Robert Rauschenberg: Black Mountain College and the Spreads
Celebrating the centennial of American artist Robert Rauschenberg’s birth, this program brings together two lectures that examine distinct moments in the artist’s career. One focuses on Rauschenberg’s time at the experimental Black Mountain College, where his studies with Josef Albers and collaborations with fellow artists shaped key approaches to postwar American art. The other considers Rauschenberg’s lesser-known Spread works from the 1970s, including Credit Blossom (Spread) in the collection of the NCMA.
Rather than tracing a single narrative, the program places these moments side by side, offering focused perspectives on Rauschenberg’s working methods, materials, and artistic concerns across different periods of his career. Speakers include Jeff Arnal, executive director of the Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, and Sarah Roberts, who is currently the senior director of curatorial affairs at the Joan Mitchell Foundation and formerly served as the primary author and editor of the Robert Rauschenberg Research Project and co-curated the 2017–18 retrospective Robert Rauschenberg: Erasing the Rules.
This project is supported by the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation.
About the speakers
Jeff Arnal is an American percussionist, curator, writer, and community organizer based in Asheville, NC. Since 2016 he has guided the Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center’s growth and programming, expanding exhibitions, performances, residencies, publications, research initiatives, and public programs. As an artist, Arnal has been active in experimental music since the 1990s, presenting work internationally across a wide range of performance contexts. Previously, Arnal served as senior music and performance program officer at the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage in Philadelphia, where he supported artists and organizations through grantmaking, research, and field-building initiatives. He holds an MFA in Music from Bennington College and a BA in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of Maryland and studied percussion at the Peabody Conservatory.
Sarah Roberts joined the Joan Mitchell Foundation in June 2024 as senior director of curatorial affairs. In this role she oversees the foundation’s collection, archives, research initiatives, exhibitions, publications, digital assets, and image licensing. She previously served as the Andrew W. Mellon Curator and Head of Painting and Sculpture at SFMOMA, where she organized exhibitions and directed research initiatives on the museum’s permanent collection for twenty years. In addition to her Rauschenberg-related projects, in 2021 she curated Joan Mitchell, a major retrospective organized with Katy Siegel and the Baltimore Museum of Art. Other exhibitions include Amy Sherald: American Sublime (currently on tour); Louise Bourgeois Spiders (2017–19); Carol Bove and John Chamberlain: Converse (2019–20); and SFMOMA’s presentation of Frank Bowling: The New York Years (2023), organized by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Image: Robert Rauschenberg, Credit Blossom (Spread), 1978, solvent transfer, quilt, and other fabrics on paperboard applied to gessoed wood panel, H. 84 × W. 108 × D. 2 in., Purchased with funds from the National Endowment for the Arts, the North Carolina State Art Society (Robert F. Phifer Bequest), and the State of North Carolina