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Lot Essay
One of the artist’s most conceptually compelling works, Eventide captures a rare meditative pause — a moment of contemplation that is further emphasized when compared to Roy Lichtenstein’s otherwise bold oeuvre of 1960s paintings inspired by America's post-war consumer boom. This unique work epitomizes Lichtenstein’s - and Pop Art's -enduring exploration of the connections between popular culture and fine art.
Eventide's structural elements appear as an easily digestible landscape; however, upon close examination, the viewer is immediately allured into the intricate details of each Ben-Day dots. Lichtenstein championed this dot painting technique — derivative of the mechanical printing method invented by Benjamin Day in the late-nineteenth century — to capture the qualities of color and texture, as seen in comic books. Working with stencils, the artist would produce rows of larger-than-life Ben-Day dots, each made to look mechanically reproduced. Despite his explicit imitation of the process of mechanical reproduction, the viewer is still able to revel in the captivating traces of the artist’s hand. Lichtenstein would diligently fill in each and every dot by hand; the dots are individually characterized by their subtle yet nuanced imperfections, engendering an intimate relationship between the artist and the artwork, and in turn, the artwork and, in turn, the viewer.
In addition to its visual prowess, Eventide’s illustrious provenance enriches Lichtenstein’s significant connection to the American zeitgeist of the 1960s. For almost twenty years, it was a core part of television mogul Douglas Cramer’s art collection. Cramer was an innovative television producer, creating iconic television series such as Wonder Woman, The Brady Bunch, and Batman, in which he integrated Lichtenstein’s trademark Pop Art style.
Eventide’s illusory depth is at once disconcerting and deeply moving: the regimented execution of Ben-Day dots conjures feelings of industrial alienation while the expansive sky arouses a sense of oscillating movement. Lichtenstein’s convergence of two distinct modes of mark-making — uniting the quasi-pointillist sky with flattened strips of unmodulated color — imbues the composition with a heightened intrigue. The blue and light pewter strips spanning across the bottom quarter of the canvas ground the work; they operate as a source of gravity for the ephemeral vastness aroused by the undulating red and yellow horizon. The landscape’s horizon, intimated by the stylistic transition from flat strips of paint to the field Ben-Day dots, anchors the painting in reality. It draws the viewer’s focus back to the painting’s surface, foregrounding the flatness of the canvas.
A hypnotic progression of receding shadows, the alternating bands of red and yellow dots are likewise referential to mass media, recalling the early two-color technique of mass-commercial printing. Eventide exemplifies Lichtenstein’s intellectual exploration of semiotics. In referencing the iconic sign of landscape as an alternative to its symbolic significance, the artist once again directs our attention to the reality of this work as an object whose evocative presence depends on its cultural relevance. When speaking with curator Alan Solomon in 1966, Lichtenstein explains his conviction that “almost all of the landscape, all of our environment, seems to be made up partially of the desire to sell products” (R. Lichtenstein, quoted in J. Coplans, Roy Lichtenstein, New York, 1972, pp. 66).
The evocation of time and place, as referenced in the painting’s title and subject matter, inspire questions relating to the artist’s commitment to conceptual and visual abstraction. Lichtenstein is fully aware of his engagement with the use of abstraction’s—indeed, painting’s—apparently total reification as an engine and not an ending. At the root of this project, as the repeated erotics of Lichtenstein’s images make clear, is desire: the desire, quite simply, to paint, to put marks on canvas that are not swallowed up by, but actively work within, the networks they engage, that actually say something (G. Bader, “Emptied Gesture: Roy Lichtenstein's ‘Brushstrokes,’” Artforum, Vol. 49, No. 10, Summer 2011, pp. 346-351). According to Lichtenstein, the landscape is in fact akin to his earlier images sourced from commercial advertisements and comic books. In essence, the landscape isn’t about nature but rather about popular culture; Lichtenstein’s landscape, like his comic book strip, meditates on art production as it is inflected by mass culture.
Eventide's structural elements appear as an easily digestible landscape; however, upon close examination, the viewer is immediately allured into the intricate details of each Ben-Day dots. Lichtenstein championed this dot painting technique — derivative of the mechanical printing method invented by Benjamin Day in the late-nineteenth century — to capture the qualities of color and texture, as seen in comic books. Working with stencils, the artist would produce rows of larger-than-life Ben-Day dots, each made to look mechanically reproduced. Despite his explicit imitation of the process of mechanical reproduction, the viewer is still able to revel in the captivating traces of the artist’s hand. Lichtenstein would diligently fill in each and every dot by hand; the dots are individually characterized by their subtle yet nuanced imperfections, engendering an intimate relationship between the artist and the artwork, and in turn, the artwork and, in turn, the viewer.
In addition to its visual prowess, Eventide’s illustrious provenance enriches Lichtenstein’s significant connection to the American zeitgeist of the 1960s. For almost twenty years, it was a core part of television mogul Douglas Cramer’s art collection. Cramer was an innovative television producer, creating iconic television series such as Wonder Woman, The Brady Bunch, and Batman, in which he integrated Lichtenstein’s trademark Pop Art style.
Eventide’s illusory depth is at once disconcerting and deeply moving: the regimented execution of Ben-Day dots conjures feelings of industrial alienation while the expansive sky arouses a sense of oscillating movement. Lichtenstein’s convergence of two distinct modes of mark-making — uniting the quasi-pointillist sky with flattened strips of unmodulated color — imbues the composition with a heightened intrigue. The blue and light pewter strips spanning across the bottom quarter of the canvas ground the work; they operate as a source of gravity for the ephemeral vastness aroused by the undulating red and yellow horizon. The landscape’s horizon, intimated by the stylistic transition from flat strips of paint to the field Ben-Day dots, anchors the painting in reality. It draws the viewer’s focus back to the painting’s surface, foregrounding the flatness of the canvas.
A hypnotic progression of receding shadows, the alternating bands of red and yellow dots are likewise referential to mass media, recalling the early two-color technique of mass-commercial printing. Eventide exemplifies Lichtenstein’s intellectual exploration of semiotics. In referencing the iconic sign of landscape as an alternative to its symbolic significance, the artist once again directs our attention to the reality of this work as an object whose evocative presence depends on its cultural relevance. When speaking with curator Alan Solomon in 1966, Lichtenstein explains his conviction that “almost all of the landscape, all of our environment, seems to be made up partially of the desire to sell products” (R. Lichtenstein, quoted in J. Coplans, Roy Lichtenstein, New York, 1972, pp. 66).
The evocation of time and place, as referenced in the painting’s title and subject matter, inspire questions relating to the artist’s commitment to conceptual and visual abstraction. Lichtenstein is fully aware of his engagement with the use of abstraction’s—indeed, painting’s—apparently total reification as an engine and not an ending. At the root of this project, as the repeated erotics of Lichtenstein’s images make clear, is desire: the desire, quite simply, to paint, to put marks on canvas that are not swallowed up by, but actively work within, the networks they engage, that actually say something (G. Bader, “Emptied Gesture: Roy Lichtenstein's ‘Brushstrokes,’” Artforum, Vol. 49, No. 10, Summer 2011, pp. 346-351). According to Lichtenstein, the landscape is in fact akin to his earlier images sourced from commercial advertisements and comic books. In essence, the landscape isn’t about nature but rather about popular culture; Lichtenstein’s landscape, like his comic book strip, meditates on art production as it is inflected by mass culture.