Jasper Johns is an iconic American artist who came to define the period between Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art. In Flag (1954–1955)—a collage of paper, encaustic oil, and fabric that is perhaps his most famous work—Johns makes a formal abstraction from the American stars and stripes while also muting its power. “I think that one wants from a painting a sense of life,” the artist mused. “The final suggestion, the final statement, has to be not a deliberate statement but a helpless statement. It has to be what you can't avoid saying.” Born on May 15, 1930 in Augusta, GA, Johns left his course of study at the University of South Carolina after one year and moved to New York. While in New York, he met...