William T. Wiley
Portrait of Radon1982
watercolor, felt-tipped pen, and ink
22 1/4 x 29 7/8 in.
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase
William Wiley's humorous and quirky parody of a map of the United States refers to darker meanings. The diagonal line stretching from New York to Los Angeles represents a virtual highway—twelve lanes wide and one foot deep—constructed of radioactive tailings from the country's nuclear power plants. These tailings exude radon, a colorless, odorless, radioactive gas.
