Roy Lichtenstein’s Brushstroke on Canvas (1989) is a commanding meditation on the paradox of painting itself — a work in which the artist transforms the most primal gesture of the painter’s hand into an object of mechanical precision and conceptual clarity. Created late in his career, the piece distills decades of exploration into a single, elegant confrontation between spontaneity and control, expression and artifice.

At first glance, the composition radiates simplicity: a monumental brushstroke unfurls across a pristine field of canvas. Yet what appears to be a free, impulsive flourish is, in Lichtenstein’s world, the product of absolute deliberation. The brushstroke — historically the mark of the artist’s individuality and emotion — becomes a stylized emblem, flattened, outlined, and rendered in the artist’s signature Ben-Day dots. The result is both a celebration and a subversion of Abstract Expressionism’s grand romanticism, turning gesture into image, process into object.

The painting’s surface vibrates with paradox. Lichtenstein’s brushstroke, frozen in time, is dynamic yet immobile, exuberant yet restrained. The mechanical perfection of the dots and the crisp black contours evoke industrial printing techniques, but the shape retains a sensual rhythm — the undulating motion of paint once wet and alive. In this duality, Lichtenstein captures the tension between human impulse and technological mediation, between the handmade and the manufactured.

The palette is deliberately bold yet harmonious — radiant yellows, deep reds, and assertive blacks set against expanses of white. The colors are pure, almost archetypal, evoking both modern advertising and the purest ideals of abstraction. This chromatic precision elevates the brushstroke to an icon, both playful and monumental, as if the energy of an entire artistic tradition had been distilled into a single, crystalline sign.

Brushstroke on Canvas extends the series Lichtenstein began in the mid-1960s, when he turned his gaze from comic strips to the gestures of painters themselves. But here, in the refined confidence of his late style, the irony deepens into philosophical reflection. The “brushstroke” becomes not merely a parody of expression but a symbol of painting’s perpetual self-awareness — its dialogue with history, authenticity, and illusion. The canvas, pristine and silent, becomes a stage upon which the idea of painting performs itself.

In this work, Lichtenstein achieves a rare balance of humor and gravity. What began as a Pop commentary on artistic seriousness has evolved into a meditation on the very essence of art: how image and gesture, emotion and intellect, can coexist within a single mark. Brushstroke on Canvas thus stands as both homage and critique, a summation of Lichtenstein’s lifelong inquiry into the language of painting.

With its cool elegance and conceptual precision, the work transforms the spontaneous act into a timeless icon — a brushstroke that is not painted, but thought, refined, and immortalized. It is at once the death of gesture and its eternal rebirth: a triumph of intellect over impulse, and yet, paradoxically, a deeply moving tribute to the enduring vitality of the painter’s touch.

Created in 1989, Roy Lichtenstein Brushtroke on Canvas, 1989  is a color lithograph on Rives BFK paper. This work is hand signed and dated by Roy Lichtenstein (New York, 1923 – New York, 1997) in pencil in the lower right margin. Numbered from the edition of 40 in pencil in the lower right.

Catalogue Raisonné & COA:
Roy Lichtenstein Brushtroke on Canvas, 1989 is fully documented and referenced in the below catalogue raisonnés and texts (copies will be enclosed as added documentation with the invoices that will accompany the sale of the work).

1.  Corlett, Lee Mary. The Prints of Roy Lichtenstein A Catalogue Raisonné 1948-1997. New York: Hudson Hills Press, 2002. Listed and illustrated as catalogue raisonné no. 234.
2. A Certificate of Authenticity will accompany this artwork.

About the Framing:
Framed to museum-grade, conservation standards, Roy Lichtenstein Brushtroke on Canvas, 1989 is presented in a complementary moulding and optical grade Plexiglas.