Pop Art has been stand firmed up to the present ever since its appearance from mid to late 1950s. The imitations or extended products of Pop Art can be seen everywhere in life. In the art market, works by American artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol also frequently create a high auction transaction price myth. But somehow, no one can expect that the origin of Pop Art is actually the United Kingdom. So, what is the difference between the styles of pop art in these two countries?
Let’s discover from the starting point. First, the America has made a fortune from World War II, and its excessive extravagant consumption has attracted the attention of British artists. At that time, a group of British young artists, architects, writers and art critics established the "The Independent Group" in London, in the mission of questioning abstract expressionism only cares about the purity of art form, as well as calling for the meaning and value of real life in art works. In 1952, at the first meeting of "Independent Group", one of the founders, Eduardo Paolozzi, used a series of collages works including "I was a Rich Man's Plaything" to elaborate his concept. These collages works are full of symbols that symbolize the American mass culture. In addition to giving a slap in the popular culture of America, the onomatopoeia of bullet fired "POP!", showed the pun of "Popular Art." Since then, the group members have paid attention to the American popular culture and used these popular cultural images to produce works that can resonate strongly. In 1956, the British art critic Lawrence Allowey established the word "Pop Art", and the Pop Art was officially born.
Based on the core concept of anti-artistic form and art needs to be close to real life, ready-made objects and misappropriation are the creative approach of Pop Art. British Pop ridiculed the phenomenon of commercial and consumption in the America with the way of cultural metaphor narrative and a subjective and romantic expression. On the contrary, the American hold the positive and glorification attitude towards this. In the end, the leadership of Pop Art was taken over and carried forward by America with its huge consumer art market, in the reason of the arrogant attitude of British art ecology.
Unlike British Pop's contains British humor and romantic style, American Pop takes a more straightforward expression in Pop Art. American Pop has strong social challenges, symbolic symbolism and non-personality, these characteristic was formed due to the nihilism and anarchism caused by the shallow historical background and culture of emerging country. Compared with the positive attitude of the British art community towards pop art, the American Pop, which developed in response to the national economic policy, was initially negatively evaluated for its strong commercial sense. However, after seeing the response of reputation and vested interests, the mature period of American Pop just stands unscrupulously with capitalism.
Pop art has a huge and far-reaching impact on the art of later generations. It subverts the established concept of refined art and vulgar art in the past, breaks the barrier between commercial and art, providing a new artistic value as well as opened a new path for Post Pop, Neo-Pop and even Post Modernism. Contemporary art has also successfully developed into a new and blooming scenario under the foundation of Pop Art movement. Jean-Michel Basquiat, Jeff Koons, Damien Hirst, Takashi Murakami, and Yayoi Kusama, these contemporary artists’s artistic styles are also inspired by Pop Art movement. Therefore, we can say, Pop Art is an indispensable existence in art history.
British Pop Artist
Richard Hamilton, 1922-2011
Richard Hamilton, graduated of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in London, he was one of the member of the "Independent Group". Hamilton used collage techniques as his artistic expression, his work was full of political and criticism, as well as irony. In 1956, Hamilton's collage work " Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing??" clearly expressed the ridicule of American consumption culture and hedonism. He proposed that Pop Art should be a youthful and is universal corporate that is universal, mass-produced, and with low-priced. He suggested that Pop art can be treated positively but superficially, without the esoteric or philosophical spirit.
David Hockney, 1937-
David Hockney's work holds strong symbol of consumption, reflecting the social phenomenon of social luxury, affluence but thinness in the 1960s and 1970s. His works opened up another style of figurative painting, which is regarded as the most influential in the 20th century. The work "A Bigger Splash" is one of his masterpieces. David Hockney graduated from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in London and has been involved in painting, photography, and stage design. Along his art journey, he readily using newest technology to produce his art in his half-century artistic career. He is also keen to study the perspective in art history and practice in his work. In 2012, he was awarded the Meritorious Medal by the Queen of England for his outstanding achievements in photography, painting and design. David Hockney is openly for his homosexual, his love for the same sex was also hidden in his works. In 1983, Hockney, who was gradually deaf due to the sudden death of his friends, and he began to use modern tools and software such as iphone and ipad to paint and show the creative process. At the Christie's Autumn Auction 2018, one of Hockney's masterpieces, "Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures)", was sold for $90.3 million, smashing a new auction record for a living artist.
American Pop Artist
Roy Lichtenstein, 1923-1997
Roy Lichtenstein was born in New York in 1923. He obtained a master's degree in art from the Ohio State University in 1949 and he was one of the representative figures of American pop art. He used outlets, thick lines and primary colors as his artistic expression, drawing on images that can be seen everywhere in life such as phone books, newspapers, advertisements, newspapers and magazines, etc., to form a refreshing and approachable imitating comic strips works. Beside that, Lichtenstein also brought Disney cartoon characters into his creations. His style of work was biased towards surrealism after 1970.
Andy Warhol, 1928-1987
Andy Warhol, the Pop artist, printer, and experimental film director in the United States, was a highly controversial person who played a pivotal role in the development of pop art. His famous series work "Campbell’s Soup Cans" brought him the name, as well as celebrity life. From then, he started to launch a series of replication works of movie stars and celebrity portrait. His extensive replication explored the concept of consumer issues and forthrightly self-marketing strategies that influence part of the ecological direction of contemporary art, the contemporary artists such as Takashi Murakami and Jeff Koons was inspired by him. Although accused critics of consumerism flatter, Andy Warhol remained unchanged, even though made his famous "15 minutes of fame" theory. Andy Warhol's production of experimental films was characterized by lengthy, non-dramatic, and the main purpose was to create topicality. In 1968, Andy Warhol suffered a shot and survived, but died unexpectedly after a cholecystitis operation in 1987, ending his legendary life.
James Francis Gill, 1934-
James Francis Gill is an American artist and one of the advocates of Pop Art. He began his artistic career in the 1950s and is renowned for his photographic images of contemporary phenomena. His work “Marilyn Tryptych” was permanently collected by New York MoMA in 1962. His works have been affected by the Vietnam War for a while, with a frustrating, bleak atmosphere, which included “The Machine”, one of the anti-war series created in 1965. He was introduced to the world by participating in the Ninth São Paulo Biennale in 1967. He resolutely chose to retire at the most successful moment of his career, and he returned to the art world 30 years later.
American Neo-Pop Artist
Keith Haring, 1958-1990
Keith Haring was American Neo-Pop artist, street artist and social activist, as well as a homosexual artist. He was active in the 1980s and he studied at the School of Visual Arts in New York for a while. He started his art creation from street and left his work on telephone poles, concrete pillars, billboards, and subways in New York. His works have a strong pop styles, with the characteristic of monochrome background, thick lines of hollow abstract figures, animals and cartoon-animate symbols for his work. Keith Haring was renowned after his interview with American television to talk about about his arrestment while break train at subway station. The most important achievement of Keith Haring was to bring street art to the museum, together with Jean-Michel Basquiat and other street artists, creating a miracle of subculture into the mainstream art world. Keith Haring's dissolute private life led him to AIDS in 1988, and the following year he set up a foundation to focus on AIDS treatment research and the promotion of child welfare programs. A year later, the only 31-year-old Keith Haring died of AIDS complications.
Figure 1：Andy Warhol, Marilyn Monroe, 1967 © MoMA
Figure 2：David Hockney, Portrait of an artist（pool with two figures）, 1972, Acrylic on canvas, 84 x 120 in © David Hockney
