Edward Ruscha

Born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1937, Ruscha is a painter, filmmaker and printmaker living in Los Angeles, California. He became well known in 1960’s for his witty paintings incorporating words and phrases, relishing Pop Art’s wry irreverence and reflecting the Southern Californian lifestyle. In the late 1960’s and 1970’s, Ruscha began using unconventional media, painting with gunpowder, blood and Pepto-Bismol. He also published several books of photographs. With self explanatory titles such as Twenty-six Gasoline Stations and Thirty-four Parking Lots in Los Angeles, these books are deadpan catalogues of the mundane. Raised a Catholic, Ruscha has been influenced by religion, even though his work does not take a moral or spiritual stance. A recurring motif in his later work is a patch of light, building on a centuries-old tradition of light signaling a divine presence.