Great art is about art, as Roy Lichtenstein demonstrates (at the Centre Pompidou)
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- Roy Lichtenstein, Look Mickey, 1961, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington.
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- Roy Lichtenstein, Magnifying Glass, 1963, oil on canvas, private collection.
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- Roy Lichtenstein, The Ring (Engagement), 1962, oil on canvas, private collection.
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- Roy Lichtenstein, Sunrise, 1965, oil and magna on canvas, private collection. Detail.
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- Roy Lichtenstein, Fishing village, 1987, oil and magna on canvas, courtesy Fondation Carmignac. Detail.
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- Roy Lichtenstein, Artist’s studio “Foot medication”, 1974, oil and magna on canvas, Stefan T. Edlis collection.
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- Roy Lichtenstein, Nudes with Beach Ball, 1994, oil and magna on canvas, private collection.
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- Roy Lichtenstein, Landscape with Philosopher, 1996, oil and magna on canvas, private collection.
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- Tom Wolfe, The painted word, 1975.
If you are planning to visit the great retrospective exhibition about Roy Lichtenstein currently at the Centre Pompidou (until 4 November), and you would like to refresh your post second world war American art history, then we warmly suggest the reading of “The painted word”, by Tom Wolfe (1975).
Written in a light and effective prose, this easy book is a rare example of acute art social-criticism and good journalism – and it’s so even if the author never takes into consideration the role played by the Central Intelligence Agency in the promotion of the American artists.
Wolfe highlights for the first time in history the importance of the Theory, and its autonomous beauty: “Theories? – he writes -They were more than theories, they were mental constructs. No, more than that even … veritable edifices behind the eyeballs … caste in the cortex … mezuzhas on the pyramids of Betz … crystalline … comparable in their bizarre refinements to medieval Scholasticism”.
With regards to “Lichtenstein’s blowups of panels from war comics and love comic’s and Andy Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup cans and Brillo boxes”, Wolf stresses what Lawrence Alloway – the English scholar who coined the term “pop art” – said: they were not representations of external reality, but sign systems of the American culture. Nevertheless, sixteen years after the New York born painter passed away, the current show at the Pompidou makes clear how Lichtenstein was not only concerned with American culture, but with the idea of “culture” in general, and especially with art culture in itself, that seems indeed his favorite subject.
July 15, 2015
