Brushstroke Group 1987

Roy Lichtenstein made Brushstroke Group, and it's one of those pieces that makes you stop and think about what painting really is. Lichtenstein was always playing with the idea of mass production versus the handmade, and you can see it here in the clean lines and bold colors. Everything's so flat and graphic, but then you realize he's representing a brushstroke, something that's inherently messy and expressive. It's like he's freezing a moment of pure gesture and blowing it up to monumental scale. Look closely at how he renders the edges of those brushstrokes. There’s this sense of precision, almost like he’s using stencils to mimic the look of a comic book. But that’s the trick, right? He's taking something spontaneous and turning it into something deliberate, making us question the whole idea of originality and authorship. It’s a dialogue with artists like Warhol and Johns, about high art and low art, and the space in between.