In the mid-1950s, pop art took the world by storm, bursting into the art scene and asking the establishment the one question no one dared to ask before - why so serious?
The movement, emerging in a post-2nd World War New York and London, was a rebellious response to the baby-boomer era, a consumer oriented culture, dominated by the sudden surge of mass media and the cult of hedonism.
Defying the powers that be, Warhol, Lichtenstein, Haring and many others embraced everyday objects and commercial imagery - comic books, advertising posters and yes, soup cans and hamburgers - and transformed them into eye-catching, larger than life masterpieces.
But why did pop art matter so much? Well, the truth is it had this incredible ability to bridge the gap between the art world and everyday people (yep, that’s us), by celebrating the mass-produced, the mundane. And don’t let the colourful brush strokes or the light subject matter fool you – behind some of the movement’s most iconic pieces, very powerful messages were hidden.
Pop artists were, in a sense, cultural commentators, shining a spotlight on consumerism, advertising, and celebrity culture.
They cheekily critiqued the very society they lived in, using bold colours, comic book-esque stereotypes, and clever wordplay to make u question the world we live in.
The result? A celebration of beauty
in the seemingly ordinary. Pop art forever blurred the
lines between high and low culture, leaving us all wondering
if a soup can belongs in a museum – or if a banana should
be the star of your new pair of socks.
