Over the past four decades, Bruce Nauman has become a cornerstone of contemporary artistic practice through his maverick use of mediums--encompassing photography, neon, film and video, installation, drawing, sculpture, and printmaking--and his continual investigation into often paradoxical and conceptual uses of language and the body. In 1967, Nauman had recently completed his MFA at the University of California, Davis, and was newly cast into the world as young artist pondering his role in society. A relic of his San Francisco street-level studio's former capacity as a grocery store-a still-functioning neon beer sign-propelled Nauman's creation of this seminal Window or Wall Sign, which he hung in the window facing the street. By commandeering the commercial medium of neon for an artist statement, Nauman both proclaims the importance of the "true artist's" role and implies its inherent quixotic ambition. At once forward and facetious, lofty and self-aware, Window or Wall Sign asks its reader to participate in determining the validity of its declaration. Erica Battle, from Philadelphia Museum of Art: Handbook of the Collections, 2009.