Wild Girl 1963

Mel Ramos made ‘Wild Girl’, and it’s a trip! The jungle backdrop is rendered in flat planes of contrasting color. The jungle almost looks pasted on, like a theatre set. I can imagine Ramos working on this, figuring out how to balance the girl with the jungle backdrop. Was he trying to figure out how to make this image appear both cartoonish and real at the same time? What does it mean to be wild? Is he trying to be funny or is he trying to make us think? What I like about this piece is the flat application of paint. There’s very little blending, and the colors don’t mix. It reminds me of Alex Katz, but also of some comic books I had as a kid. I wonder if Ramos looked at those too? There’s an ongoing conversation between painters across time. We’re all inspiring one another. Painting is a form of embodied expression which embraces ambiguity.