SEOUL.- Thaddaeus Ropac Seoul presents a selection of exemplary metal works from Robert Rauschenberg’s Copperhead series, created in 1985 and 1989. This important body of paintings executed on copper supports originated with a group of 12 Copperhead-Bites, eight of which are shown together for the first time since they were created and exhibited in 1985. The first of Rauschenberg’s metal series, the Copperhead-Bites mark the artist's early experimentation with creating images directly on sheets of metal using silkscreen printing techniques, acrylic paint and tarnishing agents.
The innovative techniques developed by the artist in the fabrication of the Copperhead-Bite series commenced his decade-long period of experimentation with painting on a variety of metal supports, including copper, brass, aluminium and bronze. The title of the series highlights his conceptualisation of the works as a means to expand his repertoire of artistic techniques. He explained that the name refers to the process of inscribing the images onto the metal support: ‘The images were the bite on the copper.’
The Copperhead-Bites were produced in the course of the Rauschenberg Overseas Culture Interchange (ROCI) project, designed to foster international collaboration through artmaking. The artist travelled extensively with the intention of accruing knowledge about the artistic practices of different cultures to inform new work that he presented in international touring exhibitions.
During his ROCI Chile research trip in 1984, he encountered the significance of copper to the country’s economy. He was motivated to devise new techniques to integrate metal into his practice. He visited a copper mine and foundry near Antofagasta and learned how to apply tarnishing agents to copper to create luminous tonal ranges. The experience inspired him to experiment with creating images and tarnished finishes on flat copper sheets when he returned to his studio in Captiva, Florida. Here, he produced the 12 Copperhead-Bites for the exhibition Rauschenberg Overseas Culture Interchange: ROCI CHILE presented at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Santiago in 1985.
The surfaces of the Copperhead-Bites depict images of animals, architectural facades, graffiti and signs drawn from the black-and-white photographs Rauschenberg took during the ROCI research trip to Chile – a selection of which are displayed alongside the metal works in the exhibition. Pavements and cobbled streets offer textural backdrops to images of grazing horses, stacked Coca-Cola bottles and, an enduring subject in the artist’s oeuvre, birds. The tarnishes, washed across the copper sheets, disrupt the reflective surface of the metal in painterly splashes of discolouration, juxtaposing hand-painted elements with the mediated process of silkscreening.
Distinguished by their uniform vertical format and exclusive use of photographic imagery from Chile, the Copperhead-Bites are contextualised in the exhibition by three exemplary works from the larger Copperhead series. These later works, created in 1989, demonstrate how Rauschenberg continued to play with the scale and format of his copper paintings following the ROCI CHILE exhibition. Unlike the artist’s earlier employment of silkscreen techniques in the 1960s, which layered images atop one another to create dense, grid-like formations, the photographic elements in the Copperhead series are juxtaposed in poetic compositions that generate open-ended meanings. This development in his practice builds upon his interest in exploring modes of communication expressed through the interplay of diverse imagery relating to modern life.
The multipart Cousins (1989), for instance, is a rare work on metal to feature multiple, unattached panels. Two of its three copper components are printed with, respectively, a field of sunflowers in red silkscreen ink and the image of waves splashing against a wooden pallet in blue. The title holds the interrelated images of land and sea in a relationship of kinship, despite their physical separation. In turn, a copper object suspended from the left silkscreened panel demonstrates Rauschenberg’s sustained interest in assemblage, as epitomised by his iconic Combines (1954-64) and the found metal incorporated in his sculptural Glut series (1986-89/1991-94), the latter created simultaneously with his later Copperhead works.
Together, the two groups of copper paintings and selection of black-and-white photographs featured in the exhibition represent the artist’s expansive approach to materials and technical innovation, which characterise the six-decade span of his practice, asserting his position at the forefront of the artistic landscape in the 20th century.
