Red, Yellow, Blue
1962-1963
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
lithograph in black and gray on Angoumois à la Main handmade paper
Dimensions
sheet: 45.72 × 32.39 cm (18 × 12 3/4 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of the Woodward Foundation, Washington, D.C.
Accession Number
1976.56.60
Art Historical Context
Jasper Johns's *Red, Yellow, Blue* (1962–1963) is a striking lithograph that captures the artist's fascination with primary colors and everyday motifs during a pivotal era in American art. Created amid the rise of Pop Art and Neo-Dada in the early 1960s, Johns bridged Abstract Expressionism's emotional intensity with cool, mechanical precision. Though rendered in black and gray tones on luxurious Angoumois à la Main handmade paper, the title evokes his iconic color explorations—seen in paintings like his flag and target series—challenging viewers to reconsider perception and representation. T...
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...