Robert Rauschenberg’s New York Home Now Open by Appointment
one of the floors of the Soho home
The late 1960s home of artist Robert Rauschenberg, newly renovated and staffed with a team of archivists, curators, and managers, is now open by appointment to researchers.
one of his most famous Prints
Rauschenberg purchased the five-story building at 381 Lafayette Street in 1965. Situated between Manhattan’s NoHo and SoHo neighborhoods, it was originally constructed as a town house; in the early 1800s it became the administrative offices for an adjacent orphanage, and later, a school. Though the school relocated to Staten Island in 1929, the convent and offices stayed.
After Rauschenberg purchased the building, he spent a year renovating it, removing religious fixtures such as an altar from the chapel—though it still boasts three iconic Gothic lancet windows. At that time, SoHo was an up-and-coming neighborhood for New York artists and galleries, and Rauschenberg regularly exhibited art and held parties.
One of his most famous combines
Rauschenberg is perhaps best known for his “Combines” series of the 1950s and ’60s: paintings and collages into which he incorporated ready-made materials like taxidermy animals, fans, and pillows. Before he controversially won the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale in 1964, he had collaborated with painters such as Jasper Johns and Cy Twombly, as well as dancer Merce Cunningham, who used some of Rauschenberg’s work as stage backdrops.