Pop Art Research Paper

Pop Art is Alive and Kicking In the post-war era of the 1950’s there was a movement gaining popularity in the art world. Artists could not ignore the rapidly changing world they lived in. Post-war prosperity fueled an age of consumerism and commercialism and art began to celebrate this popular commercial culture. Advertisements, billboards, television, film, comic books, newspapers, magazines, and even automobile styling inspired artists. This movement was described by Richard Hamilton, as “Popular, Transient, Expendable, Low Cost, Mass Produced, Young, Witty, Sexy, Gimmicky, Glamorous; and Big Business” (qtd. in Kaizen 28). This easily accessible, cool, exciting and relatable phenomena became to be known as Pop Art. Its influence was
By 1953 fifty percent of Americans had televisions and commercial advertising was widespread. Rock and Roll was the music of the time and fast food was being born in the name of McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken. Pop Art fed off of this shift in society and in doing so rejected the supremacy of 'high art'. By overthrowing tradition, they attempted to bring art back to the material realities of everyday life. As it gained popularity it closed the gap between ‘high’ and ‘low’ art. Colin Self described it as the first truly popularist, democratic art movement. “Pop Art was the first art movement for goodness knows how long, to accept and reflect the world in which it lives. Before Pop all Art hid behind being ‘Arty’. Art had reached such a state of insincerity and pretentiousness, Pop was a real revelation” (qtd. in Bigham
He created some of the most recognizable images ever produced. Warhol appropriated images from magazines and newspapers and silk-screened them onto canvases enabling him to produce similar images multiple times. Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Can (Tomato) (1962), a silk-screen print on canvas with colour painted on, is one of the most iconic images of the twentieth century. His colours were flat, bold and bright with contrasting black outlines and silhouettes. He selected the most powerful visual images from the media and conveyed them as the iconic symbols of the