Becoming Roy Lichtenstein
Roy Lichtenstein once said: “I take a cliche and try to organize its forms to make it monumental. The difference is often not great, but it is crucial.” Lichtenstein defied traditional good taste and became a celebrated artist by imbuing ordinary objects—from hot dogs to trash cans—with tremendous power.
Join art historian and scholar Avis Berman, author of Roy Lichtenstein: The Impossible Collection (Assouline Ultimate Collection, 2019), as she traces Lichtenstein’s artistic development, the creation of his signature style, and explores his transformation into an iconic Pop artist who redefined American art in the 1960s.
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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Avis Berman is an independent writer and art historian. She has written extensively on painting, sculpture, photography, design, and museum history. Berman is the author of Rebels on Eighth Street: Juliana Force and the Whitney Museum of American Art; James McNeill Whistler; and Edward Hopper’s New York; and co-author and editor of Katharine Kuh’s memoir My Love Affair with Modern Art: Behind the Scenes with a Legendary Curator. In 2001, she helped establish the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation oral history program, and from 2016 to 2021, she contributed to similar projects for the Helen Frankenthaler, Dedalus, and Richard Pousette-Dart Foundations. Her articles and reviews have appeared in numerous magazines and newspapers, including The New York Times, New York Review of Books, ARTnews, Smithsonian, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Baltimore Sun, Antiques, Architectural Digest, and Art & Antiques. She has contributed essays to encyclopedias, anthologies, and museum catalogues on the Armory Show, Brassaï, Roy Lichtenstein, John Sloan, William Glackens, Edward Hopper, the Addison Gallery of American Art, the Andy Warhol Museum, the Armory Show, American folk art, Ellsworth Kelly, Elie Nadelman, Ursula von Rydingsvard, and James McNeill Whistler. She is now at work on the first biography of Roy Lichtenstein.
This program is co-presented with our Brandeis University Partners: Department of Fine Arts and held in conjunction with the exhibition, Lichtenstein100, September 18–December 29, 2024.