American Collection

Rosati's work is typically abstract or non-representational, but often does allude to the human figure, with trunk, head, legs, or arms. This piece is meant to be viewed in-the-round so that its stainless steel surface can reflect light in different ways. Before he became a sculptor (self-taught) Rosati was a violinist with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. He became interested in becoming a sculptor after an art museum visit. He worked in various media, and was influenced by the work of the Abstract Expressionists and particularly the sculptor David Smith.

After studying at the Minneapolis School of Art and the University of Minnesota, Rosenquist won a scholarship to the Art Students League in New York where he met Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and Robert Indiana. For a while, Rosenquist supported himself as a billboard painter and commercial artist-the large format used in billboard painting fascinated him. He continued to use the imagery of advertising in his paintings, which consists of enlarged or over-scale fragments of unrelated objects in juxtaposition. By 1957 Rosenquist was in New York and the would-be Pop Scene was beginning to coalesce. Andy Warhol had arrived in 1949, Claes Oldenburg and Tom Wesselman had arrived, Roy Lichtenstein was already exhibiting, Jim Dine would arrive the following year, and Rauschenberg and Johns were only months away from their landmark exhibitions. The 1960s and 1970s saw a renaissance in American printmaking, due largely to Pop imagery. Rosenquist continued to develop new techniques and methods in his work, but never strayed far from his signature large-format fragments of American media advertising.

Ruscha said of this image, "Somewhere there should be a stamp or impression (I get the impression) that America has made herself. And isn't she her best product?" Ruscha was born in Omaha, Nebraska and studied art in Los Angeles. His more conventional images come from popular culture, however, he is also known for his use of experimental processes and materials, often using foods or blood in his art.