Who is roy Lichtenstein?

Roy Lichtenstein was born in New York City 1923 Roy Lichtenstein was born in New York City 1923. He became famous for his bold, Pop Art paintings of comic strip cartoons and everyday objects: Although best known as a painter, he worked in a variety of media: sculpture, murals, prints and ceramics.

Lichtenstein chose colours carefully, to imitate the four colours of printers’ inks. He also used Ben Day dots, a system invented to increase the range of colours available to newspaper printing. Look closely at his work – can you see how the colours are clear from a distance, but look like tiny dots close-up? Lichtenstein is famous for his use of cartoon strips from American comic books, which had a wide readership in the 1950s. He admired the skill of the comic book artist, who could create complex stories of love and war in cartoon form.

Lichtenstein was sometimes accused of copying comics exactly, but he stressed that he made changes to them – right down to the tiniest placement of individual dots. He was also criticized for using very basic painting techniques. What do you think about his artworks?

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