11-81-C-3A #3

Robert Rauschenberg, one of the most celebrated practitioners of Pop Art, began his career as a photographer. His street photography from New York, Boston, and Los Angeles (where this work was made) appears in his series Photos In + Out City Limits. Much of Rauschenberg’s painting utilizes assemblage, and here he has captured a sort of found collage of seemingly disparate elements: a public water fountain, “Holy Water” sign, free pamphlets, and a small, hanging bell. With deadpan humor, the image singles out these offers of salvation found by chance on an urban street.