April 12, 2007

Pop goes the Block

Spanning five decades of American Pop artist Roy Lichtenstein’s career, an important, seldom seen private collection of his graphic work is on display this spring at the Block Museum of Art.

“Roy Lichtenstein Prints 1956–97: From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation,” an exhibition of more than 75 works, which runs through June 17 in the museum’s Main Gallery and Print, Drawing and Photography Study Center, examines the Pop Art pioneer’s evolving working methods and use of iconography, color, form and material.

The Block Museum also has planned a number of Lichtenstein-related programs that will be held in May, as well as another spring exhibition that will highlight the work of graduating master of fine arts students. All the events are free and open to the public.

Although he is also known for his painting and sculptural work, print is especially suited to Lichtenstein, who often appropriated his imagery from mass printed material such as comic books and advertisements while lifting his colors, stripes and Benday dots from commercial printing. The exhibition includes some of Lichtenstein’s classic prints from the early to mid-1960s, such as “Crying Girl” (1963), “Moonscape” (1965), which Lichtenstein considered one of his first “true” Pop prints, and an “Explosion” (1967), images that helped define the Lichtenstein style. 

In 1967 Lichtenstein created the first of the more than 20 print series he would make in his lifetime. As he did in his paintings, Lichtenstein adopted the series as his preferred way of printmaking. “I like the activity of deciding to do a group of prints,” he said. “I don’t particularly like the activity of doing one print. It just interrupts my focus.”

The “Haystack” and “Cathedral” series, both printed and published by Gemini G.E.L. in Los Angeles in 1969 and on display in the exhibition, signaled a change in Lichtenstein’s working methods. Impressed with the technology and skilled hands at printing shops like Gemini, Lichtenstein became deeply involved in the printing process. He eventually expanded his color range, paper selection and repertoire of print media to explore the medium’s full potential. “I’ve come to want the prints to be less about precision,” he told scholar Ruth E. Fine in 1983. “That’s why I went into woodcuts, for example, where there was a material to fight against, something that would keep me from making things ‘perfect.’”

“Roy Lichtenstein Prints 1956–97” demonstrates these changes as seen in a number of the artist’s print series, including “Bull Profile” (1973) and the “Reflections” and large scale “Interiors” of the early 1990s. All of these prints show Lichtenstein’s concern for composition and form, whether in creating abstract images such as those in the “Imperfect” Series or in combining the abstract with his comic images, as in the “Reflections” Series.

The Block Museum has planned a number of programs to complement the exhibition. For detailed information about upcoming events, go to www.blockmuseum.northwestern.edu or call (847) 491-4000.