Torpedo . . . Los ! Torpedo . . . Los ! ( sometimes Torpedo . . . LOS ! ) is a 1963 pop art oil on canvas painting by Roy Lichtenstein . When it was last sold in 1989 , " The New York Times " described the work as " a comic - strip image of sea warfare " . It formerly held the record for the highest auction price for a Lichtenstein work . Its 1989 sale helped finance the construction of the current home of the Museum of Contemporary Art , Chicago in 1991 . Like many of Lichtenstein ' s works its title comes from the speech balloon in the painting . The work was included in Lichtenstein ' s second solo exhibition . The source of the image is a comic book from DC Comics . Lichtenstein has made significant alterations to the original image to change the focus and perspective in addition to significant alteration of the narrative element of the work . The work plays on the background - foreground relationship and the theme of vision that appears in many of Lichtenstein ' s works . Background . The source of the image is " Battle of the Ghost Ships ? " in DC Comics ' " Our Fighting Forces " ( October 1962 ) , although the content of the speech balloon is different ( this is edition number 72 according to some sources and 71 ( a ) according to others ) . 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 $ million in 2018 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 . Description . Measuring , " Torpedo . . . Los ! " is an oil on canvas painting . By enlarging the face of the captain relative to the entire field , Lichtenstein makes him more prominent than in the source . He retained the source ' s " clumsiness " in how the secondary figure is presented and replaced the dialogue with a much shorter " cryptic command " . The original source had dialog related to the repeated torpedoing of the same ship , but Lichtenstein cut the entire speech balloon down to two words . He moved the captain ' s scar from his nose to his cheek and he made the captain appear more aggressive by depicting him with his mouth wide open , also opting to leave the eye which was not looking through the telescope open . He also made the ship appear to be more technologically sophisticated with a variety of changes . The scar was actually most readily apparent in panels other than the source from the same story . This work exemplifies Lichtenstein ' s theme relating to vision . Lichtenstein uses a " mechanical viewing device " to present his depiction of technically aided vision . The depicted mechanical device , a periscope in this case , forces the vision into a monocular format . In some of his works such as this , monocularity is a strong theme that is directly embodied although only by allusion . Michael Lobel notes that " . . . his work proposes a dialectical tension between monocular and binocular modes of vision , a tension that operates on the level of gender as well . " The work is regarded as one in which Lichtenstein over - exaggerated comic book sound effects in common pop art style . Reception . This painting exemplifies Lichtenstein ' s use of the background / foreground shift and ironic colloquialisms in critical commands . Although most of Lichtenstein ' s war imagery depicts American war themes , this depicts " a scarred German submarine captain at a battle station " . The manner of depiction with the commander ' s face pressed against the periscope reflects fusions of industrial art of the 1920s and 1930s . The ironic aspect of this in 1963 is in part due to its temporal displacement referring back to World War II during the much later period of the Cold War . The styling of the balloon content , especially that of the large font characters , is complemented by or complementary to the other traditional visual content of the painting . Lichtenstein ' s alterations heightened the sense of urgency in the image , however , they also offset that menace by forming a detached work . A November 1963 " Art Magazine " review stated that this was one of the " broad and powerful paintings " of the 1963 exhibition at Castelli ' s Gallery .