His Art:
Best known for sign-like paintings and sculpture, Robert Indiana worked with many numbers and short words in his work, including EAT, HUG, and LOVE. In 1964, he created a 20-foot "EAT" sign for the New York World’s Fair that was made of flashing lights. In 1966, he began experimenting with the word "LOVE" and the image of the letters arranged in a square, with "LO" and "VE" on top of each other, with "O" tilted on its side was soon featured in many paintings and sculptures that can still be seen today around the world. The first Love sculpture was made for the Indianapolis Museum of Art in 1970.
The 1973 Love stamp was one of the most widely distributed Pop Art images ever (300 million were issued), but his subject matter is drawn from decidedly un-Pop American literature and poetry. In addition to the sign-like paintings and sculpture, Indiana has also done figurative painting, written poetry and collaborated on the film EAT with Andy Warhol.
He reintroduced the iconic Love image, replacing it with the word "HOPE," raising more than $1,000,000 for Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign.