Pop Art is back again and proves in two exhibitions held in Nice and Antibes, Southern France, that such movement has been playing a major role in the development of contemporary art.
Born in Britain and developed in the U.S and in France during the 1950's Pop Art induces renewed curiosity especially as works by artists belonging to this movement were produced with the help and against the consuming world.
The exhibition held in Nice from February 16th until April 3rd 2000 enables to understand the passion of Italian artist Mimmo Rotella for advertising posters which has been recuperating in his own way while the Antibes exhibition, due to last until March 19th 2000, offers American artist Peter Sarkisian the opportunity to present his installation and video works for the first time in France.
Last year the Pompidou Centre in Paris organised a retrospective exhibition of the works of David Hockney, one of the stars of British Pop Art while the Museum of Modern Art in Paris showed the lacerated posters of Raymond Hains and la Villeglé. There was also an exhibition of Andy Warhol's works in Brussels last summer, another one of Gudmundur Erro's paintings at the Musée du Jeu de Paume in Paris while the French National Museum of Modern Art reopened its doors last January with the presentation of two major installations by Jean Tinguely and Claes Oldenburg in its new entrance hall.
Many Parisian galleries are back on the Pop Art track, notably Daniel Templon with an exhibition of Jim Dine's works. Today, Dine, one of the most vehement American Pop artists, now uses computerised photos to produce funerary reliquaries in a derisive way. Another exhibition of Martial Raysse's works is being held at the Galerie de France. Raysse, one of the co-founders of French New Realism, has been produced paintings mainly. In the 1960's he was rather much involved in the creation of neon, serigraph, photographic of artificial flower works. His technique is now completely different but his motives- Man and his desires- are the same.
Pop Art is back again and proves in two exhibitions held in Nice and Antibes, Southern France, that such movement has been playing a major role in the development of contemporary art.
Born in Britain and developed in the U.S and in France during the 1950's Pop Art induces renewed curiosity especially as works by artists belonging to this movement were produced with the help and against the consuming world.
The exhibition held in Nice from February 16th until April 3rd 2000 enables to understand the passion of Italian artist Mimmo Rotella for advertising posters which has been recuperating in his own way while the Antibes exhibition, due to last until March 19th 2000, offers American artist Peter Sarkisian the opportunity to present his installation and video works for the first time in France.
Last year the Pompidou Centre in Paris organised a retrospective exhibition of the works of David Hockney, one of the stars of British Pop Art while the Museum of Modern Art in Paris showed the lacerated posters of Raymond Hains and la Villeglé. There was also an exhibition of Andy Warhol's works in Brussels last summer, another one of Gudmundur Erro's paintings at the Musée du Jeu de Paume in Paris while the French National Museum of Modern Art reopened its doors last January with the presentation of two major installations by Jean Tinguely and Claes Oldenburg in its new entrance hall.
Many Parisian galleries are back on the Pop Art track, notably Daniel Templon with an exhibition of Jim Dine's works. Today, Dine, one of the most vehement American Pop artists, now uses computerised photos to produce funerary reliquaries in a derisive way. Another exhibition of Martial Raysse's works is being held at the Galerie de France. Raysse, one of the co-founders of French New Realism, has been produced paintings mainly. In the 1960's he was rather much involved in the creation of neon, serigraph, photographic of artificial flower works. His technique is now completely different but his motives- Man and his desires- are the same.
Daniel Templon is also set to organise exhibitions with works by Raymond Hains and Arman soon while a Hains retrospective show will take place in January 2001 in the Pompidou Centre which will organise a major Pop Art exhibition the following month. One can say the French seem rather late in this respect since the Royal Academy organised in 1991 its Pop Art exhibition that left Paris indifferent at that time.
Pop Art creators have not retired though their movement remained somewhat less active during the past decade. French museums however needed 40 years to take the risk of fully examining this current and to give it the place it deserves.
According to the daily Le Monde art critic Philippe Dagen, 40 years is the minimum length of time to consecrate an art movement. For example, Cubist works produced before 1914 entered French museums after 1945 while those painted by Mondrian, who died in 1944, were acquired by these institutions during the 1970's. Warhol, Lichtenstein, Tinguely and Cesar are now also dead so Beaubourg can serenely commemorate Pop Art from now on.
Pop is above all popular and the public has immediately understood works produced by Hockney, Warhol, Lichtenstein or Niki de Saint-Phalle because they dealt with the daily life of industrialised countries. Their art developed with and against the consuming society with its most representatives commercialised and advertised goods such as Campbell soup cans, dollars, the images of Marylin Monroe, Mao Tse Toung, J. F. Kennedy by Warhol, enlarged comic strips by Lichtenstein, recycled pictures by Polke or Hockney, hyperrealistic paintings showing cars, cafés or streets with neon lights and so on.
All these artists picked the main symbols of our contemporary society to create Pop Art and such movement has remained alive despite many attacks from those who cannot admit that a box of powder soap by Warhol can prove as much interesting as a well-painted canvas.
Pop Art is resisting and kicking back especially as most top contemporary artists, notably Damien Hirst and Nan Goldin are its best exponents. Whatever the medium used- photos, ready-made, installations or else- we always have a link with Pop Art and when Hirst shocked people during his «Sensation» exhibition in London in 1998 with his bottled animals he was again referring to the symbols of our laboratories producing clones. Artists mainly refer to present facts which make the headlines of big newspapers. Many French artists are now attracted by Pop Art, notably Gonzales-Foerster, Bernard Lallemand, Gilles Barbier, Alain Bublex, Xavier Veilhan, Valérie Jouve, Carole Benzaken, Jean Rault and Luc Delahaye among others.
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