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Lot 11
Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997)
Ceramic Sculpture 13
Fermé27 May 2020
Estimation
USD 300,000–500,000
Plus d'informations
Note du spécialiste
Infatuated with the iconic imagery of Americana, Pop Art pioneer Roy Lichtenstein based his oeuvre on the style and subject matter of pulp comics and mainstream advertisement imagery. In the present work, the artist appropriates the classic diner mug as depicted in mass-produced advertisements – a two-dimensional, artificial representation, honed through the iterations of commercial artists and the reproductive machinery of mass media – and unfolds in a three-dimensional sculpture. The work incorporates Ben-Day dots, the technique Lichtenstein is best known for, in trompe-l’oeil, playfully recalling both shadows and tonalities while pretending at functionality. While the work is an obvious nonfunctional, purely decorative work of art, a visual representation of a stack of cups, Ceramic Sculpture 13 highlights the extent to which the imagery of the Americana tradition are pictorially and culturally coded.
In his Ceramic Sculpture series, Lichtenstein investigates the visual conventions that come together to create the classic coffee cup. The artist states, however, “I don’t care what, say, a cup of coffee looks like…I only care about how its drawn” (R. Lichtenstein, quoted in J. Cowart (ed.), Roy Lichtenstein: Beginning to End, exh. Cat., Madrid, 2007, pp. 118-19). Glossy and beautifully handcrafted, the ceramic work takes the two-dimensional image of the classic coffee cup and shapes into three-dimensional life, blurring the lines between painting and sculpture with the artist’s incorporation of his classic painting technique, the Ben-Day dot. A solid and steadfast object, the classic American diner staple breaks into fragments of obvious representational tactics that pay homage to the work of art historical forerunners like Pablo Picasso. In Lichtenstein’s interpretation, volume is visually reduced, dissolving into heavy black lines and dots, while color invigorates, with the stark primary red modulated by the sharp bright white highlights. Thus, these tiny towers of American diner culture and the familiar cultural repertoire they conjure up border the strikingly strange.
Highly regarded as one of the leaders of the Pop Art movement, Lichtenstein, known for his lithographs and paintings, was also a prolific sculptor. He first began his exploration of sculpture in the ‘40s and ‘50s, producing carved works made from old furniture parts, as well as assemblages of wood, terracotta, and stone. In the mid-‘60s, his sculptural style further developed as he began creating glazed ceramics, developing more figurative works that infused his iconic pop imagery. These glazed sculptures included busts of female mannequins and molded stacks of ceramic cups and saucers, like the present lot, that comprised his Ceramic Sculpture series of 1965. The use of Ben-Day dots, taken from his seminal paintings, in his sculptures produced a flat appearance despite the works’ literal three-dimensionality. As the years passed, Lichtenstein continued to expand his body of sculptural work, including large scale public sculptures in the ‘70s and ‘80s, such as the 1979 Mermaid in Miami and the 1986 Mural with Blue Brushstroke in New York City.
In his Ceramic Sculpture series, Lichtenstein investigates the visual conventions that come together to create the classic coffee cup. The artist states, however, “I don’t care what, say, a cup of coffee looks like…I only care about how its drawn” (R. Lichtenstein, quoted in J. Cowart (ed.), Roy Lichtenstein: Beginning to End, exh. Cat., Madrid, 2007, pp. 118-19). Glossy and beautifully handcrafted, the ceramic work takes the two-dimensional image of the classic coffee cup and shapes into three-dimensional life, blurring the lines between painting and sculpture with the artist’s incorporation of his classic painting technique, the Ben-Day dot. A solid and steadfast object, the classic American diner staple breaks into fragments of obvious representational tactics that pay homage to the work of art historical forerunners like Pablo Picasso. In Lichtenstein’s interpretation, volume is visually reduced, dissolving into heavy black lines and dots, while color invigorates, with the stark primary red modulated by the sharp bright white highlights. Thus, these tiny towers of American diner culture and the familiar cultural repertoire they conjure up border the strikingly strange.
Highly regarded as one of the leaders of the Pop Art movement, Lichtenstein, known for his lithographs and paintings, was also a prolific sculptor. He first began his exploration of sculpture in the ‘40s and ‘50s, producing carved works made from old furniture parts, as well as assemblages of wood, terracotta, and stone. In the mid-‘60s, his sculptural style further developed as he began creating glazed ceramics, developing more figurative works that infused his iconic pop imagery. These glazed sculptures included busts of female mannequins and molded stacks of ceramic cups and saucers, like the present lot, that comprised his Ceramic Sculpture series of 1965. The use of Ben-Day dots, taken from his seminal paintings, in his sculptures produced a flat appearance despite the works’ literal three-dimensionality. As the years passed, Lichtenstein continued to expand his body of sculptural work, including large scale public sculptures in the ‘70s and ‘80s, such as the 1979 Mermaid in Miami and the 1986 Mural with Blue Brushstroke in New York City.