Flags II [trial proof]

1967-1970

Jasper Johns

Associated Names
Jasper Johns

Artist, American, born 1930

Bill Goldston

Printer, American, active late 20th century

Universal Limited Art Editions

Publisher

The image features a series of horizontal lines and a rectangle filled with star shapes at the top left corner. The flag consists of green and black stripes with a red rectangle in the upper left containing a pattern of blue stars. Below, a more subdued version mirrors the form with tones of gray and white. The composition is set against a textured gray background.
This object’s media is not available for download. Contact us about image usage.
Not on view See artworks now on view

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    color lithograph on wove paper [trial proof]

  • Credit Line

    Patrons' Permanent Fund and Special Friends of the National Gallery of Art

  • Dimensions

    sheet: 87.63 x 64.77 cm (34 1/2 x 25 1/2 in.)

  • Accession Number

    2006.136.31

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    ULAE, no. 086 [trial proof]

  • Copyright

    © 2025 Jasper Johns and ULAE / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY, Published by Universal Limited Art Editions

More About this Artwork

We look beyond a cluster of flags hanging from the side of one tall building onto a wide street at a row of buildings across from us in this vertical painting. The scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes, so some details are difficult to make out. We seem to lean out a window to look along the street, so the building to our right only skims the edge of the composition and continues off the top. The three flags closest to us fly from nearly horizontal flagstaffs along the bottom edge of the painting. All the flags are in shades of scarlet red, white, and royal blue. The flag closest to us is red with the red, white, and blue Union Jack in the upper corner. Beyond it is an American flag with 49 stars, and then the French flag with the vertical bands of blue, white, and red. Those three flags are repeated about a dozen times along the building that stretches away from us, along the right edge of the painting. More of those flags are hung from the cream-white and tan buildings across the street, to our left. Some of those buildings reach off the top edge of the canvas and others come close. The shadows along moldings and the windows are painted with pale and lapis blue. Through narrow gaps left between the fluttering flags, vertical strokes of navy blue and violet purple suggest crowds of people in the street below. The sky between the buildings is ice blue. The artist signed and dated the painting in the center left, “Childe Hassam May 17 1917.”

Interactive Article:  Childe Hassam and the Flag in American Art

Explore the American impressionist's paintings of the US flag.

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

the artist, Sharon, Connecticut; acquired 2006 by the National Gallery of Art

Associated Names

Bibliography

1978

  • Field, Richard S. Jasper Johns: Prints 1970-1977. Middletown, Connecticut: Wesleyan University Press, 1978, no.

1994

  • Field, Richard S. The Prints of Jasper Johns, 1960-1993: A Catalogue Raisonné. West Islip, New York: Universal Limited Art Editions, 1994, no. 86.

Inscriptions

in graphite, lower right: TRIAL PROOF 1/2 / J Johns '67 - '70

Wikidata ID

Q76345142

You may be interested in

Loading Results