American Pop Art And The Conformity Of The 1960's

“The movement's rise was aided by parallel growth in other areas” (ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ART HISTORY). Though after the Pop art movement’s peak during the mid-1960s, the movement took a turn, and found itself losing its popularity; when the Vietnam War was in effect; by the late 1960’s and early 1970’s the pop art movement had ended.

The 1950s and 1960s were times of unprecedented change, and Australian society was influenced greatly by American popular culture, through various mediums, such as: music, film, television and fashion. This especially affected teenagers. It will be explained how Australian society was impacted by American popular culture, and also why American popular culture had such an affect. Australian developed its own responses to these influences, and the extent of this will also be explored.

Australian popular culture in the 1960s had multiple features, many of which were influenced by the social changes and counter culture at the time. The primary aspects of Australian popular culture in the 1960s were; music, fashion, film, sport and television.

With the overwhelming amount of Levittown houses, the obsession to obtain the perfect American “ideal family” as seen on TV and the unspoken agreement to fear any and all foreign ideas and values, the 1950s were revealed to be a decade of prosperity, conformity and consensus. Just ten years later the atmosphere in America was shockingly different; the 1960s were a decade of turbulence, protest and disillusionment due to the ongoing struggle for civil rights, arising feminism, and the Vietnam War.

The Sixties, by Terry H. Anderson, takes the reader on a journey through one of the most turbulent decades in American life. Beginning with the crew-cut conformity of 1950s Cold War culture and ending with the transition into the uneasy '70s, Anderson notes the rise of an idealistic generation of baby boomers, widespread social activism, and revolutionary counterculture. Anderson explores the rapidly shifting mood of the country with the optimism during the Kennedy years, the liberal advances of Johnson's "Great Society," and the growing conflict over Vietnam that nearly tore America apart. The book also navigates through different themes regarding the decade's different currents of social change; including the anti-war movement, the civil

During the 1950’s art took a major turn in history from traditional styles depicting people and scenes of everyday life to abstract thoughts and ideas that were transformed onto a canvas to express emotions and ideals in society. People, events, and society have always impacted several styles of art, but the consumer culture in the 1950’s impacted art in a new completely unique way. Post WWII society was more industrialized and more focused on developing and selling new products. The postwar generation had more disposable income to spend on the latest and greatest products and the market turned to advertisements in mass media to get their products out there to consumers. With televisions and films increasing in popularity the market flooded these forms of media with catchy flashy ads that showed favorable people like movie stars using products. With the increasing use of mass media, the culture shifted to consumerism which effectively shifted art as well. Art was directly impacted by the consumer culture because of society’s use of advertisements, photographs, and films which artists like Richard Hamilton and Andy Warhol used those elements in their own works to portray the change of societal standards in a new modern style of art called pop art.

Freddie’s Market during the early 1950s would be the host of much gossip and change. The Corsica Café would lend itself to long political debates and chats over coffee. Meanwhile, the Korean War would be blasting through the decade of the 1950s. The fashions, the fads, the prices, the music, the art, and the infamous Korean War tell the story of the decade we call the fabulous fifties.

In order to discuss pop art I have chosen to examine the work and to some extent lives of Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol who were two of the main forces behind the American movement. I intend to reflect the attitudes of the public and artists in America at this time, while examining the growing popularity of pop art from its rocky, abstract expressionist start in the 1950s through the height of consumer culture in the 60s and 70s to the present day.

Post World-War II, mass media had a profound impact on European and American artistic practices. As a result of the war, the U.S. was at the center of the international stage, and American visual culture began being consumed worldwide. This made it a relevant, accessible and common ground for international artists. American Pop artists, like Andy Warhol, sought to use common culture eliminate the division between high and low aesthetics. Warhol’s use of high culture and mediums, such as his use of famed icon Marilyn Monroe and his oil paintings, mixed with his use of low culture and mediums, like his imagery of the ubiquitious Campbell’s Soup cans and his factory produced posters, blurred this line, making the once inaccessible high culture,

Although the dominance of Pop Art was evident throughout the 1960’s to the 1980’s, its roots took hold in the late 1940’s. Eduardo Paolozzi, a British artist, may have inadvertently fathered the Pop Art culture. Paolozzi’s collage, “I was a Rich Man’s Plaything (1947)” was merely a composition of American magazine advertisements that he received from former servicemen, however, it resulted in providing new insight and inspiration to generations of future artists. Incidentally, Paolozzi’s piece was interestingly dubbed “POP” by British art critic Lawrence Alloway in 1954. His series of “Bunk Art” (short for bunkum or slang for nonsense) captured an ironic satire of the all-American lifestyle, and undoubtedly opened the door for “Pop Art” to evolve as a style.

In 2016, Black Mountain College was recognized in two major exhibits as the creative genesis of art in America. Curator Helen Molesworth’s show, “Art of Our Time” at Los Angeles’ MOCA museum re-contextualizes the story of 20th century modern art in America, re-framing the common idea that it began in New York City. The Hammer Museum’s “Leap Before You Look”, developed first at the ICA in Boston and then taken to Los Angeles, reflects the sheer scale and relevance of art, performance, literature and music developed at BMC during 1933 to 1957.

What most people associate with 1960s art is the pop art style with very vibrant colors and

The 1960s were a time in history in which the United States was filled with much disillusionment; however, the 1960s were a time of hope. It was a decade unlike any other, where everyday individuals thought they could change the world and were willing to put themselves in physical danger to see that change happen (Cassity 13). The 1960s offered disposition for multiple scenarios—Civil Rights, Vietnam War, Feminism, Pollution—which led to artists such as Pete

“If Pop art was a from of realism, it was a realism that represented the ways American consumer culture had altered the perception of reality itself. Pop artists imagined themselves confronting a world in which the scale and compass of consumer capitalism, with its near-total saturation of society, exceeded traditional perceptual structures (Miller 598). Pop Art movement took place in various cities but mainly in New York in the sixties and became popular within two or three years. Artist from this movement worked on “imagery originally created for the base amusement of lowbrows” (Scherman 68). This movement took place to get rid of boundaries between “high” art and “low” culture. I think the artist’s concept behind their work to show everyone that there is no hierarchy of culture.

Art has always been utilized throughout centuries as an outlet of expression and has the ability to convey a message in a way that words cannot. At first glance, art may seem ordinary or too different to understand, but the meaning that lays behind the surface of a canvas has the power to impact an audience. Throughout the 1940’s, America was enduring monumental moments that were reflected through art. It was an era of growth for not only specific artistic styles, but for artist themselves. Dr. Wingate mentions that during the 1940’s, art and political action were linked together. Consequently, some of the most iconic paintings and photographs in history were born. Above all, it was a time period where art was able to blossom while the nation faced adversity.