Yale Joel was clearly LIFE Magazine's go-to guy for photographing artists in the 1960s. Google's archive of LIFE photos has several dozen outtakes from a 1960 photo series called Off Beat Artist, which featured Robert Rauschenberg, Claes Oldenburg, and Jim Dine. And Dine's young son. In 1959-60, Dine was becoming known around New York for his Happenings; his emergence as an early Pop Art figure was still a couple of years off.
One of those Happenings apparently involved running small children through an obstacle course of brooms, ladders, and paint cans.
Off Beat Artists: Jim Dine and baby in his studio, June 1960, photographed for LIFE by Yale Joel [LIFE/Google]
This is what I hope for with me and my son. Great photo. Thanks for digging this up.