Roy Lichtenstein: Early Black and White Paintings

This book was published on the occasion of Roy Lichtenstein: Early Black and White Paintings at Gagosian, 980 Madison Avenue, New York, the first exhibition devoted exclusively to the artist’s black-and-white paintings from the early 1960s.

Lichtenstein was attracted to the look of printed images from comic books, newspaper advertisements, and mail-order catalogues because their basic hand-drawn lines lacked an association with “art,” lending them an archetypal power. The artist’s early black-and-white paintings, begun in 1961, are some of his most essential and enduring works. Focusing on single objects—a tire, a curtain, a sock, a diamond brooch, a golf ball—they project the clarity, simplicity, and novelty that are the foundations of Pop art.

The catalogue includes color plates and details of the twenty-three works in the exhibition and essays by Robert Rosenblum and Frederic Tuten.