Photo By Gail

In 1961, artist George Siegel began using a recently released Johnson & Johnson product – gauze bandages, pre-treated with dry plaster – to make full-body plaster casts of family and friends. He combined these unpainted, lifelike figures with found object from every day life.

This portrait from 1967 pays homage to the legendary art dealer Sidney Janis, who staged an early exhibition of Pop art. He’s shown with one hand perched  atop Dutch artist Piet Mondrian’s 1933 painting Composition with Red and Blue, which Janis purchased before its completion. His gesture suggests both a collectors pride and a salesman’s display of his product.

Photographed in the Museum of Modern Art in New York