Rauschenberg was born in Port Arthur, Texas in 1925. He began studying art in 1947 at the Kansas City Art Institute. He then attended Academie Julien in Paris (1948) and Black Mountain College (1949) where he studied under Josef Albers. His first solo exhibition was at the Betty Parsons Gallery, New York in 1951.

Rauschenberg's work has been exhibited extensively over the last 50 years. The last major retrospective of Rauschenberg's work was held between 1997 and 1999, shown at the Solomon R Guggenheim Museum and Guggenheim Museum Soho, New York touring to The Menil Collection, Contemporary Arts Museum and The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Museum Ludwig, Cologne and the Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao. Rauschenberg has received numerous awards and honours; he was elected Honorary Royal Academician by the Royal Academy of Arts, London in 2000. Robert Rauschenberg died in 2008.