ABSTRACT
The pursuit of new techniques has been a continuous theme of Robert Rauschenberg’s work. During a trip to Cuba in spring 1952, the artist first experimented with transfer drawings, taking printed images, primarily from newspapers and magazines, placing them face down on sheets of paper, and then rubbing the backs of the images or other burnishing device to transfer the original to the paper. He also made life-size body cyanotypes on commercial, pre-coated blueprint paper in the early 1950s. Numerous companies make acceptable transfer sheets that one can put through a digital printer and afterwards dislodge the image using heat from an iron. Since good printmaking papers are rag. Lifts from live imagery with any film, although more uncertain due to the one-of-a-kind nature of the process, allow for adjustments in composition, focus, lighting, and exposure.
