Drowning Girl

A 1963 pop-art painting by Roy Lichtenstein depicts a woman in turbulent water and a thought balloon expressing emotional despair. Its image and text derive from a comic-book panel.

Roy Lichtenstein: An American pop artist known for paintings that adapted the visual language of commercial printing and comic strips. He transformed a comic-book image into this painting.
Tracing: A method of transferring an image by following its outlines onto another surface. Lichtenstein used tracing to transfer the source composition to a larger canvas.
Drowning Girl (1963 drawing): A preparatory drawing by Roy Lichtenstein related to his 1963 painting Drowning Girl. It documents the image-making process behind the finished painting.
Secret Hearts #83: A 1962 issue of DC Comics’ Secret Hearts containing the panel adapted for Drowning Girl. The printed panel gives the painting’s words and composition a direct comic-book counterpart.
Pop art: An art movement that drew on mass media, advertising, consumer goods, and popular culture. The painting turns popular comic imagery into fine art.
Lithography: A planographic printing process that uses the repulsion of oil and water to transfer ink from a surface. The painting imitates the flat, reproducible look of printed comic art.
Whaam!: A 1963 diptych by Roy Lichtenstein depicting an aircraft firing a missile at another plane. It is a contemporaneous example of his comic-derived painting practice.
Romance comic: A comic-book genre centered on romantic relationships and emotional conflicts. The painting extracts a moment of romantic melodrama from this genre.
Comic book: A medium that tells stories through sequences of images, often combining pictures with written text. The painting’s composition and speech balloon borrow comic-book conventions.
Speech balloon: A graphic shape that assigns words or thoughts to a character in a comic. Its text delivers the woman’s despair as part of the image.

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