As one gallery at Guild Hall opens an exhibition Saturday of works by the pioneering artist Robert Rauschenberg, who would have turned 100 this year, the other will be filled with student work inspired by Rauschenberg’s innovation.
The Student Art Festival and “Impressions Transferred: Lasting Legacies of Robert Rauschenberg” are both part of Rauschenberg 100, an international celebration of the artist’s legacy organized by the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation. The student show “explores what Rauschenberg described as the ‘gap between art and life,’ embracing experimentation and chance through a wide variety of materials and creative approaches,” according to Guild Hall. “His practice blurred distinctions between painting, sculpture, collage, photography, and printmaking, often incorporating everyday materials such as fabric, found objects, magazine images, and photographic transfers.”
With that approach in mind, public school students from East Hampton, Amagansett, Bridgehampton, Sag Harbor, Shelter Island, and Springs worked with the artists Linda K. Alpern, Scott Bluedorn, Peter Dayton, Eva Faye, Margaret Garrett, Candace Hill-Montgomery, Laurie Lambrecht, Bastienne Schmidt, Kevin Teare, and Evan Yee to create their own artworks for the student festival. The show was curated by the Guild Hall Teen Arts Council along with Melanie Crader, a museum director and curator of visual arts there.
An opening reception on Saturday from noon to 2 p.m. will include student performances and a drop-in workshop led by members of the Teen Arts Council.
Both shows will be on view through Jan. 4. Admission is free.