" (no matterhow ephemerally)
the shadowsof passersbyto the underlyingnotion forthe latersilkscreens,which
Rauschenbergthoughtof as functioningsomethinglike "photographicsensitized"
surfacesthatregisterthe flitting
of informationpassingthroughthe space in front
of them.21[Rauschenberg himselfhas emphasized the continuitybetween his
WhitePaintingsand his desire to workon photosensitizedgrounds. Rauschenberg:
"Thefirstphotodrawingsweredonein Cuba in 1952 duringa working
vacationfrom
BlackMountain,whereI was studying
withAlbers(he neversaw them).Silkscreen
was
and limited
in scaleand colo,butstillhaveaccesstocurrent
[later]a waynottobevictimized
I didnot[then]knowaboutthecommercial
worldwide
and
information.
process
ofsilkscreen
had triedtophotosensitize
groundstoworkon."]22
21.
Rauschenbergsuggestedthat his ultimateproject along these lines would be "a project that I
have in mindwherethe wallswillabsorb whateverimages appear in thatroom" (Rose, Rauschenberg,
p.
77). In an essayon Rauschenberg,John Cage emphasized that "the whitepaintingscaught whatever
fell on them," calling them "airports for the lights, shadows, and particles" (Cage, "On Robert
Rauschenberg,Artist,and His Work,"in Silence:Lecturesand Writings
byJohnCage [Hanover, N.H.:
of New England Press/Wesleyan
Press,1973], pp. 108, 102, respectively;
University
University
reprinted
fromMetro[Milan] 2 [May 1961], pp. 36-51).
22.
During the editing process of this essay,Rauschenbergread it and on April 1, 1997, sent me
several comments that functionas expansions or associations to the text. The present remarkwas
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98
OCTOBER
The bridge fromthe barest monochrome canvas to the most richlyphotographicconcatenationis built,then,on the concept of the index, namely,a type
of mark made causally,so that it must be conceived as the physicaltrace of its
referent.In structuralterms,thisis whatlinksthe cast shadow to the footprint,or
the brokenbranch to the medical symptom,or the photographto the windsock.
But, as ifin punishmentfortheirutmostdegree of truthvalue, these witnessesto
what is passing or has passed are struckdumb; for the index, although a sign,is
uncoded and is thusdeprivedof speech.
It is in thismatrixof connectionsbetweenshadow and photography,
on the
one hand, and index and silence,on the other,thatRauschenbergwas effortlessly
enactingthe semioticanalysisthatwas onlyexplicitlytheorizedin the early1960s,
when Barthesbegan to publish on photography.That importanttextsby Barthes
bracketRauschenberg'sturnto silkscreenis convenientbut fortuitous.Not much
art-historical
weathercan be made fromthe factthat"The PhotographicMessage"
appeared in 1961, the year before Rauschenberg found the photomechanical
silkscreenmedium-through the example of AndyWarhol,who had begun using
it in August 1962-(although news photographshad alreadybeen servingas his
source forthe transferdrawingsover the precedingfewyears),and "Rhetoricof
the Image" was published in 1964, the year Rauschenberg's success with the
silkscreensled to his winningthe Grand Prize at the Venice Biennale,which he
celebratedbytelephoningto NewYorkto have all his screens (about 150 of them)
cut fromtheirframesand burned,therebydefinitively
ending the series.About all
thatcan be said about thischronologicalconvergenceis thatthe media saturation
of dailylifehad made the ubiquityof the photographica subjectof some urgency,
whetherfortheoryor formakingart.
And yetwhatinterestsme is both the waytheseparallel practicesturnon the
index's muteness,what Barthescharacterizedas the scandal of its constitutinga
"message withouta code," and the growingrealization that in its photographic
formthismutenessis nonethelessabuzz withconnotations,so that,yes,Virginia,
there is alwaysand everywhere(and especiallyonce photographed) a potentially
"sad cup of coffee."
6. Barthessets out fromthe photograph'sstatusas pure denotation,as analogon, in "The PhotographicMessage."Stenciledoffthe worlditself,it appears to
have onlyone messageto convey,whichis identicalto the realityfromwhichitwas
taken. The photographicmessage seems to reduce itselfto the brute gestureof
pointing to something in physical space and pronouncing the single syllable
"this."But behind such a mythicconditionas objective,neutral,and all but silent
lies a whole varietyof connotationaldimensions,which,thoughtheycannot code
elicitedbythissectionand relatesnot onlyto the continuityof his own connectionto the index,but to
the issue of Warhol'spriorityin the use of the commercialsilkscreenprocess,frequentlyrepeated in
the literatureon the subject.Rauschenberg'sothercommentsappear in bracketswithinthisessay.
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99
the photographin the manner of digitallanguages,can open up its visual continuity,partitioningit into a scatterof signifiedsor meanings.Some of these result
fromhow the photographis produced (its cropping,lighting,exposure,printing);
others arise fromthe culturalmeaningsinvestedin certaingestures,such as the
pose a subject is directedto, or caught in the act of taking,or again the cultural
knowledge summoned by clothing stylesor the typographyon signs included
withinthe image. This constant, covertlyperformedsegmentationmeans that
"thephotographic'language' ['langage']is not unlikecertainideographiclanguages
whichmix analogical and specifying
units,the differencebeing,"Barthesstressed,
"that the ideogram is experienced as a sign whereas the photographic'copy' is
takenas the pure and simpledenotationof reality."23
like the flowof
So strongis the experience of pure continuity,
uninterrupted
even
has
to
subsume
the coded,
that
the
the
itself,
power
reality
photograph
status:
"It is not
this
denotational
of
its
own
into
nature
blank,
caption
linguistic
the image whichcomes to elucidate or 'realize' the text,"as in older formsof illustration,"but the latterwhich comes to sublimate,patheticize or rationalize the
image."For,parasiticas itis on the photograph,"thetextis onlya kindofsecondary
vibration,almostwithoutconsequence" in relationshipto an "objective(denoted)
message,"and "connotationis now experienced onlyas the naturalresonance of
the fundamentaldenotationconstitutedbythe photographicanalogy."24
Beginningin 1961, then, the structuralparadox Bartheswas exploringwas
that of a connotationalsystemhiding behind the seeminglyunbrokenfacade of
itsnaturalness,its"innocence."In "Rhetoricof the Image,"
denotation'sobjectivity,
he wenteven furtherin developingan analysisof the wayconnotationstriatesthe
image, allowing himselfto do so by confininghis demonstrationto a specific
photographused as an advertisingimage, the various connotative"messages"of
whichcould reasonablybe understoodas intentional.Alwaysreturningto the way
the denotative"fact"of the photographcloses over these readings to naturalize
them-"the discontinuous connotators are connected, actualized, 'spoken'
through the syntagmof the denotation, the discontinuous world of symbols
plunges into the storyof the denoted scene as though into a lustral bath of
innocence"25-he triednonethelessto systematize
the connotationalswarms.
The system,he suggested,alwaysmoves fromthe particularto the general,
fromthegreen,yellow,and red foundin thePanzani advertising
photo,forexample,
to the connotator "Italianicity,"itselfgeneralized onto a certain axis, that of
whichcan in turnbe seen as partofa structurally
nationalities,
oppositionalnetwork
that organizes a whole associativefield.This common domain was identifiedby
Barthesas thatof ideology,which"speaks"itselfthrougha rhetoric,no matterin
what medium the speech is conducted, whetherin image, articulatedsound, or
23.
24.
25.
Barthes,"The PhotographicMessage,"in Image,Music,Text,
p. 28.
Ibid., pp. 25-26.
Barthes,"Rhetoricof the Image,"in Image,Music,Text,
p. 51.
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OCTOBER
100
gesture. These differentsupports for the "speech" affectthe substance of the
he said, but theydo not affectitsform,bywhichhe meantthe functional
signifiers,
organizationof the signifiedsin relationshipto each other.And if rhetorics,that
is, the set of connotators,have form,Barthesspeculated,"itis even probable that
common forinstanceto dream,literatureand
thereexistsa singlerhetoricalform,
image."26For the psyche,structuredlike a language,also seems to move fromthe
specific(as in the dailyresidue fromwhichdream images are in part fabricated)
to the general (the dream's highlyrepetitive"kernel"),such that"the furtherone
'descends' into the psychicdepths of an individual,the more rarifiedand the
more classifiable the signs become. What could be more systematic,"Barthes
finallyasked,"thanthe readingsof Rorschachtests?"27
7. Which bringsus back to Breton,the focusof mysecond counterintuitive
example, and, more specifically, to the Breton who, like Rauschenberg in
"Random Order,"insistedon insertingthe supposedlysilent testimonyof documentaryphotographs into the pages of his diarylikenovels Nadja (1928) and
L'Amourfou(Mad Love,1937).28Thus in Nadja, no sooner does Bretontell us that
he is sittingin the Manoir d'Ango in August 1927, writingthe account of his
relationshipwith the quixotic, clairvoyant,mad Nadja, than we have a photograph of the manor house, with its dovecote and courtyardonto which a dead
pigeon falls,announcing the closure of the storyin the past (Nadja's) and the
opening onto a futureBretonhas yetto live,much less to record. (That futurewill
enterthe book's finalpages.) The account itselfcontinueswithdiaryentriesand
photographic documents, the entries turning on the "predictive" nature of
Nadja's relationto futureevents (and Breton'sto her), somethingBretonunderstood as the workingof Surrealism'sconcept of objectivechance.
Among the usual explanations as to whyBreton would have proceeded in
thiscuriouswayare thathe was usingphotographsas a means to dispensewiththe
descriptionsthatlitternaturalisticnovels,as Bretonhimselfclaimed at one point,
and to authenticatethe nonfictionalstatusof his narratives.("Provide me with
the real names,"Bretonfamouslywrote,"proveto me thatyou in no wayhad free
reignoveryourheroes."29)These have been sweptaside byDenis Hollier,who has
argued thatthe heartof the matterlies in the two formsof the index converging
in these pages: (1) the photograph,which can onlybe a precipitateof the real,
and (2) the diaristic,first-person
narrator,whose verbalpositionis equally (deicti26.
Ibid., p. 49.
27.
Ibid., p. 47.
28.
During a conversation withYve-Alain Bois, in which we were discussing the enigmatic yet
suggestivecharacterof "Random Order" as a manifesto,he said thatthese sheets somehowreminded
him of Nadja,a commentforwhich,as willbe obvious,I am extremelygrateful.
Andre Breton,"Introductionto the Discourse on the Paucityof Reality"(1924), trans.Richard
29.
Sieburthand JenniferGordon, October
69 (Summer1994), p. 134. Previouslypublishedas "Introduction
au discourssurle peu de realite"(1924), in Pointdujour (Paris: EditionsGallimard,1970).
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101
cally) dependent on reality,in thiscase upon the actual, existentialconditionsof
saying"I." So thatwhichis at stakein a worklike Nadja
is not a change in the referent,a passage from imaginary to real
characters as one would do by leaving the novel for historiography.
Rather it is a change in the mode of enunciation; the passage to the
real mustbe inferrednot bya change of object as much as by the entry
onto the stage of the subjectand itsindex.30
And whatthismeans is thatthe writerleaves the backstageof the novel to go sitin
the theaterwiththe restof the audience. Placing himselfon the same side of the
page as his reader,the writernot onlycasts his own shadow onto the fieldof the
book, but allows the eventsunfoldingin a futurehe cannot foreseeto cast theirs
onto the same space. If,forthe plasticarts,the indexicalprinciplehad meantthat
"a real shadow,fallingonto Mir6's SpanishDancer,opens the internalspace of the
workto the contextof its reception,mixingit withthatof its beholder,"then "in
the same way,what [Michel] Leiris called the literaryequivalentof the shadow of
the bull's horn should propel the autobiographicaltext in the shared space of
What is crucialabout thisspace is thatit is open; ifBretoncalls Nadja a
history."31
book thatis like a door leftajar,he means thatwhen he began to writeit he knew
no more than did his reader,who by book's end would walk throughthatdoor.
"The one who writeshas no privilege,"Hollier writes,"no advance over the one
who reads. He doesn't knowanymore about it than the other."32
Leaving things "open" has been Rauschenberg's most frequentlyused
expression in describing his artisticstance; whateverhappens, he must always
conspire to leave the situationopen, so that,like Breton,he will be surprised.33
30.
Denis Hollier, "SurrealistPrecipitates:Shadows Don't Cast Shadows,"trans.Rosalind Krauss,
October69(Summer1994), p. 126.
31.
Ibid., p. 124.
32.
Ibid., p. 129.
In her summaryof Rauschenberg'saestheticstance,Secklerintroducedher long interviewwith
33.
him by sayingthat although Rauschenberg"does not recall having paid much attentionto abstract
and Zen, he apparentlytook seriouslythatpart
expressionism'sphilosophicalpremisesin existentialism
of its moral positionwhichemphasizedriskand openness and keepingthe artist'sactivity-withall its
precariousbalancing-clearly in view."In the interviewitself,Rauschenbergstatedthisbysaying,"This
insistenceon the piece operatingin the time situationit was observedin is anotherone of the waysof
tryingto put offthe death of the work"(Seckler,"The ArtistSpeaks,"pp. 74, 84). Cage also quoted a
typicalexpressionof Rauschenberg'sdriveforopenness: "I am tryingto check myhabitsof seeing,to
counterthemforthe sake ofgreaterfreshness.I am tryingto be unfamiliarwithwhatI'm doing" (Cage,
"On RobertRauschenberg,Artist,and His Work,"p. 106). Or again, Rauschenbergsaid severaltimesto
PhilipSmiththathe wantedto be open to eventsin orderto createan artthatwould not "tellyou somethingthat you alreadyknow" (Smith, "To and about Robert Rauschenberg,"ArtsMagazine51, no. 7
[March 1977], p. 121). The most frequentlyrepeated version is Rauschenberg's refrainabout his
"collaborationwithmaterials"(see CalvinTomkins,TheBrideand theBachelors:
TheHeretical
in
Courtship
ModernArt[NewYork:The VikingPress,1965], pp. 204, 232), whichhe enunciatedtoJohn Gruen as "I
put my trustin the materials that confrontme, because theyput me in touch with the unknown"
76, no. 2 [February1977], p. 48).
(Gruen,"RobertRauschenberg:An Audience of One," Artnews
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OCTOBER
102
fromchance, since chance is programmedahead
This, he has stressed,is different
of time,whichis exactlywhatRauschenberghas insistedupon avoiding.34Instead,
if he has continuallyreferredto his process as a collaborationwithobjects and
materials,it is because he never wants it said that he in any way has, as Breton
would put it,"had freereignoverhis heroes."
In Breton'scase, openness is equally a matterof diaristic,autobiographical
or a kindofautomaticwritingintendedto register
writingand "psychicautomatism,"
unconsciousthoughts.But since both forms-the diaryas a demonstrationof the
of everydaylife"(read: objectivechance), and automaticwriting
"psychopathology
as an unconscious precipitate-are viewed as being in collaboration with the
unconscious,in theirattemptto registerthis psychicdimension theyare equally
indexical. They both share in the index's "mode of enunciation."Hollier points
out:
whetheritbe autobiographical
The specificfeatureof Surrealistwriting,
or automatic,is,in fact,less the lack of knowledgeof itsfinaldestination
as such than the identicalpositioninto whichthislack places both the
readerand the authorin the face of a textwhose unfoldingneitherthe
one nor the othercontrols,and about whichboth of themknowneither
the futurenor the ending.35
The Nadja-like quality of "Random Order"-in its unfolding that feels both
and in the dreamaleatoryand associative,in its mixtureof intimacyand veracity,
like qualityof whatimpressesone as a nocturnalatmosphereno matterifsome of
the photographsW1eretaken in daylight-puts Breton back in the interpretative
picture.Not in anydirect,historicalway,of course, but as a means of flaggingthe
experienceof a certainkindof field:fullof associations,metaphors,connotations.
This was a fieldRauschenberghad expresslycourtedin the Inferno
drawings.
"Dantewas soughtand completed
tohavetheadventure
ofwhat,and if I
[Rauschenberg:
to a classical restrictive
could applymyabstractsensibility
assignment.A one-on-one
and
no
to
either.
with
embarrassment
Illustration
compulsive
handling
respect.
"]
8. There are causal questionsthatare extremelyhard to answer.For example,
would
why
Rauschenberghave chosen the Dante project,not onlyselectingit,but
workover two
doggedlydecidingas well to continue it, necessitatingintermittent
and a halfyears,and, towardthe end, six monthsof isolationin Florida in order
to bringit to completion?Rauschenberghas givenseveraldifferent
explanations.
34.
Rauschenbergsaid, "I was interestedin manyofJohn Cage's chance operationsand I liked the
sense of experimentationhe is involvedin, but paintingisjust a different
groundforactivities.I could
neverfigureout an interestingwayto use any kind of programmedactivity--andeven thoughchance
deals withthe unexpected and unplanned, it stillhas to be organized.Workingwithchance, I would
end up withsomethingthatwas quite geometric:I feltas though I were carryingout an idea rather
thanwitnessingan unknownidea takingshape." In Seckler,"The ArtistSpeaks,"p. 81.
35.
Hollier,"SurrealistPrecipitates,"
p. 129.
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103
As he told Dorothy Gees Seckler in 1966, he wanted the figurativeproject
demanded by illustration:"The problem when I startedthe Dante illustrations
was to see if I was workingabstractlybecause I couldn't workany other way or
whetherI was doing it bychoice. So I insistedon the challenge of being restricted
bya particularsubjectwhereit meant thatI'd have to be involvedin symbolism."36
Earlier,however,he had told Tomkinsthat he was simplytryingto finda wayof
solvingthe problem thathis drawingsdid not followone fromthe other the way
his paintingsdid: "I reallywanted to make a whole lot of drawings,though,so I
began looking around fora vehicle,somethingto keep them going."37If thiswas
his explanationin 1964, however,it had become farmore generalizedbythe time
TomkinswroteOfftheWall:Robert
and theArtWorldofOur Time(pubRauschenberg
lished in 1980), which quotes Rauschenberg's pretextas simplywanting to be
taken more seriouslyas an artist.38[Rauschenberg:
"Itis mentioned
whyI spentsucha
longperiodof timeon thiswork.(1) I was notgoingto leave it undone.(2) I became
irritated
extremely
bytheself-servicing
of thetextdisguisedas righteousness.
Attempting
Dantewas a privateexercise
in mygrowth
and self-exploration
tofacemyweaknesses.
A test.
toalienateortoally."]
BydoingitI had equalopportunity
If Rauschenbergwas forcinghimselfto engage with "symbolism,"
was this
because his Combine paintingshad been trulyabstract,as he claimed? Or was it
because theyhad alreadybeen invokingconnotational fields,particularlyin the
matricesset up between objects,words,and photographicreproductionson the
surfaces of works like Rebus (1955), Talisman (1958), or TrophyI (forMerce
"In thecanto... thespaceallowedforeachimage
Cunningham)(1959)? [Rauschenberg:
was a measure
madebythespaceoccupied
(Nottoexaggerate
bytheauthor'swords,literally.
oredit.)I was thereporter
"] And was the figurativenatureof the new projectboth a
connection
wayof acknowledgingthisand of extendingit?Further,in the three-way
set up in these drawingsbetween the figurative,the symbolic,and the photographic, which element is primary?39Does the avowed desire to break with
abstractionpromote figuration,which then leads to the allegorical requirement
of a mastertext (in this case the Inferno)and the subsequent need fora (photographic) image bank fromwhichto draw?Or do the photographicforcesalready
36.
Quoted in Seckler,"The ArtistSpeaks,"p. 84.
37.
Quoted in Tomkins,TheBrideand theBachelors,
p. 224.
38.
Tomkins,OfftheWall,p. 157. That Rauschenberg continues to be defensiveabout the early
characterizationof himselfas an unseriousjokester (in a January1956 review,Steinberghad written
in which,referringto his reception
"Eulenspiegelis abroad again") is witnessedbythe manyinterviews
in the 1950s,he made remarkslike "I was considereda clown."See Leo Steinberg,"Monthin Review:
ContemporaryGroup at Stable Gallery,"Arts30, no. 4 (January1956), p. 47, and Paul Taylor,"Robert
20, no. 12 (December 1990), p. 147.
Rauschenberg,"Interview
39.
I am using"symbolic"here in a ratherloose way,to gathertogetherthe idea of imagessymbolizing othersensorydata or specifictextualideas, and thus the drivetowardthe textualor the linguistic
("symbol"in the semiologicalsense). In this usage, symboloverlapswith the idea of the allegorical
emblem, rather than opposing it, as it does in Walter Benjamin's analysisof the fragmentaryand
disunifiednature of allegorycontrastedto the organic characterof the workunderstood as symbol.
See Benjamin,TheOriginofGermanTragicDrama,trans.JohnOsborne (London: New LeftBooks,1977).
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104
OCTOBER
assemblingon the surfacesof the Combine paintings,themselvesreleasinguncontainable networksof association, simultaneouslydemand the figurativeand its
textualsupport?
Whateverthe first,originaryterm in this departure,the Infernocertainly
plunged Rauschenberginto the domain of the connotational,in which messages
and metaphors.Fromthe kindof
overlayone anotherin a pile-upof substitutions
visual symbolsused for smells (Canto VI's "putrid slush" is metaphorized as a
stinkingfishin Rauschenberg's illustration),for sounds (Canto IV's "roar and
trembling of Hell" becomes a racing car), and for tactile sensations (Canto
XXXII's icywilderness,
wheretearsfreezethe eyesshut,is visualizedbya transparent
cube withan eye inside it),40to those forconceptual conditions (Canto XX's idea
of fortune-tellers
and divinersis renderedby a large head of SigmundFreud and
the
fact
that
all
the bodies have theirheads on backward),the drawingsexplore
by
the allegoricaldimensionof the image. But whateverthe specificsymbolicassociationsreleased maybe, theirinterconnectionscould not pass fromone partof the
drawingto anotherwithoutanother dimension.That aspect is the technicalone,
in whichrubbing,veiling,and liquiditynot onlyopen vignettesof space withinthe
surfaceof the pages but, by reaffirming
that surface,convertit into the vehicle
thatallowsone such space to flowinto another.
In creatinga unifiedstrokeas the mediumof all the imagesin the series,the
act of rubbingnecessaryto Rauschenberg'ssolvent-transfer
process (in which a
magazineor newsprintpage is soaked withlighterfluidor some othersolvent,laid
face down on top of the drawingsheet, and then rubbed witha bluntinstrument
to force the ink of the printed page onto the underlyingsheet) serves as the
matrixof slippage betweenone image and the next,whichthe spillsand flowsof
watercolorand gouache merelyheighten.41But the rubbing also produces two
more effects.Since a rubbing most often takes the formof a rectangularunit
capturinga givenfigureor object along witha patch of itsbackground,the firstis
that individualimages are framed,somethingheightenednot only by the many
found,internalframeswithinindividualimages (such as the astronaut'svisored
helmetin Canto XXX) but by the numerousrectangularelementscollaged to the
pages. The second is thatthe rubbing'svisualblurpromotesthe sensationthatthe
imagesare "veiled."
It is thiscombinationof framingand veilingthatparadoxicallyrestoresthese
drawingsto the verydimensionthatLeo Steinbergwas to call the "diaphane,"in
40.
These have been pointed out in Ashton,"Rauschenberg'sThirty-four
Illustrations,"
pp. 57, 61.
For another reading of the drawings'relations to the textof Inferno,
see BititeVinklers,"WhyNot
Dante? A Study of Rauschenberg's Drawings for the Inferno,"
ArtInternational(Lugano) 12, no. 6
(Summer1968), pp. 99-106.
41.
A precedentfor the use of rubbingto promoteassociativereadingsand slippage is, of course,
Max Ernst's frottagetechnique, which I do not think is connected historicallyto Rauschenberg's
method. Far more likelyis the connection between the parallel strokesof the rubbingand Jasper
Johns'sdrawingtechniqueof usingparallel hatchingto open up pocketsof shallowspace.
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,
?
..
d.. .
:
i
::/':::::
.. . . !i
ii
?I
i
,i"
?;
'
?Is
Canto XX: CircleEight,Bolgia 4,
The FortuneTellersand Diviners.1959-60.
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OCTOBER
106
it (and the whole traditionof picturemakingbeforeRauschenberg)
distinguishing
fromthe very"flatbedpicture plane" that he saw Rauschenberg's Combines as
inaugurating.The sense of the visual fieldfallingin a transparentbut decidedly
verticalveil before the viewer's upright body connects the "diaphanic" with a
dimensionof naturethatSteinbergwenton to contrastexplicitlyto Rauschenberg's
exploitationof the "post-Modern"dimensionof culture,understood now,in the
Combines, as a horizontal "receptorsurface on which objects are scattered,on
whichdata is entered,on whichinformation
maybe received,printed,impressed."42
To returnto the veil,and therebyto the diaphane-or to the frame,and hence to
the windowmodel of the pictureplane-was, then, to arise fromthisflatbed,in
whichRauschenberg'soriginalityas an artisthad been invested.
But the returnto thisverticalaxis in the Dante drawingsseems to have been
motivatedless by a need to connect to nature (or landscape) than to what we
would have to call an "imagelogic,"whichis to saythat,whetherstoredwithinthe
imaginaryspaces of our dreams,fantasies,or memories,or observedin the external
world,images are verticallyoriented,withheads at the top, feetat the bottom.If
Rauschenbergwas exploringthe associationalfieldof thosechainsof connotations
that,as Bartheshad noted,make up the rhetoricalform"commonforinstanceto
dream, literatureand image," he had no choice but to seek the image logic's
vector,whichis vertical.This is the reason whyit is hard to see whichwas foremost
in Rauschenberg'sset of choices in 1958: the conditionof the symbol;itsexistence
as figurative;
or the supportof the photograph.This is also whythereis no break
between the image logic exploited in the Dante drawingsand the oneiric feeling
of"RandomOrder."The mentalspacesofdream,ofmemory,
and ofthe imagination
are equallyupright.
9. Heads containedbyframesappear throughoutthe Dante drawings,either
because Rauschenbergencased faceswithinframingrectangles(as in CantosX and
XXXI) or because he foundsuch framingin the borrowedimagesthemselves(the
diver'shelmetin Canto XX, the astronaut'sin Canto XXX). This resourceis carried
over into the silkscreenedpaintings.In Transom(1963), Flush(1964), and Trapeze
Venusand Peter Paul Rubens's
(1964), forexample,mirrorsfromboth the Rokeby
TheToiletofVenus(ca. 1613-14) isolatethe femalefacesand are themselvesfurther
isolatedbythe painting'sfield,and in Retroactive
II (1964) and Press(1964),JohnE
Kennedy'shead is tightlyframed.Enclosingthe head and face,the frameseems to
organizean imageof the mental,or of thought,meditation,or reflection.
Steinberg had indeed spoken of the flatbed of Rauschenberg's Combine
paintings as a turningaway fromthe optical towardthe mental. "It seemed at
times,"he wrote,"thatRauschenberg'sworksurfacestood for the mind itselfdump, reservoir,switchingcenter, abundant with concrete references freely
42,
Steinberg,"OtherCriteria,"p. 84.
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107
associated as in an internalmonologue-the outward symbolof the mind as a
running transformerof the external world, constantly ingesting incoming
And buildingon that
unprocesseddata to be mapped in an overchargedfield."43
the
sense
that
the
diverse
elements
wildly
suggestion,plus
"dumped" onto this
embedded withinit in such a wayas to produce
surfacewerenonethelessphysically
a peculiar homogeneityamong the varied elements,and between them and that
surface,I myselftried to develop the particulardimension of the mental space
suggestedbythe Combines,namelymemory.44
If fromthe Combines to the Dante drawingsto the silkscreensvia "Random
Order,"the assortmentof materialobjects giveswayto the framedimage-a twodimensionalelementwhose substanceis now trulyat one withits planar support
and whose medium is consistently
photographic-this experience of a mnemonic
of the image
space becomes ever more specific.For not onlydoes the verticality
become pervasive,but now,as assertively
"Random
presentedin the manifestolike
Order,"the formulaforthe entiresilkscreenseriesis to be a loose gridof enframed
photographicspaces thatseems to presentone withnothingso much as a visual
archive:the storage and retrievalmatrixof the organized miscellanyof images,
whichpresentsthe memoryas a kindof filingcabinetof the mind.
10. The photographic archive was not whollyforeign to Rauschenberg's
Identikit.He is fond of sayingthat he almost became a photographer,and the
project he imagined embarkingon, inspiredby the presence at Black Mountain
College of Harry Callahan and Aaron Siskind,was, W.P.A.-like,to photograph
America,footbyfoot,"in actual size."45
Given Rauschenberg'sgeneration,the W.P.A.characterizationis surprising.
We would sooner expect him to share a sensibilitywith someone like Robert
Frank.We would predictthatRauschenberg'shandlingof photographywould give
us the sense of our connectionto a place thatis onlypossiblethroughthe intensity
of our experience of separation fromit, the sense that to see it directlyis so
painfulthatthe image mustsomehowbe mediatedby the presence of a veil. This
is true of Frank's famous BarberShop through
ScreenDoor-McClellanville,South
Carolina(1955) and his Fourthof uly-Jay,New York(1954), in whichthe mesh of
screeningthatparadoxicallyservesas both focusingdeviceand barrierin the former
and the Americanflagdroppinga verticalcurtainthroughthe space of the latter
produce the simultaneousconnection and distance that is the heart of Frank's
ambivalence.Whetherwe are looking at ViewfromHotelWindow-Butte,
Montana
or
Elevator-Miami
Beach
there
is
the
effect
of
a
(1956)
veil,created
(1955),
always
43.
Ibid., p. 88.
See my "Rauschenberg and the Materialized Image," Artforum
44.
13, no. 4 (December 1974),
pp. 41-43.
45.
Quoted in Rose, Rauschenberg,
p. 75. In 1979, Rauschenbergundertooka projectof thisnature,
In + Out CityLimits.
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Robert
Frank.
ViewfromHotel
Montana.1956.
Window-Butte,
eitherby the literalmeans of photographedfabricor by the technicalmeans of
blur,flare,or pulled focus.
Veils do functionin Rauschenberg'streatmentof foundphotographswithin
his Combines,famouslyso in the gauze thatfallsovera group of photos in Rebus
and over the reproductionof the stag in Curfew(1958). In these instances,the
veilscan be seen as workingto createa balance betweenthe assumedtransparency
of the photographicimage's relationto realityand the opaque presence of the
other objects piled onto the Combine. The skin of paint that oftenscabs over
these objects,marryingthem to the flatbedsurface,is thusmimickedby the veil
thatis dropped in frontof the occasional photographicimage.
we see somethingfarmore in
However,in Rauschenberg'sown photography,
tunewiththe example ofWalkerEvans'sworks:the frontality;
the relentlessfocus;
the qualityof lightfallingon texturedsurfaces(clapboard siding,forexample,or
brick) actingas a kind of graphic,or drawn,stroke;and the fascinationwithtwodimensional"fronts"(billboards,tornposters,shop windows)standingin forthe
block.It is thesequalities,combined
deep space of the "real,"whichtheyeffectively
withthe surveymentalityexpressed by the photographicproject Rauschenberg
initiallyimagined,that make the connection to the idea of an archive,a photographiccorpusthroughwhichrealityis somehowingested,organized,catalogued,
and retrieved.Indeed, beginningwiththe silkscreens-Rauschenberg'ssystematic
turnto photographyas the basis forhis paintings-this procedureof the survey
has markedhis approach in variousways.
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Above:Rauschenberg.
Baltimore,Maryland.1979.
N.Y.C.Midtown.1979.
Below:Rauschenberg.
ONE
WH
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OCTOBER
110
One ofthemis the amassingof thearchiveon the basisofcertainpreconceived
categories.A precedentcan be foundin the notorious"shootingscripts"handed out
in 1936 to hisW.P.A.cameramen,includingEvans,whoweredirected
byRoyStryker
to recordcertainkindsof settings,social types,and accoutrements.In collectinghis
own materialforthe silkscreenseriesand forsubsequentworks,Rauschenberghas
also looked forcertaintypesof subjectsin hismedia sources.As he and his assistants
scour these sources,theyarrangethismaterialin prescribedcategories-athletes,
space travel,animals,domesticobjects,transport,and Americanemblems,among
in hisCaptivastudio.46
others-in pileson theworktables
But the mostimportantaspect of the archivalis the idea of the standardized
format,which allows for its informationalspace to be mapped. This is where
Rauschenberg'stwo choices-his employmentof the loose grid as a structureand
the conveyanceof the image in itsframe,so clearlyenunciatedin "RandomOrder"
and so faithfully
followedin the silkscreens-become important.[Rauschenberg:
"Re
I also arrangemyothercolorsand materials
thearchives:
in sucha waytokeepthemin my
I can organize
I do,so I amfreetoworkin chaos,spontaneity,
and thenot
reach.Everything
yetdone."]
11. The archiveis a documentaryproject,a public act of collectivememory;
or at leastthatis itsideal form,the one projectedbyvariousprewararchivalsurveys,
like the W.P.A.'sin America, or August Sander's Das AntlitzderZeit (The Face of
Time,1929) in Germany.BenjaminBuchloh has writtenabout the peculiarrelation
of postwaravant-gardeartiststo these earlierdemonstrationsof a beliefnot only
in the transparencyof the photographic medium but in the common-sense
assumptionof the transparencyof the realityitselfonto which the camera was
focused. GerhardRichter,as his complex projectAtlas(1962-present) reflects,is
of anysuch transparency
and the need
peculiarlyadamant about the impossibility
to punctureits mythologicalstatus.If the archivalprojectis founded on memory,
Richter'sown example seems to say,it mustbe based as well on a notion of subjectivityfor which (or for whom) coherent memory is possible. But what Atlas
questions,over the meander of its burgeoningbut hapless categoricalspaces, is
just thisoption at a historicalpointat which,to use Buchloh's terms,"anomie" has
taken over in such a wayas to eclipse the subject,to produce thatsubject as the
basis of mnemonicactivityno longer.47
In Buchloh's reconstructionof Richter'sdevelopment,Richter'sexperience
of seeing Rauschenberg'sworkin the 1959 exhibitionDocumentaII: Kunstnach
46.
This was described to me byNan Rosenthal,who was struckbyit on her firstvisitto Captiva in
1983.
47.
Benjamin H. D. Buchloh, "L'Archiveanomique de GerhardRichter,"a chapter of his seminal
exhibitioncatalog, vol. 2, La Peinturea' la fin du sujet(Paris: Mus&e
Richter,
studyof Richter,Gerhard
d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, 1993), pp. 7-17. See also Buchloh's essayin thisissue of October,
startingon p. 117.
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111
1980.
Charleston.
Rauschenberg.
1945 in Kasselwas crucialto his embraceof modernismand redirectionof his own
project, which Atlas inaugurated.48 It is therefore fortuitous that by 1962
Rauschenberghimselfhad embarkedon a seriesnot unrelatedto Atlasin various
photos (here suppliedbyRauschenberg,taking
aspects:the use of "amateur-type"
themwithhis Roloflexcamera) combinedwithimagesculled frommagazinesand
newspapers;the exploitationof serializationand repetition;the coordinationof
the framedphotographicimage withthe geometricallypatternedlayoutof the
whichis thenowhighlyproblematicspace ofmemory.
grid;and theultimatequarry,
12. The last word of the two-pagespread in "Random Order" is "allegory,"
whichis penciled byitselfunder the layeredinteriorspace of Rauschenberg'sloft,
48.
were Bed,Kickback
Ibid., p. 13. The RauschenbergworksthatRichtersaw at the 1959 Documenta
(1959), and Thaw(1958).
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OCTOBER
112
stove and sink lined up parallel to the surfaceplane in the image's foreground,
countertoprepeatingthisparallelin the middleground,and floor-boundworksin
progressin the background.This image showsinteriorspace as organized by the
language of perspective,which makes the order of the asserted "allegory"not
exactlywhatwe would have expected.
If "allegory"has been applied as a termof criticalappraisalto Rauschenberg's
work,thishas been to align it witha varietyof deployments,includingfragmentation, appropriation, and indeterminacyof reading, that characterize certain
postmodernpractices.49It has also been to annex it to WalterBenjamin's use of
of allegoryto addressthe reifiedstatusof the humansubjectwithin
baroque systems
a cultureof the commodity.50
In myconsiderationof "Random Order,"however,I
would like to do somethingboth more limitedand more precise.If allegorybegins
withthe doublingofone text(or image) byanother,Rauschenbergis clearlyplacing
photographyand (Renaissance) paintinginto such a reciprocalrelationship.Not
onlyhas he told us whathe thinksRenaissancepaintingis (the volume thatcan be
flattened"to the extentthata brushloadof paintcan hold it to a picturesurface"),
but he has made an emblem of thisbellows-likeopening and closingeverybit as
graphic as Albers's reversiblesquares. The opaque, two-dimensionalplane, or
is suspended withinthe schematic,perspectivalrenderingof
square, in Renascence
the cube as one of itsdimensionsnow "holdingvolumeto the surface";the cube is a
figurethatwillreappearpersistently
throughoutthe silkscreenseriesin workssuch
as Exile,NewPainting,
Payload,and Vault(all 1962); Die Hard (1963); Bicycle,
StopGap,
and Transom
(all 1963); and Press,Stunt,and Trap(all 1964).
But in "Random Order,"whatRauschenberghas also said is that the photographicmarkis notjust an imprintfallingonto the emulsionof the light-sensitive
surface fromthe space in frontof the camera (as in the example of the White
Paintings,which catch cast shadows), but that the mark seems to be wellingup
fromwithinthe camera itself,as in the case of a foggyor dirtypane, where "what
is outside appear[s] to be projected onto the window plane." In the artist's
access to reality
description,the photographis neitherconsideredthe "transparent"
that is part of the ideology of the document,nor conceived of as the indexically
opaque markof the cast shadow. Rather,it is understood-on the model of the
Renaissancepicture,whichstandsas its allegory--aslayered:a depth and a surface
forcedintosome kindof contact.
The model of that contact is not the sameas the Renaissance picture;if it
were,we would not be speakingof an allegory.Rather,thisrelationship,or contact,
betweensurfaceand depth is made-hence the "integrity
of the pictureplane"and then broken-the allegorical condition. The figurethat comes to mind in
49.
See Craig Owens, "The Allegorical Impulse: Toward a Theory of Postmodernism,"October
12
13 (Summer 1980), pp. 59-80.
(Spring 1980), pp. 67-86; and October
50.
See Benjamin H. D. Buchloh, "Allegorical Procedures: Appropriation and Montage in
21, no. 1 (September1982), pp. 44, 46-47.
ContemporaryArt,"Artforum
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113
thisregardis Freud's model of memory,the "MysticWriting-Pad."
How, he asked,
can we conceive of the storageof informationnecessaryto memoryoccurringin
the verysame neurological systemthat provides the perpetuallyvirginfieldsof
impression requisite for new, incoming perceptions?51In thinkingabout the
relationship between two systemsof neurons-those of permanent impression
(that is, storage) and those of perception-Freud turned to a child's toy,the
Wunderblock,whichis comprisedof a plasticsheet layeredovera wax tablet.The
pressureof drawingon the sheet witha stylusmakes the sheet stickto the tablet,
producing a graphic outline. But this configurationcan be made to disappear
simplybyliftingthe plasticsheet, therebypullingit awayfromthe tabletto which
it had been temporarilyattached. The sheet is then virginonce more, and, like
the perceptual system,ready to accept freshdata. The tablet has nonetheless
retainedthe marksof the stylus'simpressionand, like memory,bears a permanent
networkof tracesin the partof the apparatusthatlies below.
If"RandomOrder"is an allegory,
itis one thatattemptsto triangulatememory,
and text,withthe allegoricalexemplarbeing the oscillatingspace of
photography,
paintingin which inside and outside, virtualand actual, depth and surfaceare
bound and parted only to be bound and parted again. If there was a "belief"in
the early1960s thatthese could have somethingto do withone another,it would
surelynot have been along the lines of the prewararchive.Rather,althoughthere
is no immediate historical connection, the relationships are on the order of
Barthes's discussion in "Rhetoricof the Image," in which connotational chains,
anarchic and metastatic,open a kind of echo chamber of unstable meanings
thatBartheslatercalled the "stereophonic
ricochetingaroundthe archivalstructure
space" of the endlesslymultipleassociationalcodes.
By 1964,at theheightof hissilkscreenproduction,itwasclear to Rauschenberg
that these chains were both what he was confrontingand what he could never
control.Accordingly,
he said to David Sylvester,
We have ideas about bricks.A brickjust isn'ta physicalmassof a certain
dimensionthatone buildshouses or chimneyswith.The whole worldof
associations,all the informationthatwe have-the factthatit'smade of
dirt, that it's been through a kiln, romantic ideas about little brick
cottages,or the chimneywhich is so romantic,or labor-you have to
deal withas manyof the thingsas you knowabout. Because ifyou don't,
I thinkyou startworkingmore like an eccentric,or primitive,which,
you know,who can be anymore,or the insane,whichis veryobsessive.52
51.
SigmundFreud, "A Note upon the 'MysticWriting-Pad'"(1924), in Freud, TheStandardEdition
Works
oftheComplete
Psychological
ofSigmundFreud,ed. JamesStrachey,vol. 19 (London: Hogarth Press
and the InstituteforPsycho-analysis,
1961), pp. 227-32.
52.
TheSilkscreen
1962-64 (NewYork:Whitney
Quoted in Roni Feinstein,Robert
Rauschenberg:
Paintings,
Museum of AmericanArtin associationwithLittle,Brown,Boston,1990), p. 25, fromDavid Sylvester,
withRauschenberg,BBC, August1964,audiotape in Chelsea School ofArtLibrary,
interview
London.
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114
OCTOBER
ofa
Rauschenberg.
Photograph
material
glassofwaterusedas source
1962.
in silkscreened
paintings.
Another instance he provided Sylvesterwas the image of a glass of water,
whichenteredinto the silkscreenrepertory
bymeans of his own photograph.Not
onlywas it a purelyphysicalor functionalobject-"the factthatit's thisbig, this
high, that it mighttopple over,that it evaporatesand has to be refilled,thatit
he admitted,adheringto it were "all the psychological
picksup reflections"--but,
implicationsof a glass of water."Speaking of the glass thatappears in Persimmon
demonstration
(1964), he gave an example of one such implication,an interesting
forthe personwho insistedthattherewas no such thingas a sad cup of coffee:
In most cases, mymanipulationof the psychologicalis to tryto avoid
the ones that I know about. I had trouble in one painting ... I was
silkscreeninga glass of waterand I put it over green and thatwhole
paintinghad to changeto destroythelook ofpoison,whichisjust simply
an associationthatone has witha glassof green,I think.53
53.
Quoted in ibid.
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The year before this conversation, Rauschenberg had written"Note on
Painting,"54in which he returned to his rejection of the connotational as the
"cliches"thatpsychologicalcommon sense annexes to certainobjects ("If I see any
superficialsubconsciousrelationshipthatI'm familiarwith-cliches ofassociationI change the picture").55In "Note on Painting,"he wrote,"The workthen has a
chance to electric
servicebecome its own cliche,"withthe interjectionof "electric
service"into the sentencefunctioningsomewhatin the manner of the insertions
of photographsinto the flowof "Random Order."Indeed, these strangeinterruptions in "Note on Painting"-"open 24 hrs.,""heated pool," "Denver 39"-have
the qualityof textualfragmentsliftedfromadvertising,
journalism, or any of a
numberof other sources forthose wordsthat "broadsideour culture,"which the
trucksof "Random Order" are pictured as delivering. It's just that the word
"cliche," which in Rauschenberg's usage curiouslyjoins the psychological"cliches of association"-and the material-the words that "broadside our
culture"-sets up a relationshipbetweenthe externalsource of the image and the
internalspace of itsreception.
Because Rauschenberg has repeatedlysaid, "I alwayswanted myworkswhateverhappened in the studio-to look more like whatwas going on outside
the window,"56
we are not surprisedthatwiththe adventof the silkscreenseries he
should have identifiedthatoutside withphotographicmedia: "I was bombarded
withTV sets and magazinesby the excess of the world.I thoughtan honestwork
should incorporateall of these elements,whichwere and are a reality."57
What is
more surprisingis that he should have conceived of "whateverhappened in the
studio"as "itsown clich6,"now consideredas a positivequality.
This cliche, a precipitateof his characterizationof the media image as "the
complex interlockingof disparatevisual factsheatedpoolthat have no respectfor
is nonethelessthe stuffof the "subconscious."It is like the kernel of
grammar,"58
the dream,or the repetitively
simplewish,encircledby the elaborate disjuncture
of itsimagery,much of whichis fabricatedfromthe "dailyresidue"of one's recent
wakinglife.This relationshipbetweentheformof a rhetoricand itswildlyproliferating,manifestcontentis whatBartheshad been gettingat as wellwhen he spoke
about the endlesslexes intowhichimagesof realitycan be divided (the ideolects);
towardthe "psychicdepths of an individual... the more
however,as one descends
54.
The handwritten text, dated October 31-November 2, 1963, is reproduced as Robert
Rauschenberg, "Note on Painting,"in John Russell and Suzi Gablik, Pop ArtRedefined(New York:
FrederickA. Praeger,Publishers,1969), pp. 101-2.
55.
This particularquotation is taken fromthe Seckler interview,
whichtook place two yearsafter
"Note on Painting"was written.But at the time he made his black paintings,Rauschenberg'shostility
to associationswas expressedin his distressabout the connotationscriticswantedto annex to whathe
considereda simplematerial.
56.
Quoted in Taylor,"RobertRauschenberg,"p. 146.
57.
Artand Life(New York:HarryN. Abrams,1990),
Quoted in MaryLynnKotz,Robert
Rauschenberg:
p. 99.
58.
Rauschenberg,"Note on Painting,"p. 101. Italicsadded.
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OCTOBER
classifiablethe signsbecome. What could be more systematicthan the readingsof
Rorschachtests?"
The allegoryof inside and outside, of frontand back, of the photographic
the subjectfromthe outsidebutwellingup in a different
striking
form(the grammar
of the cliche) fromwithin,emblematizedby a reversiblecube, is the message of
"RandomOrder."As allegoriesgo, itis bothsimpleand moving,evincinga particular
faithin the renewability
of painting,capable of emerging"likea new season."59
59.
I would like to addressin thislastfootnotethe pressurethathas been exertedon Rauschenberg's
workin attemptsto read it as the encoding of a coherentmessageand in some cases to use the conventional procedures of iconographyto decode that message. This began withCharles F. Stuckey'sselfproclaimed deciphering of the rebus in Rebus ("Reading Rauschenberg,"Artin America65, no. 2
[March-April1977], pp. 74-84) and has continued in the kind of thematicreadings developed by
Roni Feinstein,where,among other things,she sees certainof the silkscreenedpaintingsas allegories
of Marcel Duchamp's TheBrideStripped
Bare byHer Bachelors,
Even (Large Glass) (1915-23; Feinstein,
RobertRauschenberg,
pp. 75-90). More recentlythe iconographyhas been understood as encrypting
themes of gay subculture,whetherthroughallusions to mythsresonant withingay sensibility(the
Ganymedemythin Canyonin Kenneth Bendiner,"RobertRauschenberg'sCanyon,"ArtsMagazine56,
no. 10 [June 1982], pp. 57-59) or, in the case of the entire Dante drawingsproject,throughhidden
references to bathhouse culture and the media support for homoerotic displays of male bodies
Others:
(Jonathan Katz, "The Art of Code: JasperJohns and Robert Rauschenberg,"in Significant
and Intimate
ed. WhitneyChadwickand Isabelle de Courtivron[London: Thames
Creativity
Partnership,
and Hudson, 1993], pp. 188-207; and Laura Auricchio, "Liftingthe Veil: Robert Rauschenberg's
and the CommercialHomoerotic Imageryof 1950s America,"in
Thirty-four
Drawings
forDante'sInferno
TheGay90s: Disciplinary
and Interdisciplinary
in QueerStudies,ed. Thomas Foster,Carol Siegel,
Formation
and Ellen E. Berry,Genders
26 [1997]). This idea of the iconographicas the encoding of a relatively
coherenttextthatunderliesand explainsthe imagesis,of course,milesawayfromthe complex theories
of allegoryput in place by WalterBenjamin and then used by other authors,fromPaul de Man for
literatureto BenjaminBuchloh and Craig Owens forthe visualarts.In those theories,baroque allegory
is broughtforwardto demonstratewhatin twentieth-century
experience is not readable throughthe
of
iconographicmodel of a stable relationbetweentwotexts.It is preciselythe messageof uncertainty,
slippage,of unreadabilityand fragmentationthatallegorynot onlyconveysbut also, in a necessaryact
of redoubling,itselfbecomes. The subject of allegoryis thuspreciselynot the subjectof iconography.
This would seem to me to be clear fromRauschenberg'sown allegoryof the subject of media. But,
then,the convincediconographeris almostimpossibleto dissuade.
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