John Cage & Merce Cunningham & Robert Rauschenberg

“In summer 1952 Cage organized a performance that was later called Theater Piece No. 1 and sometimes referred to by scholars as the first Happening. According to Cage, the event was meant to explore “purposeful purposelessness.” He delivered lectures while others enacted performances with no thematic similarities during specific time allotments. Varying accounts recall Rauschenberg broadcasting Edith Piaf recordings on a gramophone, Cunningham dancing around and through the audience, and David Tudor playing the piano, with some of Rauschenberg’s White Paintings (1951) hanging in the space as décor.”

In 1952, three of Black Mountain College’s most prominent alumni, Cage, Rauschenberg, and Cunningham, came together in a performance later named Theater piece No.1. While Cage organized the performance it was the work of Rauschenberg, White Paintings, that framed the show. Cunningham provided choreography for the performance while pianist David Tudor provided music. The ideas of both the performance and paintings were to incorporate uncontrollable elements such as audience reaction, reflection, and noise into the final outcome of the works.