Roy Lichtenstein’s Comic Art Sparks an Old Controversy

Artefuse wrote about an exhibition of the art of Roy Lichtenstein, a now famous artist who drew inspirations from comics artwork, at the Whitney Museum, and the odd thing about this review is that the writer says Lichtenstein “appropriated”: Roy Lichtenstein was a real New Yorker. There are not many of those anymore. He was born and raised on the Upper West Side in a middle-class family and eventually became one of the most recognizable artists of the Pop Art movement, but his work extends beyond the comic-book paintings most people associate with him. […] The exhibition includes plenty of famous works, mixed with lesser-known pieces that, according to the Whitney, have not been seen in a long time. The appropriation is part of what makes the exhibition interesting: cartoons imitating life, life imitating art, and then back to life again. The main dark room on the west side has one of the best layouts. It keeps the story moving, almost like a storyboard, except this is Lichtenstein’s own comic-book retrospective of his art. The images pull you in, but the longer you look, the more you realize how carefully everything has been constructed. Appropriation makes Lichtenstein’s work mor...