Robert Rauschenberg
Mother of God, ca. 1950

A quietly beautiful collaged work, Robert Rauschenberg’s Mother of God (ca. 1950) is one of the artist’s earliest surviving paintings. Created by layering thickly painted areas with fragments of found maps, the composition mixes mechanical reproductions with tactile brushwork to yield a central circular form edged by both paint and paper. This combination and juxtaposition of materials blurs the usual distinctions between figure and ground, creating a tension between the mass-produced and handcrafted elements that is further heightened by the contrast of the cold, flat stripe of faded metallic paint across the painting’s lower edge and the fleshy white of the oil paint. The maps, which span nineteen American states and sections of Canada, were originally from a Rand McNally & Company atlas printed between 1949 and 1956. Yet while all of the cities charted in these fragments are identifiable, the collaged pieces act as an abstracted gridded backdrop for the painted white circle at the work’s center, a simple yet enigmatic form that suggests a face, a cloud, or a moon over a landscape.

After it debuted in 1951 at Betty Parsons Gallery, New York, in Rauschenberg’s first solo exhibition, Mother of God was lost for a number of years. When rediscovered, it was thought to be untitled. Rauschenberg later reconnected this painting with the title Mother of God because he associated that phrase with a circle. His religious upbringing gave Rauschenberg a solid understanding of Christian symbols and themes, and during the early 1950s he produced a number of works whose titles referenced religion, such as Trinity (ca. 1949) and Crucifixion and Reflection (ca. 1950). Though Rauschenberg never followed or established any strict iconography in his work, the white circle, seen through the lens of Christianity, may be read as a sign of eternity or motherhood. Mother of God’s religious undertones are amplified by a collaged advertisement for the Catholic Review, found in the lower right corner, which reads “An invaluable spiritual road map…” This bit of text draws together the title of the painting, the maps, and the spiritual allusions of the circle, yet it also walks a line between sincerity and tongue-in-cheek humor. With its interplay of paint, found materials, and puzzling text, Mother of God forecasts strategies and characteristics that would come to define Rauschenberg’s work by the late 1950s, and, in fact, occupy him throughout his life.

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Overview

A restrained study of contrasting zones of sunlight and shadow, Robert Rauschenberg’s Quiet House—Black Mountain (1949) signals the importance photography held for the artist at the dawn of his career. As its title suggests, this picture was taken at Black Mountain College, where Rauschenberg studied in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Founded in 1933 near Asheville, North Carolina, the college represents a remarkable chapter in American progressive education, and remains renowned for its distinguished faculty and alumni in the arts. Rauschenberg’s tenure there coincided with what is generally understood as the most dynamic period in the school’s twenty-four-year existence—and, more broadly, as a defining moment in the history of the postwar American avant-garde. It was at Black Mountain, for example, that Rauschenberg began lasting collaborative relationships with visiting faculty members John Cage (1912–1992) and Merce Cunningham (1919–2009). Quiet House—Black Mountain, however, highlights the influence of other places and people the artist encountered while attending the famed school.

A small stone building designed and constructed in 1942 by alumnus Alex Reed, the Quiet House was conceived as a memorial for the late son of Black Mountain co-founder and faculty member Theodore Dreier. By 1948, the year Rauschenberg arrived at the rural campus, the Quiet House was a much cherished space for meditation and ceremonial use. Hazel Larsen Archer (1921–2001), the instructor with whom Rauschenberg first studied photography, frequently made images of the structure during her tenure at the school. Evocative of solitude or perhaps contemplation, Rauschenberg’s Quiet House—Black Mountain resonates with his mentor’s treatment of this beloved site.

One of Rauschenberg’s earliest photographs, this carefully composed picture suggests a pupil’s studied exploration of form, light, and shadow. Yet it also recalls the emphasis on line, form, light, and darkness in the black-and-white photographic abstractions of Aaron Siskind (1903–1991) and Harry Callahan (1912–1999), who Rauschenberg would come to know—and, in Siskind’s case, befriend—when they taught at Black Mountain during summer 1951. Engaging what Siskind famously described as “the drama of objects,” Rauschenberg would continue to examine the tension between the characteristics of an actual object and its photographic representation in later works. The image of a chair swathed in raking sunlight seems to have presented a particularly compelling study, reappearing in the Combine Pilgrim (1960), the multimedia installation Soundings (1968), and as both a silkscreened image and an actual chair in his Big D Eclipse (Shiner) (1990).

Ownership, Exhibition, and Publication Histories

Markings and Inscriptions

Artwork Info

Artwork title
Mother of God
Date created
ca. 1950
Classification
painting
Medium
oil, enamel, printed maps, newspaper, and metallic paint on Masonite
Dimensions
48 × 32 1/8 in. (121.9 × 81.5 cm)
Date acquired
1998
Credit
Fractional purchase through a gift of Phyllis C. Wattis and promised gift of an anonymous donor
Copyright
© Robert Rauschenberg Foundation
Permanent URL
https://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/98.299
Artwork status
Not on view at this time.

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