 Tøjner describes the work as " Lichtenstein 's finest formulation of a counter @-@ image to the many explosions in his universe " , noting that the drama is past its peak although it may seem to be at a crescendo . He also notes that " the tears are drawn with classic Lichtenstein waxy fullness " despite the surrounding water , which must be significant since " naturalistic justification " is absent . 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 . Nonetheless , the name of the work was not universally known . In a December 1964 Art Magazine review of his October 24 – September 19 , 1964 Castelli Gallery show , Lichtenstein was referred to as the author of I Don 't Care , I 'd Rather Sink ( Drowning Girl ) . According to Gary Garrels of the Museum of Modern Art , the work is a " poetics of the utterly banal , of displaced ordinariness " resulting in an " image frozen in time and space " , making it " iconic " . Comparing this to the source , Garrels says it is a rendering " in a simplified vocabulary " produced while Lichtenstein put aside his mechanical objectivity . According to The Grove Encyclopedia of American Art , extreme examples of his formalization become " virtual abstraction " when the viewer recalls that the motif is an element of a larger work . Thus , Lichtenstein reinforced a non @-@ realist view of comic strips and advertisements , presenting them as artificial images with minimalistic graphic techniques . Lichtenstein 's magnification of his source material stressed the plainness of his motifs as an equivalent to mechanical commercial drawing , leading to implications about his statements on modern industrial America . Nonetheless , Lichtenstein appears to have accepted the American capitalist industrial culture . 
