Roommates, from Nudes Series (C. 282)

Asked by art critic David Sylvester whether he liked women who resembled those he depicted, Lichtenstein replied that the women he painted were made up simply of black lines and red dots. "I see it that abstractly, that it's very hard to fall for one of these creatures because they're not really reality to me. However, that doesn't mean that I don't have a clichéd ideal, a fantasy ideal, of a woman that I would be interested in. But I think I have in mind what they should look like for other people.' (David Sylvester, Interview with Roy Lichtenstein, American Vogue, September 1969)
Roommates demonstrates Lichtenstein's ability to challenge what had formerly been taken for granted in art: choosing the time-honored theme of the nude as his subject matter, which became a recurring element in many of his pictures from the 1990s. However, the imagery presented here exhibits a far greater step forward as Roommates inhabits the ether of virtual reality and, more specifically, our imagination. The appeal to the imagination functions as a vehicle of desire, the eroticism lies as much in what is withheld-what is the female in the foreground about to say?-as in what is depicted.