About This Artwork

Ed Paschke
American, 1939-2004

Minnie, 1974

Oil on linen
128 x 96.5 cm (50 3/8 x 38 in.)
Gift of the Robert A. Lewis Fund in memory of William and Polly Levey, 1982.397

© 1974 Ed Paschke

Ed Paschke was a member of the Chicago Imagist movement, a group of late-1960s artists whose expressive style of figurative painting was rooted in outsider art, popular culture, and Surrealism. Drawing inspiration from Pop Art, Paschke often culled his subjects from newspapers, tabloid magazines, and television. Although his paintings include representational imagery, they play heavily on expressionist distortion, particularly in his use of psychedelic, inharmonious colors. Minnie, which depicts an anonymous individual silhouetted against a background of emanating light, is typical of his artistic production from this period. With her theatrical costume, elaborate hairdo, and bizarre makeup, this larger-than-life figure becomes a grotesque. By painting a flamboyant, overtly sexualized underworld character in a peculiar mixture of electric hues, Paschke added heat to Pop Art’s cool aesthetic.