Study for "Razzmatazz" 1978

Roy Lichtenstein made this study for “Razzmatazz” with graphite and colored pencil. It’s all hard lines, bold shapes, and flat color. I’m imagining him, sketching and plotting, figuring out how to flatten the world into these graphic shapes. I see a face, a jacket, some triangles—it’s a puzzle, almost like he's taking apart ordinary things and putting them back together in a new, slightly off-kilter way. Take that brown amoeba shape, it’s balanced on a spindly chair, and offset by a floating yellow squiggle. It’s like he’s seeing how much tension he can create within a frame, pushing and pulling shapes until they just barely hold together. Lichtenstein was always playing with how images get made and remade, from comics to high art. And you know, this piece feels like he’s having a conversation with all the artists who came before him, twisting their ideas into something totally new and unexpected. Painting is always about that push and pull between what you know and what you’re trying to discover, and this piece embodies that spirit perfectly.