Making himself known in the United states, Pop art is an art movement
that was just finding his voice in Great Britain, year 1950. It told a
story about the post-country War cultural population making an emphases
on critical thinking and irony.
The very first definition of Pop Art came to front in 1955, by a British
curator named Lawrence Alloway, who gave an actual name to this concept
that we today know as Pop Art. Becoming one of the first art movements
to lessen the gap between commercial and fine arts, it is characterised
by its consumerism heavy look a play on new media and industrial mass
reproduction as well as its signature bold and vibrant colors. Many
popular pop artisit took inspiration from, advertisement, magazines,
television, movies and comics to produce some amazing creations.
Attracted by the use of irony and humour, Pop Art can be seen as a
celebration of the popular culture of that time but also a critique of
it. for their humorous and ironic work.
There are many big contributors to this art period. Here are some of the
most influencials of the time.
Andy WarholRichard HamiltonRoy LichtensteinDavid Hockney
Painting of Campbell's Soup CansPortrait of Mick Jagger - vivid and garish colors
Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol is one of the greatest and most known artist of the 1960s
art movement. Fresh from college with a Bachelor degre in Fine Arts,
he decided to move to New York City in 1945 to start his new career as
a commercial artist. Landing himself a job with the Glamour magazine,
Warhol is known to be one of the leading artist of Pop Art and became
a successful commercial artist in the 1960s.
He is most known for putting his own twist and style on his creations,
coming up with a blotted line technique and rubber stamps of his own.
He has also dabbled in many different art forms such as filmmaking,
performing art and illustration. He constantly pushed the boundaries
between fine art and the traditional beauty norms of that time.
"Once you 'got' pop, you could never see a sign the same way again.
And once you thought pop, you could never see America the same way
again." - Andy Warhol
One of his most known work is the Campbell's Soup Cans. In 1961,
Warhol started to focus more on paintings that were big on
mass-produced commercial goods. That was the start of the concept that
we now know as "Pop Art". He made other famoust hits featuring
Coca-cola bottles, vacucum cleaners and hamburgers. It create a shift
in the art world and brought Pop Art as well as Andy Warhol himself
onto an national scale for the first time. He also painted many
celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe, Mick Jagger and Mao Tse-tung.
Warhol died on February 22, 1987, in New York City, but not without
leaving his own unique mark in the art industry.
Art was first known as a hobby for Roy Lichtenstein, throughout his school years. Being a big jazz fan, he liked to
draw portraits of some of his favorite jazz musicians playing their instruments. He took summer classes, in 1939, at the
Art Students League of New York where he got the opportunity to be under the supervision of Reginald Marsh. He graduated
from Ohio State University and obtained his Master of Fine Arts in 1949.
Lichtenstein first started his career in imitation. Beginning 1960s, he use to take images from comic books and publicities to produce his art and then started to combine everyday life objects into his creations.
He often exagerated the dot patterned commonly seen when printing images. Lichtenstein created his own style define by what they called Ben-days dots, introducing a industrialized reproduction look to his creations.Highly influenced by famoust comic books and advertisment style, many considered his art to be "disruptive". Roy
Lichtenstein describes this art movement throught the use of mockery and irony. While some of his work might be pushing
the limits to some, they demonstrated parody in a cheeky and playful manner, creating a humorous side to his art.
“Although almost anything seemed to be fair subject matter for art,” he recalled, “commercial art and particularly cartooning were not considered to be among those possibilities.” - Roy Lichtenstein
Inspired by an art piece made by Tony Abruzzo, Lichtenstein recreated the "Drowning Girl" with oil paint. It is described as " a masterpiece of melodrama" for its acurate representation of a distress, teary-eye, woman. It showcases Lichtenstein signature of imitating mechanized reproduction.
Another one of his most iconic creation is the paiting "Whaam!. It is an image that has been inspired by many different
comic books. His primary source being a image from a war comic in 1962 ,he created an interesting connexion between the
graphics and the narration. Having served in the army, his war-collection is one of the most successful one out there.
The world of comic books just got turned on its head and was greatly impacted by the cultural aspect of Pop Art. There
was a new focus put on the use of bold and playful colors as well as the integration of the onomatopoeias.
