Vostell often utilized mass-media images of destruction in his examination of consumer culture. This critical, explicitly political stance was a primary strategy of artists associated with Capitalist Realism, established in West Germany in the early 1960s by Vostell (along with Gerhard Richter and Sigmar Polke, whose works are on view nearby) as a parody of an art movement. In this work, Vostell adapted a widely circulated war photograph of a Boeing B-52 plane dropping bombs over Vietnam. He replaced the bombs with tubes of lipstick—equating mindless consumerism with apathy toward contemporary injustices and violence.

Gallery label from

"Collection 1940s—1970s", 2019

Medium Multiple of screenprint with lipstick additions
Dimensions Frame: 39 5/16 × 50 1/4 × 4 7/8" (99.9 × 127.7 × 12.4 cm)
Publisher Galerie Art Intermedia, Cologne
Printer Kindermann and Giesen, Cologne
Edition artist's proof outside the edition of 20
Credit The Sue and Edgar Wachenheim III Endowment
Object number 609.2016
Department Drawings and Prints

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