Wolfgirl: Art in the Sixites

Hey ya'll, sorry for not posting for so long, I've been busy, i guess. Anyway, I just had to write this report for my SS class about Art in the Sixties. I thought I would post it here because I loved this topic. Hope you like:

Andy Warhol’s bright colored prints, Bridget Riley’s dizzying black and white patterns, Roy Lichtenstein’s bold and fun comic paintings; All of these and more got their start in the sixties. As turbulence stirred society, it also stirred in the art world. Many new forms emerged, changing art forever. New styles in the American art scene of the sixties ranged from Psychedelic to Optical to Environmental.


One extremely entertaining and cool form of art form the sixties was Op Art (short for Optical Art). Its name references to the fact this style uses geometry and math to create shocking optical illusions and the appearance of movement. Op art is usually non-representational, as it is designed as an illusion. Op art became popular in America in 1965 thanks to an exhibition called The Representative Eye that was held in New York City. One of the most recognized faces of the Op art movement is Bridget Riley who began her career in the sixties (and continues her work to this day). She created works like Movement in Squares and Cataract 3 that are still recognized now. The official Op art movement lasted 3 years and changed many things, including fashion and even television advertizing.

A controversial type of art from the sixties is Psychedelic art. As the hippie movement swept across America, so did the use of psychedelic drugs. These were drugs use to alter the minds perception and supposedly make the user more creative and aware. Many artists believed them to enhance their creative state; this made the drugs even more popular. Psychedelic art was created as an attempt to reproduce the psychedelic experience. Music and Concert posters helped Psychedelic art gain popularity by exploiting them to the masses, this is still true today.

Arguably, the most popular form of art from the sixties is Pop art. Pop art used figural imagery to reproduce everyday items. Pop art had a focus on pop culture and mass production. It expressed people’s frustration with America’s consumer society. Pop art was also an attempt to counteract Abstract Expression, a type of art popular in the fifties, which many believed to have become elitist and snobbish. Pop art eliminated the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ tastes of fine art and commercial techniques. Two artists who bridged the gap between Pop art and Expressionism were Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg; they also led the American Pop art movement. Pop art had been popular in the fifties in Brittan but did not catch on in America until around 1962.

There have been many notable pop artists; these include people like Richard Hamilton, Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein. Richard Hamilton is considered by many to have created the first pop art piece, titled “Just What Makes Today’s Home So Different, So appealing?” Andy Warhol was, and is, popular in both England and America. He used silk screens to produce images of everyday items and well-known celebrities. Roy Lichtenstein had a style all his own; he createdart very similar to the American Comic strip. Pop art was young, fun and cool in the sixties, but it was even more than that; Pop art changed the way the world looks at mass consumerism/production.

Many other notable changes occurred in the art world during the sixties. Photographs began to become part of fine arts as museums around the world started adding them to their collections. This led to many artists, of all different genres, to incorporate them into their art. In 1966, the underground art movement (graffiti) got its start in Philadelphia. The first known tag artists were Cool Earl and Cornbread. Graffiti soon spread to NYC and can now be seen in almost every large city in the world. Spiderman got his start in the sixties, when Amazing Fantasy 15 was published by Marvel Comics, and has since become a pop culture phenomenon.

So many changes to art occurred in the sixties, there is no way to list them all. Many types of art and media sprang from the changes of the sixties; being shaped and molded by them. The next time you look at a billboard add, or a piece of modern art, realize it was probably, in some way, influenced by art and artists of the sixties.

ttfn,
Wolfgirl