Pop Art

The World of Pop Art 

Pop Art first came out in Britain in the mid 1950's. 

                                                            

This is a picture by one of Pop Art's most famous artists Roy Lichtenstein. The painting is called 'Live Ammo (Bang!) It was painted in 1962. It was painted using oil and magna acrylic on canvas. 

  Pop Art was mainly based on everyday things and consumer objects of the time (movies, television, newspapers, magazines and everyday objects like food cans) Pop art was also used as a way to cheer up and re-brighten the lives of people who had been effected by the 2nd world war and because that was many people pop art spread very quickly through the country and then over to America. These artists wanted to express their optimism after such a hard time. Pop Art celebrated the United Generation of shopping.

  The movement officially started when Lawrence Alloway  when he wrote about Pop Art in his article, "The Arts and Mass Media," Architectural Record. Many Art History books say that Richard Hamilton's painting - 'What Is It That Makes Today's Home So Different And So Appealing?' signalled the start of Pop Art arriving to the popular ever changing scene of modern culture.

 This is the painting by Richard Hamilton, it was painted in 1956.

  The collage appeared in a exhibition called  'This is Tomorrow' at Whitechapel Art Gallery in 1956 so became popular and famous very soon after it was first created.

  For most of the time when Pop Art was popular it was part of the Modernist movement in the early in 1970's, with its optimistic viewpoint, in a very contemporary subject matter. It also ended the Modernism movement.

So what are the Key Characteristics of Pop Art? 

  Pop art always uses popular images that people will recognise straight away, from celebrities, media or products.
  Pop art usually uses bright cheerful colours.
  Pop art usually uses a lot of cartoon imagery and is influenced by comic books or newspaper photographs.
  If the artist paints a picture of a person the person is usually a celebrity or a well known fictional character from a comic book, advertisement or fan magazine.

   These are some of the very first and most famous pop artists:

• Anthony Warhol
• Richard Hamilton
• Eduardo Paolozzi 
• Peter Blake
• John Mchale
•  Lawrence Alloway 
• Peter Reyner Banham
• Richard Smith
• Jon Thompson 

   Andy Warhol is one of the most famous pop artists around, he was an american pop artist and understood how painting basic shopping objects and well known celebrities would catch the eye. Together these post - world war II obsessions drove the economy.    

  

   Personally I think pop art is one of the best styles of art that were created in the 20th century because it helped lead the way to new fashions and images that have changed today and how we dress and has inspired many other artists work. I think recently as well pop art has become very popular in clothes design because a lot of dresses, skirts and tops that have come out recently have pop art inspired images on them.It is also a very nice style of art work when you think about how come and why it was created, due to the fact it was juts after the 2nd world war and how a lot of the art created a happy mood to help people cheer up and brighten up and forget about the tragedies and violence of world war II.