This exquisite lithograph by Robert Indiana (1928–2018), titled Autoportrait 69 (Self Portrait 69), from the album XXe Siecle, Annee No. 41, Decembre 1973, originates from the 1973 edition published by Societe Internationale d’Art XXe Siecle, Paris, under the direction of Gualtieri di San Lazzaro, editeur, Paris, and printed by Mourlot Freres, Paris, 1973. Autoportrait 69 reflects Indiana’s bold visual language of crisp typography, symbolic geometry, and emotionally charged color.
Executed as a lithograph on velin paper, this work measures 12.5 x 9.75 inches. Unsigned and unnumbered as issued. The edition exemplifies the superb craftsmanship of Mourlot Freres, Paris.
Artwork Details:
Artist: Robert Indiana (1928–2018)
Title: Autoportrait 69 (Self Portrait 69)
Medium: Lithograph on velin paper
Dimensions: 12.5 x 9.75 inches (31.75 x 24.77 cm)
Inscription: Unsigned and unnumbered as issued
Date: 1973
Publisher: Societe Internationale d’Art XXe Siecle, Paris, under the direction of Gualtieri di San Lazzaro, editeur, Paris
Printer: Mourlot Freres, Paris
Catalogue raisonne reference: Sheehan, Susan, et al. Robert Indiana Prints: A Catalogue Raisonne, 1951-1991. Susan Sheehan Gallery, 1991, illustration 78.
Condition: Well preserved, consistent with age and medium
Provenance: From the album XXe Siecle, Annee No. 41, Decembre 1973, published by Societe Internationale d’Art XXe Siecle, Paris; printed by Mourlot Freres, Paris, 1973
About the Publication:
Gualtieri di San Lazzaro’s XXe Siecle (Twentieth Century) was one of the most influential art journals of modernism, founded in Paris in 1938 as a platform for the greatest painters, sculptors, printmakers, writers, and cultural thinkers of the 20th century. San Lazzaro, a visionary editor and champion of the avant garde, sought to unite text and image in a single elevated format, commissioning original prints from leading artists and pairing them with critical essays, poetry, and scholarly commentary. The publication became an essential record of modern art, featuring contributions by Picasso, Chagall, Braque, Leger, Miro, Calder, Kandinsky, Moore, and many others, produced in collaboration with the finest ateliers such as Mourlot, Jacomet, Arte, and Pizzi. Today, XXe Siecle is celebrated for its exceptional integration of fine art and literature, its historical significance, and its unmatched role in documenting the evolution of modern aesthetics.
About the Artist:
Robert Indiana (1928–2018) was a pioneering American painter, printmaker, and sculptor whose bold fusion of text, color, and hard edged geometry helped define Pop Art and positioned him within a powerful lineage extending from Pablo Picasso, Alexander Calder, Alberto Giacometti, Salvador Dali, Joan Miro, Wassily Kandinsky, Marcel Duchamp, and Man Ray, synthesizing the conceptual daring of early modernism with the visual immediacy of postwar American culture; emerging in 1960s New York as a leading voice of the Pop generation, Indiana transformed the language of commercial signage, roadside Americana, billboards, typography, and industrial stenciling into emotionally charged meditations on identity, patriotism, desire, labor, migration, and national mythology, and his seminal LOVE image first conceived in 1965 for the Museum of Modern Art’s Christmas card became one of the most influential and widely disseminated works of the 20th century, cementing his global legacy while his broader oeuvre explored political history, the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, and autobiographical narratives tied to his industrial Midwest upbringing; influenced by the structural clarity of Calder, the conceptual provocations of Duchamp, the spiritual abstraction of Kandinsky, the surreal wit of Miro, and the experimental boldness of Man Ray, Indiana moved alongside Pop and contemporary luminaries such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, James Rosenquist, Claes Oldenburg, and Tom Wesselmann, all while forging a distinct voice that elevated language into monumental sculpture and emotional architecture, shaping later generations of artists including Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Ed Ruscha, Glenn Ligon, Tracey Emin, and Martin Creed, and earning placement in the world’s foremost museums MoMA, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Guggenheim Museum, the National Gallery of Art, LACMA, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Tate Modern, and others culminating in his highest auction record on May 15, 2019, when LOVE (Red/Blue) (1966–1999) sold for 4,112,000 USD at Christies New York.
Robert Indiana XXe Siecle 1973, Robert Indiana Mourlot lithograph, Robert Indiana Autoportrait 69.