Viewing page 11 of 36
This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.
ABOUT-FACE from the ABSTRACT At his gallery, Leo Castelli (right) looks over three new Lichtenstein paintings (Lichtenstein is at left). Castelli bought the center painting, "Beachball," for himself. He already has sold five Lichtenstein paintings for prices varying from $350 to $800, and will exhibit his work in a one-man show in the spring. "Beachball" was inspired by an illustration in a resort ad. "Naval Officer" (at left) comes from the Steve Canyon comics. The diptych at the right, titled "Garbage Can," stems from a drawing showing how easily a rubbish can may be opened. [[Images: Self-Portrait of Roy Lichtenstein, "Beachball," "Naval Officer," and "Garbage Can"]] "Peephole," a Lichtenstein cartoon painting, was bought by Mr. and Mrs. Burton G. Tremaine and hangs in a bedroom of their Park Avenue apartment. Tremaine owns a lighting company. He and his wife have an extensive collection of modern art. By PAUL BERG of the PICTURES Staff A new style of painting is beginning to appear, causing excited talk among the avant-garde of the New York art world. Speculation centers around the question of whether this is the heralding of a new movement or only a momentary revolt. A scattering of artists is returning forcibly-----almost brutally-----to the stark, blatant, literal representation of everyday objects. Commercial art, billboards, and comic strips are direct influences for much of this new painting. Its most obvious characteristic is an about-face from the abstract expressionist and non-objective schools that had eliminated recognizable images. Little of this new work has been seen publicly yet, and that of two of the most controversial artists, James Rosenquist and Roy Lichtenstein, will be exhibited for the first time within the next few months. However, their work already has started a small furor among the few collectors and gallery directors who have seen it. When it is shown, it well may generate some of the most heated reactions, pro and con, that the art world has experienced in recent years. Although Rosenquist and Lichtenstein share an absorption with the coarse pictorialism of commercial art, their work is different. They do not know each other and each arrived at his style individually. The importance of their work, and the aspect arousing such interest in art circles, is that there are several other artists ----- in New York, in the Middle West, on the West Coast ----- who, unknown to each other, also have started to paint, in realistic and surrealistic styles, the mass-produced, neon-plastic-pushbutton objects of modern American life. It is this similar but independent activity that suggests a new art movement may be gestating. The new year should tell whether it will die a-borning or grow bigger and stronger. ON THE COVER Rosenquist mixes paint in front of his "Light That Won't Fail." Fragmentation and disproportion in size of objects give the painting a surrealistic look. A giant comb frames the top of the picture which shows a pretty girl, lips heavily tinted and eyes made up with mascara, looking up at the sun. The sun, in panel to her left, is shining brightly in a sandstorm. At the upper right, a man's hands reach down to pull up his socks. Rosenquist uses artists' oil colors in a ground of white lead, applies the paint with brush Rosenquist's "Hey, Let's Go for a Ride" (at right) hangs in good company in the apartment of Mr. and Mrs. Tremaine. On left wall panel is a painting by Picasso, and on center panel one by Willem de Kooning. A Calder mobile stands on the floor at the left. Rosenquist's painting shows the neck of a beer bottle being thrust forward by a smiling girl. Rosenquist's 90-by-102-inch painting "I Love You" shows the front of a 1950 Ford, a girl who is whispering into a man's ear, a field of spaghetti. [[ Image: "I Love You"]] LICHTENSTEIN Roy Lichtenstein, born in New York City in 1923, has arrived at his cartoon art from a formal academic background. He received his master's degree in art at Ohio State University, where he taught art from 1946 to 1951. He gave up teaching for the next six years, moved to Cleveland, where he worked at various jobs including industrial design and window display. He is now on the faculty of Douglass College, the women's school at Rutgers University. In recent years he experimented with an abstract expressionist style in which he occasionally used disguised and obscured cartoon characters. "This led me to wonder what it would be like if I had a cartoon that looked just like a cartoon," said Lichtenstein. "The image turned out so strong, I could not mess it up. My other paintings looked weak in comparison." ROSENQUIST Artist James Rosenquist, 28 years old, is a member in good standing of the Sign-Pictorial and Display Union, Local 230. His current style is clearly derivative from his billboard work in which he painted gigantic faces and figures. He was born in Grand Forks, N.D., grew up in Minneapolis. In 1952 he went to the University of Minnesota, studied with non-objective painter Cameron Booth. Rosenquist's father advised his son: "Learn a trade so you can always get a job and not starve in an attic." Rosenquist learned sign painting. In 1955 he went to New York to study. For a while he supported himself by working full-time as a sign painter. Working at close range on huge signs, his painting engulfed him and he saw it only in segments. With these experiences, Rosenquist was moved to give up sign painting in 1960 and turn full-time to art. "I would like my paintings to surprise people," he says. "I like to bring things into unexpected immediacy ----- as if someone thrust something right next to your face ----- a beer bottle or his shirt cuff ----- and said, 'How do you like it?'"
