How does Torpedo...Los! elucidate its Background?
The source of the image is Jack Abel's art in the Bob Haney-written story "Battle of the Ghost Ships?", in DC Comics' Our Fighting Forces #71 (October 1962), although the content of the speech balloon is different. According to the Lichtenstein Foundation website, Torpedo...Los! was part of Lichtenstein's second solo exhibition at Leo Castelli Gallery of September 28 – October 24, 1963, that included Drowning Girl, Baseball Manager, In the Car, Conversation, and Whaam! Marketing materials for the show included the lithograph artwork, Crak!On November 7, 1989, Torpedo...Los! sold at Christie's for $5.5 million (US$13 million in 2022 dollars) to Zurich dealer Thomas Ammann, which was a record for a work of art by Lichtenstein. The sale was described as the "highpoint" of a night in which Christie's achieved more than double the total sales prices of any other contemporary art auction up to that date. The seller of the work was Beatrice C. Mayer, the widow of Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago founder and board member Robert B. Mayer as well as daughter of Sara Lee Corporation founder Nathan Cummings.  Prior to the sale the work was part of the Robert B. Mayer Memorial Loan Program and was exhibited at colleges and museums. Torpedo...Los! was expected to sell for $3 to 4 million at the time. In 1991, Mayer became one of the key benefactors of the new Museum of Contemporary Art Building.
speech balloon In the Car Baseball Manager Nathan Cummings Sara Lee Corporation lithograph DC Comics Christie's contemporary art work of art Crak! Jack Abel Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago Drowning Girl Bob Haney Whaam!