Mel Casas’ art has been described as subtle, outrageous, witty, confrontational, controversial, innovative, provocative, erotic and even X-rated. As art historian Nancy Kelker explains in an important new book, Mel Casas: Artist As Cultural Adjuster, Casas’ paintings are all of that, and more.

The book traces Casas’ career from his early flirtations with Abstract Expressionism through the inception and ongoing development of his signature Pop Art “Humanscape” series. Inspired by American mainstream culture: Hollywood movies, the Vietnam War, Watergate, civil rights and women’s issues, Casas’ Humanscapes were designed as impact pieces—immediately comprehensible images—featuring visual conundrums and witty tag line puns intended to challenge the viewer’s cultural and social complacency.

Nancy L. Kelker is a professor of art history at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin. She first became acquainted with Mel Casas in the 1970s when he hired her as an adjunct instructor at San Antonio College. In the 1980s Kelker worked at the San Antonio Museum of Art as the curator of Latin American art. She is the author of several articles and exhibition catalogues and the co-author with Dr. Karen Olsen Bruhns of Faking Ancient Mesoamerica and Faking the Ancient Andes (2010).

Mel Casas: Artist As Cultural Adjuster is available through amazon.com and other fine book sellers. A digital edition will be available March 15.