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Roy Lichtenstein

Roy Lichtenstein Quotes

Artist

Roy Lichtenstein was a renowned American artist known for his Pop Art style. His works often drew inspiration from comic books and advertisements, using bright colors and geometric shapes to reflect the charm of American mass culture. Lichtenstein's art has had a profound impact on the art world and is widely considered one of the most representative artists of the 20th century.

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All Art Thinking Painting World Knows Looks People Kind Way Drawing

Famous Roy Lichtenstein Quotes

“People think one-point and two-point perspective is how the world actually looks, but of course, it isn't. It's a convention.”

People Thinking World Looks Two Courses Perspective Conventions

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“When I met Steve Kaufman, I thought he was Gene Simmons, but what an artist talent he is. He will be an art force in the art world to deal with.”

World Art Artist Force Deals Talent Mets Genes Art World

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Painting stems from a sense of organisation, the sensed positions of contrasts. Not that it is about this.”

Position Painting Contrast Stem Organisation

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Use the worst colour you can find in each place - it usually is the best.”

Use Worst Colour

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“My work sanitizes it (emotion) but it is also symbolic of commercial art sanitizing human feelings. I think it can be read that way.... People mistake the character of line for the character of art. But it's really the position of line that's important, or the position of anything, any contrast, not the character of it.”

People Thinking Way Humans Art Important Character Feelings Lines Emotion Mistake Position Contrast Symbolic Commercial Art

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“I take a cliche and try to organize its forms to make it monumental. The difference is often not great, but it is crucial.”

Trying Form Differences Crucial Organize Cliche

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“There must be something about art... almost all cultures have done art. It's a refining of the senses, which are there to keep us alive. As far as we know, no other animals do that.”

Knows Art Done Culture Animal Alive Senses Refining

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Color is crucial in painting, but it is very hard to talk about.”

Hard Color Painting Colour Crucial

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Outside is the world; it's there. Pop Art looks out into the world.”

World Looks Art Pops Pop Art

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

“Usually I begin things through a drawing, so a lot of things are worked out in the drawing. But even then, I still allow for and want to make changes. I kind of do the drawing with the painting in mind, but it's very hard to guess at a size or a color and the colors around it and what it will really look like. It's only a guess at the beginning, and then I try to refine it.”

Trying Mind Kind Painting Making Changes

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“A number of artists have done things with Mickey Mouse - including Claes Oldenburg and Andy Warhol. He's such an American symbol, and such an anti-art symbol.”

Done Artist Mice Warhol

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“I was at Rutgers University, and that was a center for Fluxus in a way. But it wasn't what I was interested in. All of it had an impact - as did happenings - because I could see that art was changing from expressionism, which I was doing at the time, or thought I was doing. But it wasn't the direction I really wanted to go.”

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“My direction is very anti-contemplative. If you thought I was for commercial products, you'd think there was no irony. The irony isn't meant to be an ironic comment on our society, exactly.”

Thinking Irony Meant To Be Comment Ironic

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“We're not living in a school-of-Paris world, you know, and the things we really see in America are like this. It's McDonald's, it's not Le Corbusier.”

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“I think that most people think painters are kind of ridiculous, you know?”

People Thinking Knows Kind Ridiculous Painter

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“I suppose I would still prefer to sit under a tree with a picnic basket rather than under a gas pump, but signs and comic strips are interesting as subject matter.”

Stills Matter Interesting Tree Subjects Comic Gas Subject Matter Baskets Pumps Picnics Comic Strips Picnic Baskets

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

“My work isn't about form. It's about seeing. I'm excited about seeing things, and I'm interested in the way I think other people see things.”

People Thinking Way Form Vision Seeing Excited

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“I'd always wanted to know the difference between a mark that was art and one that wasn't.”

Knows Art Wanted Differences Mark Drawing

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: mural with blue brushstroke

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: mural with blue brushstroke

“Color is crucial in painting, but it is very hard to talk about. There is almost nothing you can say that holds up as a generalization, because it depends on too many factors: size, modulation, the rest of the field, a certain consistency that color has with forms, and the statement you're trying to make.”

Trying Hard Form Certain Fields Color Painting Depends Size Statements Factors Colour Crucial Consistency Generalization

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Art doesn't transform. It just plain forms.”

Art Form Creative Art Education

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

“I'm never drawing the object itself; I'm only drawing a depiction of the object - a kind of crystallized symbol of it.”

Kind Objects Drawing Symbols Depiction

Book:Lichtenstein in process

Source: Lichtenstein in process

“My use of evenly repeated dots and diagonal lines and uninflected color areas suggest that my work is right where it is, right on the canvas, definitely not a window into the world.”

World Use Lines Color Areas Window Canvas Dots Diagonal

Book:Lichtenstein in process

Source: Lichtenstein in process

“Pop Art looks out into the world. It doesnt look like a painting of something, it looks like the thing itself.”

World Looks Art Painting Pops Pop Art

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“I dont have big anxieties. I wish I did. Id be much more interesting.”

Art Bigs Wish Interesting Anxiety

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Im not really sure what social message my art carries, if any. And I dont really want it to carry one. Im not interested in the subject matter to try to teach society anything, or to try to better our world in any way.”

Ifs World Way Want Trying Art Matter Social Teach Subjects Messages Carrie Our World Not Interested Subject Matter

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Im interested in what would normally be considered the worst aspects of commercial art. I think its the tension between what seems to be so rigid and cliched and the fact that art really cant be this way.”

Thinking Way Art Facts Seems Worst Aspect Tension Cant Commercial Art

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“The things that I have apparently parodied I actually admire.”

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“The big tradition, I think, is unity. And I have that in mind; and with that, you know, you could break all the traditions- all the other so-called rules, because they are stylistic.. and most are not true. As long as the marks are related to one another, there is unity. Unity in the work itself depends on unity of the artist's vision.”

Thinking Knows Mind Long Bigs Artist Vision Break Depends Tradition Mark Unity Related

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Pop Art is industrial painting. I think the meaning of my work is that it is industrial, it's what all the world will soon become. Europe will be the same way, soon, it won't be American; it will be universal.”

Thinking World Way Art Painting Art Is Europe Universal Pops Pop Art

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

“Everybody knows that abstract art can be art, and most people know that they may not like it, even if they understand there's another purpose to it.”

People Ifs Knows May Art Purpose Abstract Abstract Art

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“All my art is in some way about other art, even if the other art is cartoons.”

Ifs Way Art Art Is Cartoon

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: mural with blue brushstroke

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: mural with blue brushstroke

“I like to pretend that my art has nothing to do with me.”

Art Architecture

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“I don't think of form as a kind of architecture. The architecture is the result of the forming. It is the kinesthetic and visual sense of position and wholeness that puts the thing into the realm of art.”

Thinking Kind Art Form Results Position Architecture Realms Visuals Wholeness

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Organized perception is what art is all about.”

Art Perception Art Is Organized

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...

“I don't think that I'm over his influence but they probably don't look like Picassos; Picasso himself would probably have thrown up looking at my pictures.”

Thinking Looks Influence Thrown

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“We like to think of industrialization as being despicable. I don't really know what to make of it. There’s something terribly brittle about it. I suppose I would still prefer to sit under a tree with a picnic basket rather than under a gas pump, but signs and comic strips are interesting as subject matter. There are certain things that are usable, forceful, and vital about commercial art. We're using those things – but we're not really advocating stupidity, international teenagerism, and terrorism.”

“What interests me is to paint the kind of antisensitivity that impregnates modern civilization. I think art since Cezanne has become extremely romantic and unrealistic, feeding on art. It is Utopian. It has less and less to do with the world. It looks inward - neo-Zen and all that. Pop Art looks out into the world. It doesn't look like a painting of something, it looks like the thing itself.”

Thinking World Looks Kind Art Interest Modern Painting Civilization Paint Pops Inward Feeding Utopian Pop Art Modern Civilization Cezanne

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“There is a relationship between cartooning and people like Mir? and Picasso which may not be understood by the cartoonist, but it definitely is related even in the early Disney.”

People May Understood Related Cartoonist

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“In America the biggest is the best.”

America Standards

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“But usually I begin things through a drawing, so a lot of things are worked out in the drawing. But even then, I still allow for and want to make changes.”

Want Stills Drawing Making Changes

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“But when I worked on a painting I would do it from a drawing but I would put certain things I was fairly sure I wanted in the painting, and then collage on the painting with printed dots or painted paper or something before I really committed it.”

Wanted Certain Painting Paper Committed Drawing Printed Dots Collages

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: new paintings

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: new paintings

“I kind of do the drawing with the painting in mind, but it's very hard to guess at a size or a color and all the colors around it and what it will really look like.”

Mind Looks Kind Hard Color Painting Size Drawing

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Personally, I feel that in my own work I wanted to look programmed or impersonal but I don't really believe I am being impersonal when I do it. And I don't think you could do this.”

Thinking Feels Believe Looks Wanted My Own

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Picasso's always been such a huge influence that I thought when I started the cartoon paintings that I was getting away from Picasso, and even my cartoons of Picasso were done almost to rid myself of his influence.”

Done Influence Painting Huge Get Away Cartoon

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: new paintings

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: new paintings

“Yeah, you know, you like it to come on like gangbusters, but you get into passages that are very interesting and subtle, and sometimes your original intent changes quite a bit.”

Knows Sometimes Bits Change Interesting Originals Yeah Subtle Passages Very Interesting You Like It

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

“Yes, you know sometimes, we started out thinking out how strange our painting was next to normal painting, which was anything expressionist. You forget that this has been thirty five years now and people don't look at it as if it were some kind of oddity.”

People Ifs Thinking Knows Years Looks Kind Has Beens Sometimes Next Forget Five Strange Painting Normal Thirty Five Years Oddities

Book:Roy Lichtenstein: new paintings

Source: Roy Lichtenstein: new paintings

“You know, as you compose music, you're just off in your own world. You have no idea where reality is, so to have an idea of what people think is pretty hard.”

People Thinking Knows World Ideas Hard Reality No Idea Composition

Author:Roy Lichtenstein

About the Author

Born: October 27, 1923
Died: September 29, 1997
Known for: Artist
Quotes: 47

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Books & Sources

Roy Lichtenstein: Exhibition 6 Jan.-4 Feb. 1968, Tate Gallery, London ...Related source material

Roy Lichtenstein: new paintingsRelated source material

Lichtenstein in processRelated source material

Roy Lichtenstein: mural with blue brushstrokeRelated source material

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