For the New York Times Rauschenberg was a “Titan of American art“; for Guggenheim Director Thomas Krens the “Picasso of the second half of the 20th century“. Rauschenberg made his name in 1953 by his apparently crazy action of erasing a De Kooning drawing. With so-called “Combines”, which united trash from the streets of New York with painting in the Abstract Expressionist style, he introduced reality and sculptural plasticity into the pictorial image, preparing the way for Pop Art. Chris Granlund visited this multi-faceted artist in his Florida studio in 1997, also interviewing such important friends and colleagues as Merce Cunningham and Leo Castelli.