32. You Can’t Beat the Real Thing 1972

Editor: This is "32. You Can’t Beat the Real Thing" by Sir Eduardo Paolozzi. It appears to be a collage using magazine covers. I'm immediately struck by the juxtaposition of the glamorous figure with...a tire? What do you make of this combination? Curator: Ah, yes! Paolozzi loved to play with those sorts of unexpected pairings. He's riffing on the explosion of consumer culture and the mass media images that saturated postwar Britain. It’s almost like he's asking, "Is this pin-up really any different than this tire?" Editor: That's a wild thought! So, he's commenting on the interchangeability of objects and desires? Curator: Precisely! He saw the world turning into a giant supermarket, and he wanted to show us the absurdity of it all, with a wink and a smile. A real original, that Paolozzi! Editor: I never thought of it that way before. I'll definitely look at pop art differently now!