Retroactive 1, 1964

Rauschenberg’s art deals with the question, “Why am I here?” As a WWII veteran and artist, he became a spectacular figure of American energy. He used silk screens to create a new type of history in a brilliant reaction to mass culture. In his 1964 collage Retroactive, Rauschenberg used magazine and newspaper images to symbolize an American culture overwhelmed by media during the Cold War. The military conflicts covered by television screens saturated the lives of millions of Americans. His blue image of the freshly assassinated president John F. Kennedy pointing his accusing finger towards the viewer invoked a moving emotional response. This picture shows JFK, the youngest president in US history, demonstrating aggressive and outright protective body language. After looking first at the picture of Kennedy, the viewer analyzes the top left picture of a parachuting astronaut. JFK’s initiatives to make the United States the first nation to go to the moon come to mind. Americans were lost in Cold War fears. The media may have exacerbated these fears, but the media did allow JFK to bring the nation together. The man helped prevent a feared nuclear holocaust that so many Americans saw as an inevitable reality. In 1964, someone may have asked, “Why are we here?” JFK could be the answer to that question.