Light Bulb [proof]
1966
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
lithograph in black on Rives BFK paper [proof]
Dimensions
sheet: 49.5 x 61 cm (19 1/2 x 24 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Patrons' Permanent Fund and Special Friends of the National Gallery of Art
Accession Number
2004.28.47
Art Historical Context
Jasper Johns' *Light Bulb [proof]* (1966) is a striking lithograph in black ink on Rives BFK paper, measuring 49.5 x 61 cm. Created as a proof—a trial impression before the final edition—this print exemplifies Johns' mastery of lithography, a technique he explored extensively in the 1960s to replicate images with mechanical precision. The everyday light bulb, a motif Johns first depicted in paintings as early as the 1950s, emerges here as a bold, isolated form against the textured paper, inviting viewers to reconsider ordinary objects as symbols of perception and memory. Johns, a pivotal figu...
About the Artist
Jasper Johns
Jasper Johns (born May 15, 1930) is an American painter, sculptor, draftsman, and printmaker whose revolutionary work fundamentally transformed the trajectory of postwar American art. Emerging in the 1950s when Abstract Expressionism dominated the New York art world, Johns introduced a radically different approach by painting familiar, everyday symbols—flags, targets, numbers, and maps—that he des...