Living Gallery - Miami Design District Magazine

Artworks
The American Dream
Portfolio
Pop Artist Robert Indiana’s Second Portfolio is Published
Story by Debra Kronowitz I Photos courtesy of Markowicz Fine Art
American pop artist Robert Indiana is known for using distinctive
imagery drawing on commercial art approaches blended with
existentialism that gradually moved toward what Indiana calls
“sculptural poems.”
His work often consists of bold, simple, iconic images — especially numbers
and short words like eat, hug and his best-known, love. Indiana's iconic work
LOVE was first created for a Christmas card for the Museum of Modern Art
in 1964 and later was included on an eight-cent postage stamp in 1973, the
first of a regular series of “love stamps.” Sculptural versions of the image
have been installed nationally and internationally.
In 2008, Indiana created HOPE, an image similar to his iconic LOVE, which
became the symbol for President Barack Obama’s presidential campaign.
“It’s Love’s close relative,” said Indiana.
Indiana. The book, which took Indiana two years to complete, contains
poetry by Creeley and text by Susan Ryan and Michael McKenzie. It features
six signed and numbered removable serigraphs. In addition, there are
24 unsigned serigraphs bound in the 100 pages of text. The portfolio —
bound in black Brama leather with the artist’s name in red on the front cover
and spine — is the second collaboration between Indiana and Creeley.
They first collaborated on the portfolio, Numbers.
Other well-known works by Indiana include his painting the basketball court
formerly used by the Milwaukee Bucks with a large “M” shape taking up each
half of the court; his aluminum sculpture, 1-0, in the lobby of Taipei 101 using
multi-colored numbers to suggest the conduct of world trade and the patterns
of human life; and Peace Paintings, the works he created in the aftermath
of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and exhibited in New York in 2004. ◆
In 1997, Indiana collaborated with poet Robert Creeley to create the
American Dream Portfolio, a limited edition book (395) of collected works by
22 Design District