Decade: Autoportrait '76 (Coomb's Neck) is a print from Indiana’s Decade: Autoportraits, Vinalhaven Suite. The print mirrors the format of his Decade: Autoportrait paintings, which the artist created in the 1970s. The paintings are a portrait of his life in the 1960s, and include references to important names, places, and events. The basic format is the same in each: a large circle set in a square canvas, with five points of a star touching the circle’s rim, and within the circle Indiana’s familiar stencil-shaped words and numbers.
The Decade: Autoportraits, Vinalhaven Suite prints, which Indiana created after moving permanently to Vinalhaven, Maine, in 1969, are a record of his life in the 1970s. The artist had been visiting the island yearly since 1969, typically spending several months in the fall working in the Star of Hope Lodge.
Indiana also penned a statement explaining each individual print:
"As part of the bicentennial celebrations (200) I traveled to Santa Fe for the second production of the Virgil Thomson/Gertrude Stein opera The Mother of Us All that I designed, a project that I worked on for 12 years (2x6 equals 12). This year on still another visit to Charlotte Amalie I would often eat at another favorite place called Mafolie, making poetic resonance with 1974. The Neck is another place of beauty on the island."