Book of Love

“Love is a noun and a verb and so one must decide what my love is. It’s a command, love, and it’s a subject, love. It is an exercise, and grammar is one of my favorite subjects.”

Instantly recognizable, Robert Indiana's LOVE is an icon of popular culture. The image - the word love in capital letters arranged on two lines in a square with a tilted letter O - has been widely reproduced, both with and without the artist's authorization, on objects as diverse as rugs and coffee cups. In 1973 it was featured as the first in the United States Postal service series of 'love stamps', of which another famous contributor was Corita Kent. The epitomy of the youthful idealism of the counter-culture, LOVE was originally conceived as a Christmas card commissioned by MOMA in 1964. Indiana described LOVE as 'a concrete poem...just a one word poem', and revisited the motif throughout his career, in sculpture, canvas and print. In this, his most elaborate iteration published in 1996, Indiana reworked the image through twelve different colourways, the largest number of any LOVE print series. He also included twelve of his own love poems written between 1958-73.

With it's deceptively simple typography and vivid, flat colouration influenced by the artist's friend and once partner, the minimalist painter Ellsworth Kelly, LOVE represents Indiana's unique fusion of text and the pared-down, formal qualities of hard-edged abstraction.

“Robert Indiana’s LOVE is beloved the world over. People know the image who don’t know Indiana’s name, his other work, or even the English language. Valorised initially as an emblem of the 1960s cultural revolution, LOVE has become a symbol of unconditional affection and brotherhood.” (Barbara Haskell, Curator of Robert Indiana: Beyond LOVE, Sept 26, 2013–Jan 5, 2014, Whitney Museum of American Art).