Lichtenstein: explosive art

One of his best-known works is Drowning Girl (1963), which combines the clichéd melodrama of comic art with so-called »high art«. It has been in the possession of the Museum of Modern Art in New York for over 50 years. Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) became famous for his ironic introduction of comic aesthetics into the art world and thus became a central figure of Pop Art through his reflection on image production. Contemporary voices called his works »snotty«, »blatant«, »garish« and »explosive«. The exhibition ROY LICHTENSTEIN. A Centennial Exhibition begins with these works from the early 1960s, when Lichtenstein was almost 40 years old, and takes us through Lichtenstein's work phase as a world-famous artist with over 90 paintings, sculptures and prints. His oeuvre of the 1950s, when he tried his hand at expressionism, cubism and abstraction, is excluded. The occasion for the exhibition is Lichtenstein's 100th birthday last October and a donation of around 100 works from the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation to the ALBERTINA Museum in Vienna. The large retrospective can be seen there from March 8 to July 14.

The exhibits come from the museum's own collection as well as from 30 international museum and private lenders. These include the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Museum Ludwig in Cologne, the Louisiana Museum in Humblebæk and the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid. A highlight of the exhibition in Vienna is one of Lichtenstein's gigantic Brushstroke sculptures. They are based on a series of paintings from the late 1960s in which the artist painted abstractly in comic style and parodied gestural painting.