Good morning, ladies!! It is such a pretty day today, and it is almost May, which makes me ever so happy, because it means that I am so very close to moving to Florida! Yay! Every time I have a very happy thought, I think of a line from a famous poem, called Jabberwocky – which was written by the guy who wrote about Alice in Wonderland. It’s a poem made up with a lot of jibberish (fake words), but because of the way they’re said, you can figure out what they’re supposed to mean. And when the father of the subject of the poem is happy, he says “O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"…and day is the only real word there, but it’s perfect. Frabjous! I am totally calloohy today!
Today, I chose Robert Rauschenberg to tell you about. He was an American and is another guy who changed his name – he was born Milton Ernest Rauschenberg. I do like Robert a bit better than Milton. But I’ve never understood going to all the trouble of changing your name and not picking something really cool! I would really like to change my name to Skywalker. Not because I love Star Wars so much, but because it’s an awesome name. Your Uncle Patrick does not want to be married to someone named Skywalker, though, so I’m probably going to be stuck with Paula.
Anyway, back to Robert. One time he was in a show where the artists had to submit a portrait of a gallery owner named Iris Clert. Robert’s submission consisted of a telegram sent to the gallery declaring "This is a portrait of Iris Clert if I say so." You have to think about that, right? Can 11 words be a portrait just because an artist says so? It challenges what art means. It’s also kind of a total cop out…but an interesting one!
At one point he made a bunch of pieces out of trash, then took them to Italy and sold most of them…then he threw the ones that didn’t sell into a river. So I’m not really sure if he was one of those super-artsy people who have to make a dramatic point out of everything, or if he was a jerk who was making fun of the people who buy art (which is the only thing that really allows the art world to keep going)…but again, he was certainly interesting.
Below are three of his more famous pieces. I like them and I don’t like them at the same time (I really, REALLY want to straighten out that wheel in the middle one, and set the clocks to the same time!), but since he seemed to be the kind of artist whose main goal is to agitate people, that’s probably exactly what he would have wanted. J
Know that I love you and think that you’re awesome;
Hugs and kisses,
Auntie Paula
XOXOXO
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