1964
American
Oil and acrylic (magna) on canvas
Place Made,United States
Unframed: 68 × 80 in. (172.72 × 203.2 cm)
85.418

“There is something humorous about doing a landscape in a solidified way, especially the rays, because a sunset has little or no specific form.” —Roy Lichtenstein

An originator of pop art, Lichtenstein borrowed images from American popular culture, especially comic strips, advertising, and art reproductions. His signature vocabulary of black outlines, primary colors, and benday dots derived from commercial printing, emphasizes his subjects’ everyday origins. In this painting, Lichtenstein reinterprets and monumentalizes the kind of conventional and familiar image usually found on picture postcards, raising questions about what distinguishes art from illustration or advertising.

Signed on verso of canvas "Lichtenstein '64"
Ink on stretcher, Leo Castelli number: LC (179) 68" x 80" Eisen sticker on middle stretcher VMFA label; Pasedena Art Museum label
Gift of Sydney and Frances Lewis
The Sea, Mu.ZEE, Kunstmuseum aan zee, Ostend, Belgium, October 25, 2014 - April 19, 2015

Beyond the Frame: American Art 1960-1990, Setagaya Art Museum, Tokyo, 6 July - 18 August 1991; National Museum of Art, Osaka, 29 August - 29 September 1991; Fukuoka Art Museum, Fukuoka, November 15 – December 15, 1991

Realism in a Post-Modern World: Selections from the Sydney and Frances Lewis Collection, Maier Museum of Art, Randolph-Macon Woman’s College, Lynchburg, VA, January 21 – March 25, 1990

Made in America, Virginia Beach Arts Center, Virginia Beach, VA, April 5 – June 11, 1989

Roy Lichtenstein, Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena, CA, April 18 - May 28, 1967; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, June 23 - July 30, 1967; The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY, September 18 - November 9, 1969; William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, MO, December 18, 1969 - January 18, 1970; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL, February 7 - March 22 1970; Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, Columbus, OH, July 9 - August 30, 1970

Roy Lictenstein Landscapes, Leo Castelli Gallery, New York, NY, October 24 - November 19, 1964
(Leo Castelli Gallery, New York) by 1964. Collection of Dr. and Mrs. Eugene A. Eisner, Scarsdale, New York. (Southby Parke-Bernet, New York) by 1980; Purchased by Mr. and Mrs. Sydney and Frances Lewis, Richmond, Virginia in 1980; Gift to Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA), Richmond, Virginia in December of 1985.
©artist or artist’s estate

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