‘Revolver’ by Robert Rauschenberg

Rauschenberg anticipated the PopArt eara. He broke away from the abstract exspressionism that was coming to an end.

In 1966 Rauschenberg and Kluver collaborated with a group of artists for nine evenings to further explore their aspirations. Robert Whitman and Fred Waldhauer, joined them, forming E.A.T. "an organization devoted to facilitating interaction between artists and engineers in order to address the technological challenges of realizing artistic concepts.

"Artists and Engineers collaborated to actualize projects, which were out of reach previously, due to lack of technical support. The organization attracted so much interest that the artists were issued a grant for $8,000, allowing them to finance a home base for E.A.T. Thirty engineers participated in the "9 Evenings" with artists, by 1968 engineer membership jumped to 467.

In his first collaboration with E.A.T Rauschenberg fused elements of light sound and motion. One of the main pieces of work that came from Rauschenberg and the E.A.

T. group was 'Revolver.' This was Rauschenberg attempting to link with the general public.'Revolver' displays elements of motion and time. Silk-screened on five rotating Plexiglas disks and are set on a pedestal for the viewer to operate.

The Plexiglas disks can be adjusted to move one at a time or together; in opposite directions or in the same direction, at the discretion of the viewer. E.A.T.

contributed much more to the art world than just the pieces they facilitated. E.A.T. itself was an experiment in the integration of the world of art with science.

Under the direction of Robert Rauschenberg, these first experiments with technology paved the way for future artists to explore the possibilities of scientific ideas. Some of these mains idea come from the same principles of the major movement 'Pop Art,' which was first introduced in the 1960's. It portrayed the modern day style of living and modern day media.CompositionThe scale of the piece of work is very significant. If the piece was too small then the ideas that Rauschenberg puts across in the piece would note been seen as clearly as it is now. This piece looks more impressive because of its size.

In a gallery people may pass by a smaller version of this, but because of the size people stop and 'interact' with it.The compositional form is tightly compact but the piece allows the audience to create their own composition with the motors that revolve the piece. This piece would obviously be very hard to be the same compostion twice which gives it an extra sense of spontinaity.The composition is very vibrant and very dynamic. The dynamics comes from the colours and depth that is created from each of the different layers.

Because the Plexiglas is circular and create a frame like object, it gives the piece a sweeping feel. The circle creates a central focal point. Also because of the 5 sections a good illusion of depth is produced because of the translusant colours.The artists view point is more or less central but because of the ability to move the composition around the viewpoint changes.

The view though is mostly central this is where the deeper colours are present along with the words in the piece. The words are things the audience can relate to so therefore they become focal points. The piece has secondary images of people almost frozen in time, this creates the sense of time and space.TechniqueThe installation has beeen created by silk-screen. The images have been screened on to the 5 sheets of Plexiglas in different translucent colours.

Screen Printing is his only technique in this piece. To screen print you first have to expose the screen. This done with a Murcury vapour. Once the screen is exposed it is rinsed off and dried. Once the screen is dried it is clamped down on to the screen printing unit. Your material is then placed underneath the screen and lined up with the image on the screen.

A layer of paint, which has been mixed with retardant, is then thinly coated across the top of the screen. The person making the screen uses a tool called a 'squeegee' and applies pressure across the whole of the screen. This presses the paint through the gaps in the screen and on to the material. This is the full process of screen printing.

Rauschenberg uses this technique on Plexiglas. The process is the same as it would be for any other material.ColourThe colour in this piece is very simple. Most of the colours are processed colours such as processed blue, magenta and yellow, but he also uses crimson red, lemon yellow and ultramarine blue. These colours have then been places on top of each other to create others colours such as purples, greens and magentas. The colours are all quite different, they are not all are cool colours or warm colours.

The mixed of the two types of cool and warm colours creates an overall warm and vibrant feel. Very phycodelic. In each of the images the colours have not been modelled around the images in the picture. They are strong solid colours. They have been used translusently so that the layers behind each of the Plexiglas's can be seen without any obstructions.