Steidlville

This is the third volume in the ongoing series documenting Ruscha’s entire corpus of paintings. As in the previous two volumes, each painting is given a double-page spread with exhibition and bibliographic history, and is reproduced in color. The artist’s notebook sketches for paintings are reproduced in facsimile. This volume contains 165 paintings and, in addition, includes a major public commission for the Philip Johnson-designed Miami-Dade Public Library, which was a watershed mark for Ruscha. Paintings done immediately prior to this commission can be seen as a summation of the artist’s earlier preoccupations and techniques, while those done after the commission show a major shift in Ruscha’s direction occasioned by the artist’s use of airbrush techniques to produce dark, atmospheric canvases that correspond to film noir and such Los Angeles writers as Raymond Chandler. The book includes an introductory essay by the editor, Robert Dean, and a personal tribute by artist Lawrence Weiner. It contains a chronology to 1987, as well as a comprehensive bibliography and list of exhibitions.