Syn-Tex (1970)

This drawing and collage series includes both solvent transfer imagery and cut-and-pasted newsprint, printed reproductions, and photographs on paper. Rauschenberg used text and illustrations from advertisements that recall everyday life in addition to images and headlines that register current events. The photographs are Rauschenberg’s own Polaroids, sometimes of the drawing in progress, affixed onto the surface of the work. The title of the series plays off of “syntax,” which refers to the process of using words to create well-formed sentences; much as one uses words to form sentences, Rauschenberg uses collage to form artworks.