During January and February 2016 the artist Danny McCarthy was invited to work as “Artist In Residence” with The Rauschenberg Foundation in Captiva Florida along with fellow “The Quiet Club” member Mick O’Shea. The residency was housed in Robert Rauschenberg Studio’s and estate. While there, the artists had full access to all the studio’s facilities including Rauschenberg’s own piano which Cage, Tudor etc. had performed on. In the studios were the work tables used by Rauschenberg when he lived and worked there. These tables were marked, scored and coloured by Rauschenberg himself as he made his own work. (The tables were fabricated and built by Matt Hall, Rauschenberg’s assistant and still head technician at the studios). McCarthy took these marks, scores and colours, photographed them and used them to create a series of prints on antique handmade paper that Rauschenberg had left behind in the studio.

These became “The Rauschenberg Scores”.
 
McCarthy then used Rauschenberg’s piano in the main studio to interpret these scores. Working late into the night sounds appeared in the studio for no apparent reason. These sounds were incorporated into the recordings. The scores/prints moved on the walls, again for no apparent reason except they read/looked better that way. Whether “Bob” as Matt calls him intervened is open to interpretation, but as Matt Hall said “It would not be the first time strange things happened and things moved by themselves in these studios”.

Danny McCarthy
December 2017