Lichtenstein the Critic: Pop Art and Participation in Culture

Along with other artists coming to fame in the early 1960s, such as Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg, and Jasper Johns, the name of Roy Lichtenstein has become synonymous with Pop art. Indeed, his work is perhaps the most paradigmatic of the group. In the Roy Lichtenstein Prints 1956-97 art exhibit, one finds the familiar Benday dots, war comic-strip-style images, and playful renderings of the Interior Series that typify Lichtenstein’s prints. In this truly remarkable collection however, Lichtenstein’s art takes on a new dimension. Due to the vast assortment of prints, one is able to take in a good dose of Lichtenstein the cultural commentator, who offers satirical critiques of the contemporary culture from within the culture itself; who, at the same time, takes full advantage of that very culture in order to establish himself in the arts community. In other words, the exhibit displays Lichtenstein’s art as meta-culture, always commenting on itself and its surroundings.

For example, in what is likely Lichtenstein’s most famous print WHAAM!, as well as This Must be the Place, and Crying Girl, Lichtenstein ably captures the daunting mixture of a sense of post-war disillusionment and 50s era idealizations that was present in society. The blonde woman in Crying Girl stands together as a popular if not undemanding cartoon character and an icon for an ideal, whether of the right or the left, bringing to mind both Leave it to Beaver and Marilyn Monroe. The onomatopoetic WHAAM! explodes before the viewer, manifesting itself with the shout: hear I am! One might translate the utterance as, hear is your culture, with its neatly aligned Benday dots, straight edges, and animated characteristics. Lichtenstein does not stop there however. One further discerns the utterance that the culture, though certainly commercial and popular, is the foundation for this new art.

Some of Lichtenstein’s other works, where it is evident that he has self-consciously borrowed from canonical artists of past ages, display similar qualities. The Haystack Series, drawing on the paintings of the esteemed impressionist Claude Monet, serves as a case in point. Lichtenstein offers a new interpretation of Monet’s haystacks. His interpretive criteria are simple, namely, the work ought to be a product of its own (new) time. Whether purely tongue-in-cheek is unknown – though it seems unlikely – Lichtenstein makes prints, in mass quantities, of the updated pop goes Monet. The naïve circular Benday dots are once again employed, serving as backdrop for the red, blue, white, black, and yellow haystacks. Perhaps what is most fascinating about the series is the manner in which Lichtenstein is able to simultaneously do a number of things. The series provocatively renders the haystacks in an easy and simple way, not far off from irreverence and parody, extends responsibility for the images to the culture from which they emerged, and yet relishes in its simpleness (for that is what makes Lichtenstein Lichtenstein), while ultimately refraining from condescension.

The various other series, Entablature, Interior, Reflections, and Brushstrokes, and the individual pieces, all fill out the picture of Lichtenstein as cultural reviewer, contributor, and critic. Oftentimes appearing pretentious, otherwise commonplace, the air of easiness which runs about Lichtenstein’s prints reflects their largely unassuming nature, in that they are able to say so much with so little. And yet, as is the case with so many other cultural commentators, Lichtenstein’s prints still beg the question: is anything being said at all?

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By Zack Purvis
Expected Graduation Date: August 2006
Major: Mathematics
Hometown: Vancouver, WA
Even after revisiting the Lichtenstein exhibit, I was not sure what to think of his prints. Locating their center (if they have one) in some sort of meta-cultural task seemed to be appropriate, so I used this review as my own sort of rumination on that idea.