København

In the last months of his life, Jim showed his masterpiece, "København," part of his ongoing dialogue with Asger Jorn. "København," with references to Picasso's "Guernica" and Jasper Johns (the lightbulb), was a direct response to Jorn's masterwork, "Stalingrad." (Showing only a detail here.) Its full name as listed in the show catalog is "The Bombardment of København in 1801 by Vice Admiral Lord Nelson or The Mad Laughter of Courage II (Til: Asger S. Trine)" "Til" means "to" in Danish, and I think the "S." is a typo and should have been "&." Trine is Katrine Nyholm; this is the seventh known picture Jim dedicated to her. This show ran from March 17 through April 16, 1967. Jim committed suicide on May 11 and, four days later, his work was shown at Perakis Gallery with that of Jim McWilliams, Thomas Chimes and Paul Anthony Greenwood. McWilliams remembers Jim's widow as trying to prevent them from including Jim's work, and "finally we just barged into his studio and took it."