Image: Shapero Modern, London
This Sunday would have been Pop artist Robert Indiana’s 97th birthday. The word LOVE appeared across paintings, prints, sculptures and posters in bold typography and brilliant colour.
Indiana’s ‘The Garden of Love’ series places LOVE in the context of a garden, with each work taking its title from a flower; ‘Tulip’ and ‘Zinnia’ are currently at Shapero Modern. The works are not botanical studies, but a playful marriage of the flowers with the iconic motif Indiana employed across many of his works.
In ‘Tulip’, vivid colour becomes part of the composition’s visual rhythm, while ‘Zinnia’ draws upon the flower’s exuberant palette. Indiana takes something found in nature and filters it through the bold, instantly recognisable language of Pop.
