EDWARD RUSCHA (b. 1937) MADE IN THE USA sign

Provenance
Private collection, SWITZERLAND
Brooke Alexander, NEW YORK

Literature
E. Ruscha, GUACAMOLE AIRLINES AND OTHER DRAWINGS, BY ED RUSCHA, NEW YORK, 1980, no. 84

WHEN I FIRST BECAME ATTRACTED TO THE IDEA OF BEING AN ARTIST, PAINTING WAS THE LAST METHOD, IT WAS AN ALMOST OBSOLETE, ARCHAIC FORM OF COMMUNICATION…I FELT NEWSPAPERS, MAGAZINES, BOOKS, WORDS, TO BE MORE MEANINGFUL THAN WHAT SOME DAMN OIL PAINTING WAS DOING.
(Ed Ruscha quoted in N. Benezra & K. Brougher, ED RUSCHA, WASHINGTON, D.C.,2000, p. 145.)

THE MODE OF RUSCHA'S ART IS A NATURALISM OF SIGNS, A QUIZZICAL AND AMUSED INVESTIGATION OF THE BEHAVIOR OF SIGNS NOT IN SYSTEMS BUT IN SPECIFIC INSTANCES, CAUGHT RED HANDED. HE IS THE ARTIST AS SEMIOTIC HARD-BOILED DETECTIVE.
P. Schjeldahl, HYDROGEN JUKEBOX,BERKELEY,1991, p. 243

Ruscha's unprecedented use of various mineral and organic substances, including gunpowder, egg yolk, spinach, blood, ketchup, shellac, fruit juices, lettuce and zinc oxide. "Besides realizing a range of piquant visual beauties, these transubstantiations of humble stuff into the communion of art (ironic, to be sure, and sarcastically debased by banal verbal messages) draw a magic circle around consciousness. The comedy, too deep and elusive for hilarity, consists in an imitation of religion. The drawings do God's work: they give meaning to creation" (ibid., pp. 245-246).