"This book is the first in-depth analysis of Indiana's early career, from his maturation as an artist in the late 1950s, through the early 1970s, the peak of the proliferation of LOVE. Ryan shows how Indiana's oeuvre throughout this period is involved with the rhetoric of the American dream and shaped by the artist's intense engagement with American literature and poetry.

The author argues that Indiana's strident visual language emerges from his tendency to recast his life in story and verse, a fact that unlocks complex and secret tissues of figurative meaning within the deceptively simple canvases. By illuminating the enigmas in Indiana's word and image combinations, she helps to explain the longevity of LOVE and its influence on a later generation of artists."--BOOK JACKET.