How are consumerist ideals represented through the pop art works of Richard Hamilton, Claes Oldenburg, and Andy Warhol?

However, even the majority of the resources Hamilton used within this collage symbolize a consumerist society and mass production, his collage also represents the growth of the society through growth of technology. The collage is showered with hidden references to technological advancements, such as the staircase is taken from the advertisement of for the new hoover model “Constellation”, which is taken from an issue of “Ladies Home Journal” in 1955, the tv set, a “Stromberg-Carlson” is also taken from an advert in 1955. Hamilton played on the irony of advertising within his work, and demonstrated how quickly technology was developing due to now available money being promptly invested into it.  Art historian Russell W. Belk claims that Hamilton placed these technological constructs within the collage to demonstrate how it was shown to be one of the central ideals of consumerist society, and married to the luxury of these new technological developments was the price-tag, meaning wealth and money was of equal importance. “Such a preoccupation with buying oneself things might well be considered a selfish indulgence. If you have the wealth, it is, but it is one that is generally condoned because it occurs within the socially constructive realm meaning one thing serious leisure.”

Artist Claes Oldenburg also demonstrates the notion of technology within his work, and in particular in “Giant 3-Way Plug Scale 2/3 1970”, [Fig. 2] The fact that he made it a three-plug alone shows that consumerist ideals were infatuated with riches and technology and very much dependent on electricity, implying that a single socket plug would not be enough to fuel and satisfy their needs. This piece in particular is very similar to Duchamp’s “The Foundation”1917 [Fig. 3] and can be somewhat classed as ‘ready-made’ Pop Art. This is because Oldenburg, much like Duchamp, has removed the function of the plug by altering its size and material.

Art historian Klaus Honnef claims that “Oldenburg reproduced mass-produced consumer products in papier-mâché and other absurd materials, rendering them useless for any meaningful purpose, or blew them up to such a monstrous scale and they exploded the familiar context and seemed to rock the foundations of civilization itself”, this shows that through the manipulation of the size and materials, the sculpture becomes a testimonial to consumerist ideals within a consumerist society. Honnef then continues, “His [Oldenburg] art was shot through with fine irony and a covert love of anarchy. Only in the commercial cinema of an Alfred Hitchcock does the insurrection of objects take on a similar frightening aspect.” This is particularly apparent in the frightening scale of the sculptor, yet it is the size enhances the objects significance. The sculptor is similar to that of Hamilton’s collage, as it encompasses consumerist ideals such as wealth and beauty. This is less obvious than Hamilton portrays; the wealth aspect of the plug comes from the materials it was constructed in, an exotic wood, more importantly, an expensive wood. The beauty of the object, again similar to Hamilton, comes from the skill of taking an object that is mass produced in thousands or in Hamilton’s case magazines, and turning into a bespoke, unique piece by removing its use, whether this is done from extraction, size, or different materials.

As stated before the main ideals of the consumerist society were that of mass production and utilization. Hamilton applied the idea of taking mass produced objects, and piecing them together to create a unique collage, thus making them into art. Oldenburg had the same ideals as Hamilton, just executed them in a different way, i.e. turning something manufactured in their millions into an entirely unique artistic commodity through the use of different materials and a scale of size that made the object useless.

These artists are a contrast to that of Andy Warhol, an artist coined by art historian Osterwold, as man that “turns something trite, revitalizing a revolutionary process in the history of Pop Art.” Warhol actually mass produced the art itself, with most of the art actually being commodities within society such as food products or celebrities. Yet, although artists Hamilton and Oldenburg created unique bespoke pieces, art historian Osterwold believes that, even though the art was mass produced, it was still equally as credited:

 “Within the context of art, the banal content of these pictures gives them a striking innovative quality. They are unfamiliar paintings; one feels they must be something new, although their subject is entirely commonplace.”

One of the main consumerist ideals Warhol focused on was that of the cult of the celebrity, which had become one of the key aspects of consumerist ideals evolving around him. The celebrity was the example of the commodity fetishism attached to clichéd images of stars and brand names within society.  He further showed these ideals through his work such as his series “Reigning Queens”1985 [Fig.4] in which Queen Elizabeth II’s face was mass produced, the irony being that it was already being mass produced in the form of stamps. It has been argued by some art historians that Warhol thought that as a society we devour the need for celebrities equally as all other commodities. Their argument being that society does not personally know the celebrity being depicted in mass images; despite musical record covers or film posters and that they are merely reproductions in people’s lives. As mentioned early, the “Reigning Queens” piece resembles of a stamp, an image that is seen throughout the country on a daily basis, further showing how society has no idea about the celebrity behind the image, or even that of a woman whose face is apparent in everyday life. However, other art historians such as Osterwold believe that Warhol intended his work to have a deeper meaning: “He shows the personal tragedies behind the masks of political and Hollywood stars such as Marilyn Monroe.”

 This is particularly relevant in his piece “Marilyn Diptychn” 1962 [Fig.5] in which he produced more than twenty silkscreen paintings of her in the four months after her death in 1962.  Therefore he wanted his pictures to exemplify the fact that tragedy, in as far as it is picked up by the sensation-hungry media and consumerist society, may make a person famous for ten minutes of their being, but that their individual fate is instantly forgotten again.  For this particular images anyway, Warhol wanted to portray how a “celebrities life was cheapened by a repetitive stream of banal Hollywood clichés.”

As mentioned before, the whole process of mass producing art gave the impression that it was less unique, and would be less valuable than other bespoke pieces as the artist appeared to be mass producing images for the purpose of money. However, this was not the case, and Warhol was able to break this unmentionable theory of producing art for money within in the art world. Although he was able to make money, this was only because by mass production of his work he had turned art itself into a commodity within a consumerist society, and had also exposed another consumerist ideal- a society’s fixation with affluence. Warhol himself, according to Honnef owned his own ‘art’ factory “established for the purpose, that the indefatigable Warhol oversaw a production of paintings on a division-of-labour, assembly line basis.”  This shows that Warhol literally was following the procedure of mass production to the tee.

Warhol mainly concentrated on his subjects being developed from the world of consumerism and shiny magazines, and art historian Honnef believes that he had one particular method of repetition that was to imitate consumerist ideals.  Repetition to Warhol was a reflection on society’s need for multiples in the wake of motorized reproduction. Within his works such as “Green Coca-Cola Bottles” 1962 [Fig. 6] he has literally printed the bottles as they would be viewed within a supermarket, and in his other work “Brillo Box” 1964 [Fig.7] he has again, literally produced three dimensional boxes to resemble that of an assembly line, clearly showing consumerist ideals.  However, historian Osterwold also brings another view to Warhol’s work, this time focusing on the “Green Coca-Cola Bottles” work. He demonstrates how Warhol wanted this piece in particular to show consumerist society that for commodities such as a glass of cola, everyone- class, gender, race aside, was connected, in that, cola was cola, and not matter how much money purchased for, society would ultimately be receiving exactly the same thing: “What’s great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest. You can be watching TV and see Coca-Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and just think, you can drink Coke, too. A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are the same and all the Cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it.”

To conclude, Pop Artists Hamilton and Oldenburg have used everyday massed produced objects to produce individual, unique pieces of art work. Through using mass commodities and removing their use, whether it is by removing pictures from magazine, or replicating the object with different materials and a different scale, they have portrayed consumerist ideals throughout their work. Andy Warhol has also successfully done this, but has used other methods such as the repetition of images, and mass producing the art itself, which fittingly represents a consumerist society and their fixations upon beauty, technology, celebrities and affluence within the modern age.

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Bibliography

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Belk, Russell W.. Collecting in a consumer society  . London: Routledge, 1995. Print.

Lovejoy, Margot. Postmodern currents:  art and artists in the age of electronic media. Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1989. Print.

Osterwold, Tilman. Pop Art  . Köln: B. Taschen, 1989. Print.

Robbins, David. The Independent Group:  postwar Britain and the aesthetics of plenty. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1990. Print.

Shiner, L. E.. The invention of art:  a cultural history. Chicago: University Of Chicago Press, 2001. Print.

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"Tate Collection | Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom." Tate: British and international modern and contemporary art. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Mar. 2011. <http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/ViewWork?workid=27116>.

"Warhol_Brillo Boxes." College of Arts and Sciences & Conservatory of Music - Oberlin College. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2011. <http://www.oberlin.edu/amam/Warhol_BrilloBoxes.htm>.

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