This is what ‘Pop’ looks like: Orange County museum draws lines between art and design
If someone says “Pop art,” Andy Warhol’s Campbell’s soup cans or Roy Lichtenstein’s comic-bookish paintings may immediately come to mind, but a new exhibit at the Orange County Museum of Art pushes deeper, looking at the influence of the movement on furniture, architecture and graphic and industrial design since the early 1950s.
“Pop Art Design,” which runs through April 2, is organized by the Vitra Design Museum in Germany in collaboration with the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark and the Moderna Museet in Stockholm. About 150 pieces on display range from familiar paintings by Warhol, Ed Ruscha and Jasper Johns exhibited alongside George Nelson’s “Marshmallow” sofa, Charles and Ray Eames’ “LAR-1” chairs and the rarely exhibited stars-and-stripes patterned “Leonardo” sofa by Studio 65.
The Newport Beach museum has supplemented the show with original works from its collection, including Vija Celmin’s Pink Pearl “Eraser,” Billy Al Bengston’s “Birmingham Small Arms I,” Wallace Berman’s collage work and sculptor Claes Oldenburg’s “Wedding Souvenir.”
“So often the story of Pop art is told from the American perspective,” senior museum curator Cassandra Coblentz said. “Because it’s organized by a European museum, it really brings an international scope and context to this movement.”
One of the highlights is “Pratone,” a sculptural lounge chair from Gruppo Strum of Italy. Made of polyurethane foam similar in texture to a pool float, the piece resembles a giant patch of grass.
A graphic design section of “Pop Art” showcases an eclectic mix of posters and album art from the Beatles, “Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits“ by Milton Glaser and the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, as well as a New York City subway map and the title sequence from “North by Northwest.”
“We paired Richard Hamilton’s images with a set of black-and-white dishes by Lichtenstein,” Coblentz said. “Looking at all these objects from an equal perspective is quite remarkable.”
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