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Detail of Robert Rauschenberg’s Untitled [black painting with portal form] showing variety of paint

Related to Untitled [black painting with portal form], 1952–53

Detail of Robert Rauschenberg’s Untitled [black painting with portal form] showing variety of paint

Related to Untitled [black painting with portal form], 1952–53

Robert Rauschenberg, Untitled [black painting with portal form], 1952–53 (detail)

Research Material
Artwork Detail

Contrary to what its title may suggest, Untitled [black painting with portal form] is not entirely black. This detail from the upper right of the canvas (taken while the work was oriented with the black portal shape on the right) shows a swath of white paint, beneath which Rauschenberg left sections of a newspaper fragment untouched. The newspaper covers yet another layer of heavily applied black paint that is riddled with cracks. A highly glossy splash of a different type of black paint lies just to the upper left of the white patch.

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