tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post5338880110994657617..comments2024-03-27T05:22:27.604-05:00Comments on Eddie Campbell: LichtensteinEddie Campbellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comBlogger29125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-87954078379977274942012-03-02T22:42:15.005-05:002012-03-02T22:42:15.005-05:00Accentuating everything wrong with Gold and Silver...Accentuating everything wrong with Gold and Silver age comics (huge color dots, off-registration, sloppy drafting) is not a compliment, tribute or honor. Copycatting from a single source is not "transformative art". Roy Lichtenstein's a thief, galleries are street vendors and auctioneers are pawn shops.David Marshallhttp://www.inkystories.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-13440132744792998532009-01-29T15:47:00.000-05:002009-01-29T15:47:00.000-05:00Lichtenstein should be vilified for his blatant th...Lichtenstein should be vilified for his blatant theft of artistic works that were not his own, period. There is never an excuse for using someone else's artwork and calling it your own. As an artist myself this is the lowest you can get. It may not matter to the general public but it does to the person creating the original art. The illustrators that created the so-called low art form of comic art were ten times better than the hack we're are talking about. This is why his childish imitations are not even an improvement on the original. Try what he did today and find yourself in court tomorrow. There is no reasonable excuse.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-1388122938743701112007-02-07T05:51:00.000-05:002007-02-07T05:51:00.000-05:00and a more dramatically lit photo than the one Cra...and a more dramatically lit photo than the one Craig Yoe had access to.<br /><br />belated thanks for the link, John<br /><br />EddieEddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-71861267229474606852007-02-07T05:30:00.000-05:002007-02-07T05:30:00.000-05:00http://www.artrenewal.org/asp/database/image.asp?i...http://www.artrenewal.org/asp/database/image.asp?id=1935<br /><br />That's a brilliantly loony piece of work. Not much subtext there, eh? I love the care with which he sculpted her mighty breasts squashed against the gorilla's side... while his other hand was obviously in his pants.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-34658489844175716762007-02-07T00:01:00.000-05:002007-02-07T00:01:00.000-05:00Well I didn't know that! Wow! Thanks for telling m...Well I didn't know that! Wow! Thanks for telling me, what a brilliant piece of trivia!Johnny Walkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13302545167970532080noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-45076112784857712007-02-05T22:50:00.000-05:002007-02-05T22:50:00.000-05:00"Anyways, Rick Veitch pokes fun at the story of Li..."Anyways, Rick Veitch pokes fun at the story of Lichtenstein/Pop Art in his "Greyshirt: Indigo Sunset" book. In it, there's a pop-artist in it who ultimately meets his demise at the hands of the original comic book artist that he "stole" from. It's pretty funny."<br /><br />And to complete the fun, the story was drawn by Russ Heath, the artist of several panels that Lichtenstein copied. Many of the paintings depicted in the story by Heath are drawn from RL's paintings based on Heath's comics from 40 years ago.<br /><br />-LieberPeriscope studiohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02246265778623199914noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-29910243945641896882007-02-05T21:33:00.000-05:002007-02-05T21:33:00.000-05:00Didn't know about the Mort Walker/Lichtenstein bit...Didn't know about the Mort Walker/Lichtenstein bit. Yeah, that's pretty low.<br /><br />Some years back I was in the home of a certain comic book artist who got down this enormous German tome from the late 1800s. He begins to show me a series of cartoons in them. And my eyes bug out.<br /><br />"Goddamn! Gahan Wilson can't be old enough to have drawn these!! Fuck! How old is he?" These were my first thoughts.<br /><br />Then, my next thought was:<br /><br />"Goddamn! Gahan Wilson fucking filched his entire fucking career from some German cartoonist I've never even fucking heard of!" And I voiced that thought just so.<br /><br />And the comic book artist who had this enormous German tome from the late 1800s filled with artwork from which Gahan Wilson had filched his entire style smiled warmly and nodded his head, and said nothing. Nothing.James Robert Smithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17281049641681225389noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-64715993829498446412007-02-05T17:01:00.000-05:002007-02-05T17:01:00.000-05:00>> Which of picasso's paintings were more skilful,...>> Which of picasso's paintings were more skilful, his student work or his cubist works, and which were more important?<br /><br />Good point! I've never really thought as skill as being unimportant, but of course you are absolutely right: The most important art is about ideas.<br /><br />I'm still surprised that the anonymous artists had more technical skill than Lichtenstein, but God knows why. It's good to be reminded about what is _actually_ important about art. Thanks.Johnny Walkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13302545167970532080noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-86945741272080993962007-02-05T13:00:00.000-05:002007-02-05T13:00:00.000-05:00I've had the same ambivalence about Lichtenstein s...I've had the same ambivalence about Lichtenstein since I was in my early 20's (so, two decades now).<br /><br />I like his work. I think it's an interesting use of the comics form, and it's often funnier and more interesting (if not better drawn) than the originals.<br /><br />However, I detested the idea surrounding his work that it was 'real' art but the source material was akin to found objects.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-46394821112400441342007-02-05T11:10:00.000-05:002007-02-05T11:10:00.000-05:00A very thoughtful post, generating much interestin...A very thoughtful post, generating much interesting commentary.<br /><br />On the whole, I agree that Lichtenstein was good for comics. by showing how iconically potent certain images could be, even if done by anonymous artist in despised pulp comics, Lichtenstein mad it possible for people to see comics as art.<br /><br />But Lichtenstein wasn't the only factor involved. If we look back to the 1960s, we see that there were multiple factors involved in giving comics greater cultural currency. While Lichtenstein was doing is thing, collectors and fans like Jules Feiffer and Woody Gelman were publishing the fist real reprints of old comics; scholars like Umberto Eco and Marshall McLuhan were turning their attention to comics as a visual artform; young cartoonists like Crumb and Kim Deitch were doing work based on the idea that comics were a form of self expression, not just a commerical medium. <br /><br />So, Lichtenstein helped. But he wasn't alone -- his work was part of a much larger cultural mood.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-63202613377933593032007-02-05T09:59:00.000-05:002007-02-05T09:59:00.000-05:00And on a completely unrelated note, I always trace...And on a completely unrelated note, I always trace the Mighty Kong and Anne Darrow back at least to Emmanuel Frémiet's "Gorilla carrying off a Woman" of 1887.<br /><br />http://www.artrenewal.org/asp/database/image.asp?id=1935Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-89730444328811088322007-02-05T08:14:00.000-05:002007-02-05T08:14:00.000-05:00>>There was a time when a respected entity was con...>>There was a time when a respected entity was considered perfectly within its rights to commandeer a foreign, "primitive" entity and either seize its assets or remake that entity in its own image, in the name of "ennobling" the "savage."<br /><br />That argument would seem more applicable to the case of Glenn Brown (cited in the linked Rian Hughes piece), a painter who got into trouble for making exact copies of science fiction book cover illustrations. Lichtenstein at least was altering his raw material; the trend recently has been to simply put quotes around the annexed artefact, give it a new title then attach the new artist's name to it. Jeff Koons was sued for doing this with a postcard picture; Glenn Brown had to settle out of court with one of the artists. I get increasingly tired of seeing this in the current art world not least because of the way that world likes to fence its activities away from the "commercial" sphere but is as commercial as any other medium.<br /><br />The Glenn Brown case seems to be down to critic Robert Hughes' (no relation to Rian) assertion that there are now too many people around calling themselves artists; it's a highly competitive world and all need to find a niche that distinguishes their work from all the other thousands who left art school that year. Appropriation is an easy solution. As Hughes (Robert) says: "More people left American art schools in the 1980s than there were people living in Florence during the Renaissance." (The Shock of the New.)<br /><br />BTW, I have a nice book--A History of the Comic Strip--produced in 1968 as a result of that Louvre exhibition. Lots of stuff in it relevant to this discussion, not least Milton Caniff's intro saying "How ever did we get in the Louvre?"Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-44636827662447877952007-02-05T01:49:00.000-05:002007-02-05T01:49:00.000-05:00Shirley, the hypocrisy. yes. Indeed i ended my pie...Shirley, the hypocrisy. yes. Indeed i ended my piece with an 'irony' from the same forge.<br /><br />I was thinking about another moving of goal posts. Today you can't play another person's song in a public performance without dutifully coughing up. But a hundred years ago the income was all derived from sheet music so the owner of the song wanted it to be publically performed by as many stars as possible so ordinary people would want to play it at home on the piano. Nowadays nobody buys sheet music, so the whole game has to work differently. Micropayments for every performance.<br /><br />With RL it's really about quotation. He's lifting one panel out of a whole comic and 'performing' it in a completely different way. It might be like the London Philharmonic doing an disc of adaptations of popular tunes in new arrangements. Okay , so they pay the royalty. but it wasn't always so.<br /><br />As for crediting the original artist. Don't forget that the owner of the art, DC comics mostly, didn't give credit either. Another example of the goal posts moving. Does that change the value of the panel. We probably can't know because we can't go back to 1959 (or whenever he made the first one). <br /><br />There's evidence that William Overgard was pissed, but he was a syndicated strip artist who signed all his work. But this seems terribly small minded to me. I'm going to dig up a quote and get back to you.....Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-62660165588581863552007-02-05T01:29:00.000-05:002007-02-05T01:29:00.000-05:00Fair enough point about moving the goalposts; I've...Fair enough point about moving the goalposts; I've certainly argued many times against fellow students who e.g. attack Plato for misogyny. I think Rosen's argument is less certain in this instance because it's still recent (R.L. is less than 10 years dead, and some of the original artists are still alive), but I won't argue the point.<br /><br />But surely it's possible to recognize the presence of ideological trends in RL's work without becoming emotionally invested in the matter? And surely it's worthwhile to do so?<br /><br />And surely (Shirley?) the hypocrisy of <a href="http://www.lichtensteinfoundation.org/lfrirep1.htm">this</a> would be evident in any decade.Leigh Waltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00964802750317393614noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-63417521539747588442007-02-05T00:37:00.000-05:002007-02-05T00:37:00.000-05:00...retroactively applying anything inevtably leads......retroactively applying anything inevtably leads to misinterpretation, which is why i won't hear of the term 'comics' being applied back through history. simply because it leads to people talking gibberish. (I've coverd that subject elsewhere... an issue of the comics Journal from 2004 for instance, where i gave a specific example))Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-88050576826861143802007-02-05T00:34:00.000-05:002007-02-05T00:34:00.000-05:00This sounds to me like what Charles Rosen was warn...This sounds to me like what Charles Rosen was warning against in the quote. It's easy to express that high moral attitude now, after comic book artists have fought for their rights over many years, and in the field of music the owners of songs have asserted their rights, and the credit lines at the ends of movies go on for ten minutes. <br />by all means establish legislation that protects intellectual property, but it (all intellectual property... there was a time remember when the concept didn't exist, and in the intervening time it advanced through shades of grey) ... only came to be regarded as such after many years of debate, and it could also be argued that 'High Art's recognition of comics as art, per se (hi, Percy)... contributed to the good. Lichtenstein always asserted that comic book art was art. That's all history. To make heroes and villains out of it is like comic book morality.<br /><br />To do it now is unnacceptable (see the Hughes article linked above) because the goal posts have been shifted, but you can't go retroactively applying that.Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-35324831644027849022007-02-05T00:10:00.000-05:002007-02-05T00:10:00.000-05:00This Lawrence Alloway comment from Johnny's link i...This Lawrence Alloway comment from Johnny's link is revealing: "Future research will no doubt come up with the names of the people who drew some of Lichtenstein’s originals, but so what? He was not engaged in mutual collaboration but acts of annexation."<br /><br />There was a time when a respected entity was considered perfectly within its rights to commandeer a foreign, "primitive" entity and either seize its assets or remake that entity in its own image, in the name of "ennobling" the "savage." The White Man's Burden and all that. Nowadays such imperialism is condemned, and we emphasize indigenous sovereignty. I'm not surprised that people are seeing elitism and exploitation in Lichtenstein's work; I'm sort of surprised that it took this long.<br /><br />Another metaphor: Lichtenstein as P.T. Barnum, putting the freaks and primitives on display for the amusement of the good white folks? Hmmm.<br /><br />I'm writing a thesis this year on the translation of Greek poetry, so I'm quite interested in this topic of art, appropriation, and imperialism. In many respects I think a concern for faithfulness and authenticity has crippled classical translation for the last fifty years, and it's time for the pendulum to swing back...Leigh Waltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00964802750317393614noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-9669694645780527972007-02-04T23:35:00.000-05:002007-02-04T23:35:00.000-05:00the art-buying public
Just thought of dr Zoidberg...the art-buying public<br /><br />Just thought of dr Zoidberg, when he came into money, he immediately went to a gallery and said "i'd like to buy an art" <br />(i may not have remembered that exactly right)Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-64479096811420523062007-02-04T23:22:00.000-05:002007-02-04T23:22:00.000-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-8912954082958632512007-02-04T22:53:00.000-05:002007-02-04T22:53:00.000-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-22220017834486198692007-02-04T21:45:00.000-05:002007-02-04T21:45:00.000-05:00read it.
My own conclusion to it all is that the ...read it.<br /><br />My own conclusion to it all is that the idea of painting being some kind of higher cultural thing is in our day a total absurdity. After Pop Art on it cannot be so. And the idea that there is an art establishment which knows anything about these matters is another reality that has gone south. I believe that the dialogue of our world is being written elsewhere. In fact i would say that the notion that it is taking place in a 'where' or place or field pr milieu is also to be questioned.Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-25995893936380242892007-02-04T21:35:00.000-05:002007-02-04T21:35:00.000-05:00ps
john, thanks for the link. am checking it nowps <br />john, thanks for the link. am checking it nowEddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-31464006741565157852007-02-04T21:33:00.000-05:002007-02-04T21:33:00.000-05:00Johnny
in 1968 there was an exhibition of comics a...Johnny<br />in 1968 there was an exhibition of comics at the Louvre, with lots of panels by caniff etc, blown up to canvas size. Horn and Couperie put together the book that went with it and you can still find that. I posit that this is an example of comics being taken seriously on the heels of the Pop art movement.<br />and yes, I'd agree that wasn't Lichtenstein's purpose. he was just looking at junk culture and questioning what's the difference between high and low. and as for the comics he picked, he was deliberately picking the lowest, not caniff or Rip Kirby or any 'name' stuff.<br />and as to which was 'drawn better', i think that's beside the point. There are levels of art. at a certain level it's about how well made the thing is, at a higher level it's about ideas, and the dialogue a society is having with itself. And at that level it is quite irrelevant to talk about skill i think. But yes, a lot of the anonymous stuff is probably more skilful. <br />Which of picasso's paintings were more skilful, his student work or his cubist works, and which were more important?<br /><br />Damien<br />well, the postmodern philosophy and ideas is just a way of analysing and codifying what has already happened and continues to happen. And one can be coginzant of the ideas before knowing that somebody has put a name to it all. Of course once the codifying begins, then much of the new thing is inevitably done self-consciously, by which time some newer thing has started to sneak in half noticed.<br />Once all of the world's precious beliefs have had their 'reality' questioned and undermined it's difficult to go back, except in the way the world descended into the dark ages and forgot all the things it had learned. (and who's to say it won't, with the way they're behing in the middle east?<br /><br />as for from hell, it is very much of its era. It analyses older stories. It even debunks all the theories, including its own. The reality it spent five hundred pages setting up is then blatantly undermined. that Dance of the Gull catchers, no?<br />It's the climate of our times. No more or less.Eddie Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02492020671613766729noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-85382123886337848822007-02-04T16:33:00.000-05:002007-02-04T16:33:00.000-05:00Oops, that was me. I have no idea why blogger has ...Oops, that was me. I have no idea why blogger has me down as two mes.Andrew Hawthornhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08041600780524955205noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1752841194995687278.post-51735169922329955712007-02-04T16:32:00.000-05:002007-02-04T16:32:00.000-05:00I always viewed postmodernism as a kind of compost...I always viewed postmodernism as a kind of compost heap, breaking down all of the stuff that came before so that something better could come afterwards. <br /><br />Better than the postmodernist stuff anyway. <br /><br />I love your summing up postmodernism as "pictures will thereafter be about pictures and stories about stories." I am reticent to mention it, but I once wrote a paper arguing that <i>From Hell</i> represented a tidy argument against postmodernism, though I have no idea if you two were thinking about that at the time.Andrew Hawthornhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08041600780524955205noreply@blogger.com