POP!

Throughout the period in the arts generally defined as ‘modern’ many avant-garde movements radicalised the norms of fine art painting and sculpture, in their attempt to break free of academic tradition and represent social and political issues. None achieve such an innovative and exciting method of doing so as the Pop Art revolution which stormed Britain and America throughout the 1950’s and 60’s. Richard Hamilton, the pioneer of British Pop art, stated that ‘Pop art was what we called mass media, cinema and television; it had nothing to do with fine art’ (Hamilton, 2004). This is essentially what makes the Pop movement modern; it rejected the status quo of the celebrated abstract- expressionist movement, to elevate mundane comic strips and simple imagery to the status of high art. As one of the final movements before the post- modernist art era began, Pop art pulled its inspiration from many of the innovative movements which preceded it. In Synthetic Cubism for example, Braque sampled current newspapers which acted as a social commentary, something which is mirrored in Lichtenstein’s use of popular, comic strip images. In terms of its socio-political outlook The Twentieth Century Art Book describes Pop art as ‘the imagery of consumer society and popular culture’ (Barnes, et al., 1999). This essay will explore the ways in which Pop art addresses the growing consumer culture of the 1960’s, but also attempt to ascertain whether the comment in Life Magazine, 1964, that Pop art (in particular the work of Roy Lichtenstein) is simply ‘tedious copies of the banal’ (Life Magazine, 1964) or if it can be said that the movement addressed more serious socio- political concerns of that period.

‘Bt the early Sixties post-war Americans were happily conditioned to believe anything that mass media put forth, and advertising was embraced without question or hesitation’ (Heller, 2005, p. 5). Huge companies were beginning to hold power over people through the commodification of their goods and creating a consumer culture. Due to the fact that jobs in the urban service and manufacturing industries were rapidly increasing, because of ‘progress on the Interstate Highway System’ and ‘improvements in processing, marketing, and transportation technologies’ (Haren, 1970, p. 431), people were growing richer and moving out of rural occupations into the cities. These people were enticed by the adverts they were subjected to, so sought to be defined by the status of the material things they could now afford. Generally the west was becoming ever more rich, powerful and prosperous, something which allowed Brits and Americans the freedom to consume as they wished in a society where companies had the power to persuade them.

Through this competitive consumer culture, certain styles and fashions became prevalent and accepted as the status quo and became known as popular ‘Pop’ culture. Projection of Pop into the arts is ‘based on the acceptance and use of artefacts, mass advertising and press media’ (Murray & Murray, 1997, p. 413). It is generally accepted that Pop had two separate origins, on in Britain and one in America. ‘The English stream came first, during the 1950’s’ (Murray & Murray, 1997) when Richard Hamilton ‘became one of Pops leading exponents’ (Barnes, et al., 1999). Just What Is It Makes Today’s Home So Different So Appealing? is Hamilton’s 1956 poster which was the premiere of British Pop and is a perfect example of Pop art acting as a commentary of the consumer society. The word ‘home’ used in the title provokes imagery of an intimate, private setting, but Hamilton declines this ideal and instead presents a collage of adverts and magazine cuttings portraying popular culture, lifestyle and celebrities. The impact of this apparent paradox between the traditional and modern concepts of ‘home’ challenges the social issue of consumer culture head on and acts as a critique of the invasion of the mass media into every aspect of life.

Another way in which the earlier Pop art pieces acted as a social critique can be seen by looking at American Pop art, which began later that the British strand, in the early 1960’s. Roy Lichtenstein is a celebrated figure within the field, hailed for his use of the Ben Day dot system in his fine art. This method, widely associated with comic strips and cartoons, baffled art critics and the public alike when it was displayed alongside the fine arts and literally took relevant media and Pop culture into the realms of high art. The premiere example of this comic book art is his Look Mickey of 1961. This piece portrays Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck, fictional Walt Disney characters of comic book fame and is executed only in lurid primary colours. Because Lichtenstein creates it in the celebrated medium of oil on stretched canvas on a huge scale (121.9 x 175.3 cm) usually reserved for academic portraiture, the piece was seen to subvert the idea of art as a bourgeoisie pursuit and present it simply as popular culture; in effect it was addressing the social issue of contested social class, which prevailed throughout the 1960’s in view of the fact that the ongoing Cold War spurred interest into the ideals of communism and equality, leading to a general questioning of class differences (Ehrlich, 1971). If the imagery of Look Mickey is analysed then this idea becomes even more profound and it can be seen how Pop art is not always as simplistic as it first appears. Michael Lobel discusses how psychoanalysis of the joke, where there is a subject (in this case Donald Duck) a joke maker (Mickey Mouse) and a joke receiver (the audience), can reveal that the more ‘animal like’ character of Donald Duck, portrayed on all fours as opposed to Mickey’s standing, personified position, where he is aware of Donald’s self-exposure. According to Lobel these two figures represent ‘a form utterly identified with low culture- that has been made into an easel painting, perhaps the epitome of the high cultural form’ (Lobel, 2002, p. 37), thus supporting the idea that Pop art represents a critique of the social issue of class conflict.

From this starting point Lichtenstein’s work continued to modestly attack society’s status quo. Whilst a consumer culture and increasing affluence were rife in America, its foreign policies were destroying lives, by providing aid to the Southern Government in Vietnam. It was estimated that ‘close to 321,000 Americans have been killed or injured from January, 1961, through April, 1970’ (Ehrlich, 1971, p. 2), which was a huge loss to the nation and a moral drain on society. It is hardly surprising then, that in 1962 Lichtenstein ‘creates his first paintings based on All-American Men of War comics, such as Blam, Takka Takka, and Live Ammo’ (Bellroy, 2007).

Live Ammo is perhaps the most striking of these images, featuring a soldier figure in the larger, left hand panel who simply screams, ‘Take cover!’, whilst the thinner right hand panel features the intimate thoughts of the second figure. The composition of these two figures and their associated text is most interesting when analysing this piece. As a modernist artist, which Lichtenstein undoubtedly is, the most notable aspect of the painting is the cropped picture space, which renders the imagery ambiguous and its context illegible. This same feature however, could be seen to address the very relevant socio- political issue of the Vietnam War. Rather than rendering the image indecipherable, the cropped composition could be seen to enhance the mysticism and interest of the character. When combined with his clearly displayed thoughts this technique juxtaposes the fact that this soldier is both human, with obvious feelings, but also as simply a number whose identity we cannot access; it could be seen as a powerful reference to the American lives wasted through the experience of war. By Lichtenstein’s presentation of such a serious political issue in his signature ‘comic’ style it could also be observed that the images of the two characters actually portray the same person as their features are indistinguishable and very generically presented. In this sense the point of a public and private combatant is enhanced and the purpose of the painting, as a critique of war, is reiterated.

Andy Warhol (1928- 1987) was a radical Pop artist of the 1960’s who subversively reacted to socio- political issues of his time. His contribution to Pop culture, such as his banana album cover for radical group The Velvet Underground which meant his work was literally an object for consumption, but Warhol’s work also attacked some more important social issues. Whilst in cannot be doubted in any reasonable way that in Warhol’s ‘mass producing images of everyday items...he questioned both authorship and the validity of uniqueness’ (Barnes, et al., 1999, p. 484), ultimately remarking upon the consumer culture of the period, it was his Death and Disaster series of the early 1960’s which especially addressed some of the more serious socio- political issues. The most shocking of the images created was 129 Die in Jet (Plane Crash), 1962. This piece literally references a high profile plane crash which killed 129 people. Warhol, it seem was very conscious of the disasters happening around him, commenting,

“I guess it was the big plane crash picture, the front page of the newspaper: 129 Die.  I was also painting the Marilyns.  I realized that everything I was doing must have been Death. It was Christmas or Labor Day—a holiday—and every time you turned on the radio they said something like “4 million are going to die.”  (Warhol, 1963).

Skull, 1976, is an example of a much later work in this series. It has been noted that this piece stands for Warhol’s representation of ‘kitsch, commodities and celebrity... in its absence and anonymity, its disaster and death’ (Foster, 2001, p. 79). Warhol was disturbed by the mass media and the way such issues as the death of hundreds of people could be mass produced in the same way marketable goods were in that period. By using a skull as a subject matter, he references the death of every person in the world; it’s a bold critique of loss of individuality, the mass media and mass production.

One of the most notable long term effects of the Second World War was the movement of women from work in the home to aspiring career women. Despite this, the vast majority of adverts for household products in the 1960’s reference women in the traditional ‘housewife’ role and idealise their consumption of associated products. Roy Lichtenstein’s Washing Machine, 1961 and Spray, 1962 are good examples of this as both show a female hand performing the household chores of filling a washing machine and using a spray can. The fact that such a large volume of Lichtenstein’s paintings reference women in this way support the idea that they are a clear critique of the way women were targeted by advertisers as chief consumers. The ‘Romance’ series of his paintings also tackle the gender issues of wider society. Drowning Girl, 1963, for example depicts a female character that would rather drown than ask for help from a male character; it acts as way of showing women’s domination by men in the patriarchal society. It is possible though, that this critique was lost as ‘in several cases the advertising industry borrowed Lichtenstein's comic book style and romance themes to sell consumer goods to female shoppers’ (Whiting, 1992, p. 11); the meaning of the paintings was therefore lost as they were adopted by the sexist consumer culture they sought to resist.

Whilst Pop art is not immediately recognisable as a movement which addresses social and political issues, it can be seen that by critically analysing the content of these radical paintings and prints that they do attack the issues of a growing consumer culture as well as the associated problems such a society created, such as war, polarization of the social classes and sexism. This modernist movement was successful in reflecting the Pop culture of the 1960’s by becoming so available that it too was mass produced, challenging the relationship between high art and mass culture. Overall, Pop art defied fashions and customs of the period to invite criticism of the mass producing, impersonal and essentially consumer culture.

Bibliography

Barnes, R., Coomer, M., Freedman, K., Godfrey, T., Grant, S., Larner, M., et al. (1999). The 20th Century Art Book. London: Phaidon.

Bellroy, C. (2007). Chronology. Retrieved March 04, 2009, from The Roy Lichtenstein Foundation: http://www.lichtensteinfoundation.org/frames.htm

Ehrlich, H. J. (1971). Social Conflict in America: The 1960's. The Sociological Quarterly , 12 (3), 295- 307.

Foster, H. (2001). Death in America. In A. Michelson (Ed.), Andy Warhol (pp. 69-90). London: The MIT Press.

Hamilton, R. (2004). Interview with Richard Hamilton. (J. Tusa, Interviewer)

Hamilton, R. Just What Is It Makes Todays Home So Different, So Appealing? Kunsthalle Tübingen, Tubingen.

Haren, C. C. (1970). Rural Industrial Growth in the 1960's. American Journal of Agricultural Economics , 52 (3), 431- 437.

Heller, S. (2005). The Golden Age of Advertising- The 60's. (J. Heinmann, Ed.) Cologne: Taschen.

Lichtenstein, R. Drowning Girl. Museum Of Modern Art, New York.

Lichtenstein, R. Look Mickey. National Gallery of Washington D.C.

Lichtenstein, R. Spray. Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart.

Lichtenstein, R. Washing Machine. Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven.

Life Magazine. (1964, January 31). Is He The Worst Artist In The U.S? New York: Life Magazine.

Lobel, M. (2002). Image Duplicator. Roy Lichtenstein and the Emergence of Pop Art. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Murray, P., & Murray, L. (1997). Dictionary of Art and Artists. London: Penguin.

Warhol, A. 129 Die In Jet! (Plane Crash). Museum Ludwig College, Cologne.

Warhol, A. (1963). (G. Swenson, Interviewer) Art News.

Warhol, A. Skull. The Dia Art Foundation, New York.

Whiting, C. (1992). Borrowed Spots: The Gendering of Comic Books, Lichtenstein's Paintings, and Dishwasher Detergent. American Art , 9- 35.

Appendices.

1. Hamilton, R. Just What Is It Makes Todays Home So Different, So Appealing? Kunsthalle Tübingen, Tubingen.

  

2. Lichtenstein, R. Drowning Girl. Museum Of Modern Art, New York.

3. Lichtenstein, R. Look Mickey. National Gallery of Washington D.C.

4. Lichtenstein, R. Spray. Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart.

5. Lichtenstein, R. Washing Machine. Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven.

  

6. Warhol, A. 129 Die In Jet! (Plane Crash). Museum Ludwig College, Cologne.

7. Warhol, A. Skull. The Dia Art Foundation, New York.