Which American painter is known for his 'Flag' paintings?

Which American painter is known for his “Flag” paintings? Jasper Johns is the answer. His early encaustic painting Flag, made in 1954–55, became one of the most recognizable works of postwar American art and began a sustained series based on the American flag.

Johns painted the image with encaustic, a wax-based medium, over collage materials including newspaper, then mounted the work on plywood. The surface preserves visible brushwork and fragments of printed text, making the flag feel both familiar and physically handmade. Johns said the idea followed a dream about the American flag in 1954.

His use of a widely known symbol challenged the expressive conventions of Abstract Expressionism. The flag is simultaneously an image, an object, and a national sign, prompting questions about whether viewers are seeing a painting of a flag or the flag itself. Johns also worked repeatedly with targets, maps, letters, and numbers. His 1958 Three Flags and 1955 White Flag are related but distinct works.