How did pop art challenge beleifs in consumerism Essay -- Essays Paper

How did pop art challenge beleifs in consumerism Introduction: In order to discuss pop art I have chosen to examine the work and to some extent lives of Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol who were two of the main forces behind the American movement. I intend to reflect the attitudes of the public and artists in America at this time, while examining the growing popularity of pop art from its rocky, abstract expressionist start in the 1950s through the height of consumer culture in the 60s and 70s to the present day. Roy Liechtenstein, (fig 1) was born in 1923 into to a middle class Hungarian family living in New York, there was no artists on either side of his family and throughout Liechtenstein’s schooling there were no art classes. He used to paint in oils and draw, sometimes sketching musicians he saw playing in Harlem and the Apollo Theatre as a hobby. It was not until ‘1939’ the summer of his last year at high school that he enrolled in art classes in the Art Students League run by a man called Reginald Marsh. Liechtenstein’s influences regarding his painting style at this time had been the European avant-garde artists such as Picasso. These cubist and expressionist styles were rejected buy by Marsh who favoured painting the masses of New York life such as carnival scenes, boxing matches and the subways catching the detail in fleeting brush strokes, in a non-academic easily recognisable way. This style of recognisable American art that used everyday scenes are dir ectly related to the consumer orientated Pop Art that Liechtenstein was to develop later in his life. Andy Warhol, (fig2) no one, including Warhol him self knows his exact birthday but its thought to be around 1928-1931. Born in Forest city Pennsylvania and christened Andrew Warhola (which he changed in 1949 while living in New York). There are several contradicting stories about his life although he left two autobiographies the factual authenticates are not known, however his parents emigrated to the States from Czechoslovakia in 1909, his father came first to avoid national service and his mother nine years later. His father who worked as a coal minor in West Virginia didn’t play a big role in brining up Warhol, as he was away form home allot. After his death Andrew his mother and his brothers had a very poor existence, during school holidays Andrew sold fruit and helped as a window... ...cles for the American consumer only disconnected from there origins ‘Fig5’. Warhol’s idolisation of the super stars of that era is what set him apart from his contemporaries and immortalised him in popular culture the most famous or these being Marilyn Monroe ‘Fig6’. And this was no accident as his personal goal was to become a star in his own right and he consciously generated a cloak of mystery which made it almost impossible to distinguish the man from the legend â€Å"you can only become famous if everybody is talking about you†(Warhol). Bibliography: All dressed up (the sixties and the counter culture), Jonathon Green, Pimlico 1999. The 50s, Peter Lewis, Book Club Associates, 1978. Fifties source book, Christopher Pearce , virgin imprint W.H Allen & co, 1990 Warhol, Klaus Honnef, Benedikt Taschen Verlag Gmbh, 2000 Lichtenstein, Janis Hendrickson, Benedikt Taschen Verlag Gmbh, 2000 Pop Art, Michael Compton, Feltham-Hamlyn, 1970 Pop as art: a study of the new super realism, Amaya-Mario, London: studio vista, 1965 Pop Art U S A – UK, Japan catalogue committee (isbny8226086), 1987 Cross overs: art into pop/pop into art, Walker John A, London Methuen, 1987

Marital Conflicts and the Resolutions

Our marriage is in one of the most critical moments of our lives; in fact it is between a rock and a hard place. It has now been six years since we got married in one of the most colorful church weddings I have ever witnessed.It is not that we have not gone through some minor conflicts previously, but at least we were able to resolve them immediately by counselors, friends, our pastors and ourselves.The previous disagreements had to do with our monthly spending, pressure from our parents, time to arrive home and our choice of friends among other issues. At present, things have escalated from being bad to worse, with no signs of a possible solution at the horizon.Before we got married, I had vividly known that my fiancà ©e at that time was a committed Seventh Day Adventist though I am a member of the Assemblies of God Church, an evangelical group of the Protestant church.Our parents, friends and the best couple had asked us if we foresaw any future collision since our churchesâ€℠¢ doctrines were different; our answer then was a big no. We believed that our love for each other would conquer any disputes that would arise in our marriage.My wife’s father is a very staunch Adventist; in fact, one of the senior elders at the local church and had never had the thought that any of his five children would ever desert the church which he helped found; an action that made him become respected in the entire locality. My wife loves his father so much and thus has no intent of betraying him.Being an evangelical, a born again Christian and the head of my family, I am not comfortable with the idea of having a divided family with my wife attending church on Saturday making her not attend to her domestic and marital duties from six in the morning to six in the evening (according to their beliefs). On the other hand, I attend church services on Sundays and other fellowships on the weekdays.The conflict is arising from the fact that we do not agree in very many issues that pertain to the different doctrines that the two groups advocate for. My wife does not eat pork or any related products; she does not take either tea or coffee for to her both are drugs, classifying them in the same group with tobacco or marijuana.My wife and I are both civil servants, my wife working with the department of Education and I as an army officer though at the moment I am on the study leave enrolled in the University in an undergraduate program.We have two daughters, Shari and Shako aged five and three respectively. It is our obligation as parents to bring them up in a way that is honorable so that they can become great members of the society. What makes me uncomfortable about our religious differences is because our little children look confused (especially the elder one). Sometimes they go to church on Saturdays and on Sundays; to their mother’s and father’s churches respectively.The older daughter has severally asked me why I do not go to their mothe r’s church and she has, I suppose, asked her mum a similar question. She has made me understand that her friends usually go to church with their both parents and looking at her anxious face, it is obvious that she will be very happy if we would start doing the same.My greatest desire is for us to attend the same church for the sake of our unity and our children. Since I have never thought of myself becoming an Adventist and have always regarded myself incompatible with their doctrines (that I find very conservative) and because our church is a bit liberal, I have severally suggested that we choose a neutral church where we would all be attending together with our children but she has categorically stated that this would only happen â€Å"over her dead body†. This definitely explains why I am a stressed man.

How to Accept Death in The Stranger by Albert Camus

Accepting death is a situation that every person must deal with at least once in their life. The idea of how to accept death can be different for every person. No one deals with death in the same way. Many award winning novels like, The Stranger and Tuesdays With Morrie have a common theme of how to accept death and the changes that come along with it. Many Emily Dickinson poems also have a common theme of accepting death. All of these literary works have a common theme, but the theme is portrayed very differently. The characters in all 3 of these works are doing the same thing, accepting death, but each one of them accepts it in a very different way. Society seems to have a certain tradition on how one person should accept death. No one can tell a person how to accept death, and that is most evident in The Stranger. Not everyone feels grief when it comes to accepting death, and the main character, Meursault is a great example of that. The novel opens up with the line, â€Å"Mother died today. Or, maybe yesterday† (Camus). Meursault has a very nonchalant attitude about his mother’s death. This is not normal to society, but it seems to have been Meursaults personal way of dealing with death. He just did not want to think about it, and wanted to get back to his normal life routines. He just went on like nothing happened and was with Marie at the beach the next day. This is proof of how different the way people accept death can be. Those in the novel, who did not know Meursault,Show MoreRelatedAlberts Aimless Absurdity898 Words   |  4 PagesIn Albert Camus’ novella, The Stranger, he exposes his beliefs on absurdism through the narration of Meursault. Camus’ definition of absurdism is a philosophy based on the belief that the universe is illogical and meaningless. 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