Wear Comfortable Shoes: This Art Exhibition Covers '1/4 Mile'

Painter Robert Rauschenberg really loved his job. "My greatest joy is in working," he told PBS in 1998. "That's when I feel a wholeness and a celebration of a unity with everything about me." So when Rauschenberg walked the quarter mile from his house to his studio in Captiva, Fla., that short commute was a journey toward joy. "He talked a lot about working in that fertile, creative space between art and life," says Katia Zavistovski, an assistant curator at Los Angeles County Museum of Art. On view at LACMA now — exhibited for the first time in its entirety — is a massive Rauschenberg work which approximately spans the length of his commute. The 1/4 Mile or 2 Furlong Piece is comprised of 190 mixed media panels, sounds and sculptures. Rauschenberg worked on it on-and-off for 17 years, from 1981 to 1998. It's a memoir, says LACMA director Michael Govan — a walk through the artist's life. The panels are painted and collaged with photographs and fabrics. There are checkered tablecloths