The American artist Robert Rauschenberg (1925 - 2008, Florida) studied with Josef Albers at the legendary Black Mountain College. There, he met with Merce Cunningham, John Cage, and Cy Twombly.

His work characterize of continuing interest in experimenting. With Cage he realized "Automobile tire prints", which the patterns were printed of the tire. He has created the costumes for Merce Cunningham. He developed a special process, which he could rub off on other paper newspaper and magazine images and edit further. The graphic techniques of lithography and screen-print offered more ways to play freely and associatively with images. In the mid-60's he created the first "combine paintings", images that were combined with objects and materials of everyday life. So Rauschenberg is one of the founders of Pop Art.

The universal works with a variety of materials, techniques and media (from painting to the dance) and the new combine experiment show Rauschenberg as one of those artists who seek to remove the gap between art and life in their work. His works are appreciated all over the world and are exhibited in the Museum of modern art, New York.

Designation for the painting and sculpture detached from the representational portrayal, which spread from around 1910 in ever new style variations across the whole western and parts of the eastern world. Russian painter Wassily Kandinsky, born in 1866, is considered to be the founder of abstract art. Among other important artists of abstract art are K.S. Malewitsch, Piet Mondrian, and others.

The field of graphic arts, that includes artistic representations, which are reproduced by various printing techniques.

Printmaking techniques include woodcuts, copperplate engraving, etching, lithography, serigraphy.

Related Links:
Heliogravure
Woodcut
Copperplate engraving
Etching
Lithography
Serigraphy (Silk-screen printing)