American sculptor, painter, and installation artist Paul Thek is best known for his Technological Reliquaries series of the 1960s. These sculptures—pristine plexiglass cases containing intricately sculpted wax items that resemble chunks of meat and human flesh—were partially inspired by a trip Thek took to the catacombs of Sicily in 1959 with his then-partner, the photographer Peter Hujar. Reliquary works are often read as a rebuke of the prevailing Pop and Minimalist sensibilities of the time. Thek is also regarded for his mordant installations, including the now-lost The Tomb, 1967, in which he created a ziggurat-shaped structure housing a lifelike effigy of his own corpse.

–Kevin McDonald, from the Glenstone Field Guide