At a moment when the latest generation of artists appear to be concerned more with how to hook up with a prestigious gallery than with how to pull off a body of work that really nails a new view of the world, along comes "Robert Rauschenberg: Combines." The show, which debuts at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York (running from December 20 through April 2, 2006), and then travels to Los Angeles, Paris, and Stockholm, includes some 65 wall-hanging and freestanding works by the artist, some of them iconic, some of them basically unknown and unseen, all of them created between 1954 and 1964 and now together under one roof for the first time. It will be a welcome reminder of what it means to be a bold and inventive artist.

In 1954, Rauschenberg was 29 years old, living in New York on 15 cents a day, and sleeping on crates scooped up at the Fulton Fish Market. But he was rich with ideas and driven by rebellion against the ruling dogma of Abstract Expressionism. Rauschenberg's challenge—in part both an extension of Dada and a bridge toward Pop—saw him incorporating into his painted and drawn works the kinds of found objects generally deemed off-limits for art: ventilation ducts, roller skates, shoes and socks, a tire, even a stuffed goat. For these transgressions against the cult of paint, his work was called a joke on more than one occasion.

But as the critic Leo Steinberg once wrote of Rauschenberg vis-à-vis Abstract Expressionism, "What he invented above all was, I think, a pictorial surface that let the world in again." For his part Rauschenberg once had this to say about one of his most iconic and controversial works, Bed (which, naturally, includes a bed, quilt, and pillow): "I think of it as one of the friendliest pictures I've ever painted. My fear has always been that someone would want to crawl into it." When the piece comes to the Met as part of this don't-miss show, the guards should keep an eye out. I may just tuck myself in and spend the night.