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One burned bow tie in a plastic bag, overall: 3 in. x 4 in. (7.6 cm x 10.2 cm)

Picard’s individually singed polka-dot bow ties are simultaneously quaint and macabre. Only one in a series of “destruction art” pieces performed by the artist in the late 1960s, burning had become her metier; in the same year, Picard also created Burnt Ties and Cigarette Burned Necktie from silk and plastic men’s ties. Much like the burning of draft cards in the anti-war movement, destruction art was overtly political and socially conscious, directed to “make us more aware of the life-destructive forces of our surrounding reality.”

LL