Rauschenberg, among friends: a conversation

Art Conversations

Curated by Johan & Levi in collaboration with Fondazione Luigi Rovati

As part of miart 2025, on Friday, April 4 at 6 p.m. Fondazione Luigi Rovati hosts a conversation between Peter Benson Miller, Giorgio Di Domenico and Giorgio Motisi. The meeting is part of the Art Conversations cycle, curated by Johan & Levi in collaboration with Fondazione Luigi Rovati.

Robert Rauschenberg visited Italy for the first time over the summer of 1952, along with Cy Twombly. That trip marks the beginning of a profound relationship with the Italian context, culminating in his victory at the 1964 Venice Biennale. Through his works and a direct and reciprocal dialogue with the artists, galleries, and Italian institutions, interactions which had an important impact on his own work, Rauschenberg, also influenced the development of Italian art in the second half of the 20th century.

On the occasion of the talk, Peter Benson Miller, author of the recent American Artists in Postwar Rome: Art and Cultural Exchange (Bloomsbury Visual Arts), will focus on the context of Rome in the Fifties in which the artist immersed himself, as well as his participation in the 1958 Spoleto Festival. Giorgio Di Domenico, one of the contributing authors of the upcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist, will focus on the works and photographs made in Italy during this first stay, and on his relationship with Alberto Burri. Lastly, Giorgio Motisi, former Archival Research Resident at the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation and author of studies on the reception of the artist in Italy in the Sixties, will discuss Rauschenberg’s solo exhibition in Milan at the Galleria dell’Ariete in 1961 and its impact on Italian art.

Photo: Robert Rauschenberg 1969

The meeting is free, reservations are recommended. The conference ticket does not include access to the Art Museum. The video of the meeting will be posted on the Fondazione's YouTube channel.

Friday, April 4 | 6 p.m.

Fondazione Luigi Rovati

Sala Conferenze

Corso Venezia 52, Milano