PORT ARTHUR — The Musuem of the Gulf Coast got a special delivery via armored car Friday morning.
An early painting by famed artist and Port Arthur native Robert Rauschenberg arrived with an armed guard at the museum in Rauschenberg hometown where it will be on display for the next sixty days.
Rauschenberg was born in Port Arthur in 1925 and was a 1943 graduate of Thomas Jefferson High School according to the Rauschenberg Foundation website.
MORE | Museum of the Gulf Coast
MORE | Rauschenberg Foundation
The painting, titled "Barely There," is thought to be one of Rauschenberg's earliest "combine" paintings in which he put objects onto the painting according to Tony Webber of the Southwest Museum Services who accompanied the painting to the Port Arthur museum.
The painting is estimated to have been painted by Rauschenberg sometime between 1962 and 1965 in New York City according to Webber.
The painting has been privately owned and was recently purchased from an owner in Fredericksburg, Texas, Webber said.
The original owner was Ralph Rosenthal who owned a deli in New York and traded cash and meals to Rauschenberg for the piece according to Webber.
The painting will be on display at the Museum of the Gulf Coast for the next sixty days in the museum's Rauschenberg section.