Collage for Interior with Painting of Bather 1997

Roy Lichtenstein made this wild interior scene with collage, sometime between the mid-late twentieth century. I can imagine Lichtenstein in his studio, meticulously cutting and pasting shapes, thinking through how to render volume and depth using only flat planes of color and pattern. He's got this cool bather artwork in the window, kind of like a Matisse, but then the rest of the interior is pure Lichtenstein. There's this star shape on the table, made of different colored triangles. I bet he was thinking about how the simple geometric shapes could create a sense of dimension, like a kind of optical illusion. His signature Ben-Day dots and stripes create a rhythm that's both soothing and jarring, a kind of visual pop. To me, this work fits into the whole modernist game of playing with representation and abstraction. We see Lichtenstein nodding to painters of the past, all while forging his own instantly recognizable style. I wonder who is work will later influence? It's an ongoing game!