WHAT IS POP ART?

Pop art emerged in the late 1950’s and became popular in the 60’s in both America and Britain. The movements inspiration came from pop culture and gathered its sources from commercial culture such as advertising, holly wood films and pop music. Some key artists were Richard Hamilton, Jasper johns and the iconic Andy Warhol. It started to dominate the traditional art approaches of what art should be.

Some Characteristics of Pop Art

-  Popular, Low cost. Aimed at the youth, mass Produced

Artists I will look at:

Richard Hamilton, Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg

Born in London. Hamilton’s career spanning from the 1940’s to 2011. His inspiration came from landscapes, flower paintings and fashion magazines. His techniques were collages of different images. Hamilton was very experimental when it came to his art-making. He would create multiple outcomes than the traditional ‘single’ piece. His techniques included printmaking, photography, painting. He exhibited polaroid, prints and paintings.

His work on the right exhibits a collage featuring different pop culture items such as the body builder, T.V, posters and also shows the movie theater in the background, all pictures that relate to pop culture. It shows living spaces and what it was like in the 50’s which was supposedly made life appealing and different to any other era.

RICHARD HAMILTON

Richard Hamilton 1922-2011 “Just what was it that made yesterday’s homes so different, so appealing? “ (1956) Digital print on paper 260 x 250 mm

Jasper Johns was born on may 15th, 1930 in Augusta, Georgia U.S. He was best known for his paintings such as The Flag. Created when he was 24 (1954-1955) he used paint materials, encaustic wax and binds pigment, enamel house paint. Any material that dried fast. Bringing out the brush strokes in the painting. The American flag was something commonly looked at therefore he created a painting with the same ratio of measurements and brought something rarely examined to life, objectified by the public eye. It was a concern as many people thought recreating the flag was not considered art. When viewing the art work you see many layers of each brush stroke which could relate to the layers seen in America, the different classes from the rich class to the lower class.

JASPER JOHNS

Rauschenberg was born October 22, 1925. He was an American Painter and graphic artists during the pop art movement. He also used different techniques within his work such as photography, printmaking and papermaking. In his paintings he explored both methods of art such as traditional methods and modern methods of his time. He combined the two in may of this art works. The mix medium painting on the right shows the multiple of meduims used in his work even the materials such as metal is shown. You can clearly see news paper clippings. Rauschenberg always left the interpritations of his art works up to the views of it. I believe that the art piece is comunicating kaos in his life as there is a lot happening on the canvas, all in different directions. The colours on the painting are also very random and messy with the brush strokes which support the message of maybe his life was very disorganized but also could relate to society and how it was regaining its grounds after the war.

ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG

Robert Rauschenberg untitled combine 1963 82 x 48 x 6 ¼ inches Oil, silkscreened ink, metal and plastic on a canvas

WHAT IS ARTE POVERA?

Arte Povera noun

-  Italian arte po’vera

Word origin: Italian

Translation: Poor Art

The Arte Povera movement was in the 1967 1972. The literal translation of the work ‘Arte Povera’ translates into poor art. It relates to the materials that were often used

Some Characteristics:

Made from found objects, used materials,

Giovanni Anselmo was born in 1934 in Italy. He emerged after WWII in Italy, within the Arte Povera movement. Anselmo would often use rocks, stones and sand to create his work. His work was very influential to envoke the Arte Povera movement.

GIOVANNI ANSELMO

Mario Merz was born january the 1st 1925 and later passed on the 9th of November 2003. He was an Italian artist. Merz was known for his domes and shelters that were mostly made out of steel, metal aluminum and pewter.

MARIO MERZ

LINKS BETWEEN POP ART AND ARTE POVERA

Both used materials – such as newspaper or metals

Both thought that classic art was too narrow minded

Pop art and Arte Povera was low costing

Both used found objects such as andy warhol using the can as inspiration and Giovanni Anselmo used rocks both found objects.

Pop Art I like pop art because of its

use of colours and how it would be inspired by pop culture to design and create pieces of art. Its collage appearance is very clever as it puts together a wide range of materials onto a canvas. Also its use of mass production is very clever to create multiple pieces.

Arte Povera The way arte povera

found art is the environment surrounding it was very inspiring, it taught me that art can be found just inches away from you and beauty can be made with simple materials such as rock and stone.

MY THOUGHTS