Liechtenstein, Roy

Roy Lichtenstein was born in New York into a middle-class Jewish family. Until the age of 12, he studied at a comprehensive school, and then enrolled in Franklin's Manhattan school for boys, in which he completed his secondary education. Art was not included in the school curriculum; Liechtenstein first became interested in art and design as a hobby.

After leaving school, Liechtenstein leaves New York for Ohio to study at a local university, which taught art courses and a degree in fine art. His training was interrupted for three years, while he served in the army during the Second World War and after it in 1943 - 1946 . Liechtenstein graduated from Ohio University and remained there as a teacher for the next ten years. In 1949 , Liechtenstein received a master's degree in fine arts from the Department of Ohio State University , and in the same year married Isabelle Wilson, whom she later divorced in 1965 . In 1951, Liechtenstein hosted his first solo exhibition at the Carlebach Gallery in New York.

In the same year, he moved to Cleveland, where he lived for the next six years, sometimes returning to New York. He changed jobs until he painted - for example, in certain periods he was an assistant decorator. The style of his work at that time changed from cubism to expressionism .

In 1954, his first son, David , was born. Then in 1956, a second son appeared - Mitchell. In 1957, he moved back to New York and began teaching again.

In 1960, he began teaching at Rutgers University , where he fell under the significant influence of Allan Kaprow . This contributed to an increase in his interest in prototype art images. In 1961, Liechtenstein created his first works in the style of pop art, using pictures from comics or cartoons and technology that came from industrial print.

The first success of Liechtenstein was brought by his work on the themes of comics and magazine graphics. The artist chose the picture he liked, manually enlarged it, redrawing the raster , and performed in large format, using screen printing and silk screen printing . Most of the artist’s works are performed in the fixed-drawing technique, which consists in the fact that the image is scaled, the raster is modified, and the resulting version is converted to the original format using screen printing. ^[4] In the image itself, the features of irony and sarcasm were strengthened. He was friendly with Andy Warhol ^[5] .

• 1995 - National Medal of the Arts, Washington , DC
• 1995 - Kyoto Prize , Inamori Foundation, Kyoto , Japan .
• 1993 - Friends of Barcelona, ​​from the mayor of Barcelona, Pascual Maragal .
• 1991 - Award for creativity in painting, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts.
• 1989 - American Academy in Rome, Rome , Italy .
• 1979 - American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York.
• 1977 - Medal of the Skovehegan School for Painting, Skovehegan School, Skowehegan, Isle of Man .

Major works

• " Electric cord ", 1961
• “ I see the whole room ... But there is nobody in it! ", 1961
• " Portrait of Madame Cezanne ", 1962
• “ In the car ”, 1963
• The Sinking Girl , 1963
• “ Torpedo ... Fire!” ", 1963
• " Oh ... Well ... ", 1964
• “ M-maybe ”, 1965

Electric Cord

The painting “Electric Cord” was painted in 1961 in the style of pop art . The painting was bought by Leo Castelli for $ 750. In 1970, the painting was given to the restorer Daniel Goldreyer . ^[6] After the death of Goldreyer, the picture disappeared. The FBI conducted an investigation for a long time, but did not find any crime in the incident. Goldreyer died his death, and all the paintings that were in his workshop, were in place, except for the "Electric Cord". ^[7]

In 2009, the widow of the restorer, dismantling one of the lockers, discovered the missing canvas and reported to the police. The canvas was handed over to Barbara Castelli, the heiress of the owner of the art gallery. To date, this picture is estimated at four million dollars. ^[eight]

Auctions of Roy Lichtenstein

In 1989, the painting “Torpedo ... Fire!” Was sold at Christie's auction for $ 5.5 million, which was a record and allowed Liechtenstein to enter the top three living artists with the maximum cost of work. ^[9]

In 2005, the painting "In the Car" was sold for a record 10 million pounds (16.2 million dollars).

The 1964 painting "Oh ... Well ..." was sold on November 11, 2010 ^[10] to Christie for 42.6 million dollars (26.7 million pounds) ^[11] .

"I see the whole room ... But nobody is in it!", Written in 1961, sold at Christie's in November 2011 for $ 43 million. ^[12]

The painting "Sleeping Girl" has become the most expensive of the artist's collection. It was sold by the Sotheby's auction house for $ 44.8 million ^[13] .

In 2015, at the Christie's autumn auction in New York, the painting "Nurse" ( Eng. Nurse ) was sold for a record for the artist $ 95.4 million dollars, the price paid was unexpectedly high, since earlier its preliminary estimate did not exceed the amount of $ 80 million dollars.

• Lecture by Irina Kulik at the Garage Museum. Roy Lichtenstein - Takashi Murakami. Comic as a metalanguage