Robert Rauschenberg

Rauschenberg’s monumentala grafiska verk "Currents" består av 36 screentryck med motiv hämtade från åtta samtida amerikanska tidningar. Tillsammans med sin assistent Bob Petersen klippte Rauschenberg rubriker, artiklar och bilder ur dagstidningar under januari och februari 1970. Med dessa motiv tryckte han två olika portfolios "Surface Series from Currents" och "Features from Currents". Han sammanförde sedan de 36 motiven till ett stort verk vilket bildade en gigantisk klippbok som speglade 1960-talets kriser och omvälvande händelser. Bladets totala mått är 182.9 x 1645.9 cm, vilket då var det största grafiska blad som någonsin tryckts. Det togs fram i en upplaga om 6 exemplar. På grund av sin storlek visades verket ofta i vinkel över ett hörn i utställningslokalen, så att de allvarliga rubrikerna kunde omsluta betraktaren – bland annat på MoMa New York.

I katalogen "Robert Rauschenberg" (2016) publicerad för den stora retrospektiva utställningen på Tate Modern i London 2017 återfinns följande stycke om "Currents":

"Rauschenberg's experience of endowing printing with painting's scale was fundamental to his conception of the editioned screen-print 'Currents', a work he conceived in 1969 and published in 1970 at Styria Studio in Glendale, California. The work reproduces a series of thirty-six collages, Studies for 'Currents' (1970), each of which comprises headlines, texts, and photographs that Rauschenberg gathered from eight contemporary U.S. newspapers over a period of two months. Of his decision to use multiple newspapers simultaneously he explained, 'One reads a newspape, absorbs the information no matter how disorienting, distressing or inflammatory it might be. When reading five or six papers with the constant repetition of items, the devastating news has a serious impact and it cannot be ignored.' The impact of the work's content was heightened through 'Currents' physical manifestation: it was printed on a single sheet of paper measuring six by fifty-four feet. Once again Rauschenberg had broken a record, making the largest-known printed work at the time. Because of its size, 'Currents' typically wraps around the corner of a room, enveloping the spectator in a collage of imagery about race relations, the Vietnam War, environmental challenges, and other political issues with which Rauschenberg was concerned,"
Citat sid 364.