Andy Warhol Influence

Pop Art came to fruition at the wake of the Second World War eventually peaking at the prime of capitalism; the movement was distinguished by their portrayal of any and all characteristics of popular culture that had a powerful influence on contemporary society. Themes of consumerism such as advertisements, comic strips, film stars and products led to the blurring of boundaries between higher and lower cultures of that era, through the use of these received notions, pop art became a western sociological phenomenon, developing into a mirror of their epoch. The movement walked a tight rope of social commentary, “either honouring the accomplishments of industry and fashion or responding with sarcasm and concern to the nation’s consumer society”1.
However it was clearly evident that pop art largely critiqued the world around them I will be exploring this notion by analysing the works of renowned pop artists such as Richard Hamilton, Andy Warhol and Joan Rabascall to support my statement.
Richard Hamilton was renowned for being one of the first artists to establish Pop Art in Britain. A multidimensional artist, Hamilton worked on various mediums that ranged from collages, paintings which ultimately to graphics, he initially worked with combinations of symbols and consumer iconography which were generally cut from American magazines. He was able to produce works that romanticised consumerist culture while simultaneously exposing the vulnerabilities of its pseudo intact world. However Hamilton did take a more critical approach to his epoch, being an artist from England he witnessed the slow economy rate that crippled English middle class after the Second World War the middle class, this resulted to a growth in both envy and fascination towards the rising consumerist lifestyle and popular culture that America possessed.
Hamilton alludes to this perception through his collage just what was it that made yesterdays homes so different, so appealing (1956) (Fig1.). The collage is surrounded by all aspects of consumerism and popular culture, which at the time was circulating throughout the consciousness of Post World War Britain, themes of “man, woman, food, history, newspapers, cinema, domestic appliances, cars, space, comics, television, telephone and information2” where all incorporated into the collage, this created an atmosphere that could be perceived as romantic and a celebration of romantic culture. However that may not be the case, Hamilton’s iconography satirically questions pop culture’s incessant desire for stability and security, by using elements of distortion and exaggeration he is also able to contort the underlying message behind the collage. Hamilton focuses on the two central figures in his collage, a man who is evidently a body builder grasping a lollipop that says
“pop” at crotch level (obviously symbolic for the size of a man’s penis, which correlates towards a man’s pride), adjacent to him lays an awkwardly placed semi nude woman who is posing on top of a sofa surrounded by every day top of the line consumerist gadgetry (domestic appliances, televisions etc. Hamilton critiques the over consumption of popular culture and consumerism by cramming all the objects that represent it into one small interior complex, he also alludes to the artificiality of American society by underlying America’s misinterpretation of happiness of continuously consuming products, this is a clear example on pop artists generally being more critical towards the world they depict.

Andy Warhol is arguably the most prominent figure in pop art; he became a symbol of the counterculture movement in the early 1960’s.
His neutral and obsessive attitude towards popular culture transformed his work into a quintessential reflection of the industrial era. His adaptation of a multilayered process, and obsession with reproduction became the underlying feature that would set him apart from most pop artists. Warhol had a detached crisp style of art making that was centred on commercial imagery found in media outlets such as advertisements, magazine clippings, comics and newspapers. The use of silk screen allowed him to create copious amounts of near identical prints in a short amount of time, however he was not actually interested in the amount he could produce, rather he was more inclined to work with a mechanical process in which silk screen offered, by doing this he was able to replicate and critique the very way popular culture functioned, believing that a mechanistic process would erode the value and meaning of the image, in other words the more exposed you are to an image the more detached you will be towards it, reinforcing the statement that pop artists were generally more critical towards the society they
depicted.
Andy Warhol’s critical perception towards his epoch is further underlined through his Marilyn series, specifically the Untitled Marilyn (1967) (fig2.) which was produced five years after the unexpected death of Marilyn Monroe. Warhol appropriated a publicity shot of Marilyn from the film Niagara3 (1953) (the film that led to her massive breakthrough within the industry of Hollywood), he then cropped the image allowing a greater focus of her features, he also reproduced that image into 10 silk screens which where only 6” x 6” in size. These portraits where considered outrageously daring as he added a new twist to his silk screening technique, by painting backgrounds of evocative colours (i.e. Hot pink, acid green) at the location of her shoulders, lips and head, then by applying a silkscreen of the black and white photograph over it, he made the vivid colours appear in the foreground while simultaneously leaving the image of Marilyn Monroe in the background. Through the application of this method Warhol managed to undermine the mechanical nature of mass production and consumerism, He purposely degraded his silk screen through repeatedly use the silk screens would create paint blockages which in turn would produce random imperfections, this gave the deceased movie star different expressions in each portrait. With the combination of Warhol’s dynamic palette and his repeated use of silk screen the Marilyn portraits appeared more astonishing, exhausted, sedated, violent, brash and unrecognisable. Andy Warhol had more to say about the nature of fame than any artist and he used the portraits of Marilyn to evoke those ideas, he critiques the dehumanising effects of mass media, he believed that Marilyn was the power of life4 and the epitome of beauty who was destroyed by the machine, also used these notions to deliberately point out the contradictions in the way in which consumerism packaged its commodities in this case movie stars, who are perceived in shallow terms through the eyes of media and publicity, completely disregarding their own personal anguish’s. Warhol creates more depth to his critique through the use of his colour in Untitled Marilyn, his dynamic colour palette creates flavours and decisions in which the audience gets to choose from, which colour of Marilyn is more favourable to them, this objectifies and dehumanises Marilyn in the process, she is now more of an item which can be obtained by anybody. Warhol is able to play with our desires through centring Marilyn around it, ironically mirroring how the media would for any other product, the real Marilyn can’t be obtained by anyone but instead you can have a picture of her, you can even choose the colour that best suits your desires. By objectifying Marilyn and linking her towards the audience, Warhol successfully critiques the artificial nature of popular culture and humanity itself.

Joan Rabascall is evidently more critical towards the rise of popular culture in America, since he was a French pop artist who had an indifferent outlook to the consumerist lifestyle that America had portrayed. Rabascall’s methodologies consists of photomontages and photographic emulsions on canvas , he also worked with cut outs from newspapers, magazines and advertisement posters. Rabascall’s modus operandi was to bring forth the manipulation and allusions of media that America had created towards humanity, he does this be satirising American consumerism and using themes of sex, violence and poilitics.
The greatest example of Rabascall’s critique on media and popular culture is through his collage Atomic Kiss (1968) (fig3.), the collage simply consists of two images, an atomic explosion and a sexualised Hollywood-esque red lipstick mouth.
The iconography of the Atomic Kiss is used to completely disassemble the bubble that popular culture and consumerism has created for American society. Rabascall questions the way media is able to dissipate the violence and horror that circulates around the world (outside of America and Britain), by placing the mouth over the atomic bomb Rabascall attacks America’s inability to consider the travesties of the world around them, even the cataclysm that they have caused (Japan), in other words he questions the way Americas ambivalent consumerist society is able to hide behind the glorified icons of pop culture and cinema in the wake of mass destruction of nations that surround
them.
Even though most pop artists aspired to take an impersonal approach towards their work, it was largely evident that they were unable to take a neutral side due to the movement becoming the quintessential mirror of popular culture, it is impossible to stay neutral when reflecting on any era as everything can be criticized, to this date there is been no society that could truly call themselves a utopia