Ed Ruscha: Mysteries

Ed Ruscha created Mysteries, a color lithograph, in collaboration with the Minneapolis-based workshop Vermillion Editions Limited in 2021. It is based on a large oil-on-canvas painting from 1987.

Mysteries can be major (“Why do we exist?”) or minor (“Where the heck did I put my car keys?”). In Ruscha’s print, four instances of the word “mysteries” are superimposed one over the other in multiple registers of scale and color against a shadowy crimson ground. Receding or advancing, the overlaid texts create a visual pulse that imbues the work with both a three-dimensional and a cinematic feel, as if marking a flash in time.