The Mermaid Roy Lichtenstein

1. TheMermaidRoy Lichtenstein Adriana Kane, DanielleCaruso, Scott Sherman, SanneWijnands, and Justin Bajan

2. Roy lichtensteinResearch/context Born: October 27, 1923 Period Of Art: Pop art Famous pieces: Drowning Pieces, Whaam, Oh, Jeff… I Love You Too… But…, Look Micky First work: Look Micky, 1961 Awards: national medal of the arts 1950 Education: Ohio State University customers: Gunter Sachs Died: september 29, 1997 Adriana Kane

3. TheMermaidLandscape/Interaction Roy Lichtenstein put a lot of focus into the location of the sculpture, The Mermaid. The Mermaid is actually a boat, with a mermaid painted on it. The fact that the sculpture is on an island build in the pond makes a lot of sense, since mermaids are half fish, half human, somewhere in between land and sea creatures. The fact that you cannot see, but not reach, the boat may be related to the idea that mermaids have been part of history throughout many different cultures over many different time periods, but have never been a tangible creature that humans could see and understand. They have always been shown as secretive, quiet creatures, living out of sight of humans. Danielle Caruso and SanneWijnands

4. TheMermaidLandscape/Interaction Another part of the mermaid’s placement is that the boat is shown facing upwards. A reason for this could be that Lichtenstein wanted to represent the mermaid trying to jump out of the water, rather than just sit above it or in it. This may be because unlike the typical darkly colored, quiet mermaid, this one is brightly colored and louder. It is a more modern, pop art version of the mermaid. Danielle Caruso and SanneWijnands

5. TheMermaidRevealingDetails In this work of art, Roy Lichtenstein depicts a mermaid painted on a boat, but the mermaid is not represented how one normally would be. They have been part of myths and legends since ancient civilization, and have almost always been shown as beautiful women with a woman’s body with long brown hair, and then below the waist, the tail of a fish, with dark green or dark blue scales. Lichtenstein, however, paints this mermaid with bright, outstanding colors; the mermaid has long, bright blonde hair, a light fish’s body instead of a murky, dark color, and even bright red lipstick. Also, the woman is only human from the neck up. Scott Sherman

6. TheMermaidRevealingDetails Based on this painting, along with Lichtenstein’s other paintings, I believe he makes comic-like art out of more serious subjects in order to be ironic. Some evidence of that is a quote in which he says, "When I have used cartoon images, I've used them ironically, to raise the question: Why would anyone want to do this with modern painting?” Much of his artwork shows scenes of women upset, or of dramatic scenes, depicted as comics, such as “Hopeless” (1963), shown to the right. This shows that he likes the irony of putting things that are not pop art, into pop art. One other thing Lichtenstein does is depict the women he draws all the same, with blonde hair, red lips, and blue eyes. Scott Sherman

7. The Mermaid 2nd Interesting Detail An interesting detail of “The Mermaid” is the way it is propped up. It is held by two plain metal posts, one near the back, and one near the front. Lichtenstein could have found a way to let the boat sit on the island, even cementing it to the bottom, so that the boat looked like it was just balanced there. Instead, however, the artist decided to not only keep it out of the water by putting an island in the pond, but also to keep it off the island, by putting supports. His reason for this could, like the previous slides mentioned, be because mermaids are supposed to be very mythical creatures, and simply do not belong anywhere. Scott Sherman