Lithograph, screenprint and woodcut on paper
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<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/roy-lichtenstein-1508" aria-label="More by Roy Lichtenstein" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Roy Lichtenstein</a>
Reflections on Brushstrokes
Presented by Tyler Graphics Ltd in honour of Pat Gilmour, Tate Print Department 1974-7, 2004
abstraction
colour
emotions, concepts and ideas
fine arts and music
formal qualities
frame
gestural
humour
irregular forms
natural phenomena
non-representational
objects
paint, brushstroke
pun
reflection
texture
universal concepts
<p>This is one of a group of seven prints on the theme of reflections. Lichtenstein regularly paraphrases pre-existing images in his art, often reusing aspects of his own works, and <i>Reflections on Brushstrokes</i> refers back to his 1960s <i>Brushstroke</i> paintings. One such close-up of a schematised brushstroke forms the base image of the present print. It is partly obscured by semi-abstract blocks of colour and pattern, both printed and collaged to the surface of the print, to simulate reflected light, as if the image were behind glass or reflected in another surface.</p><p><em>Gallery label, June 2008</em></p>
paper print lithograph screenprint woodcut
13 July 2019 – 4 January 2020
2020-01-04
13 July 2019 – 7 September 2019
2019-09-07
2019-07-13
Grundy Art Gallery (Blackpool, UK)
28 September 2019 – 4 January 2020
2020-01-04
2019-09-28
Hatton Gallery (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK)
2019-07-13
ARTIST ROOMS 2019: Roy Lichtenstein
Loan-out
Reflections on Brushstrokes
image: 1287 × 1650 mm
Presented by Tyler Graphics Ltd in honour of Pat Gilmour, Tate Print Department 1974-7, 2004
<p>This <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/print" title="Glossary definition for 'Print'"><span>print</span></a> is from a group of seven Reflections prints which Lichtenstein completed at Tyler Graphics in 1989-90, another of which also appears in Tate’s collection (<i>Reflections on Hair</i> 1990, Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/lichtenstein-reflections-on-hair-p12127" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P12127</span></a>). The image is partly obscured by semi-<a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/abstract-art" title="Glossary definition for 'Abstract art'"><span>abstract</span></a> blocks of colour and pattern, both printed and <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/collage" title="Glossary definition for 'Collage'"><span>collaged</span></a> to the surface of the print, which simulate reflected light, as if the image shown is behind glass or reflected in another surface. This simulated reflection is a conceit Lichtenstein developed in a series of <i>Reflections</i> <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/painting" title="Glossary definition for 'Painting'"><span>paintings</span></a> he started in 1988, but has a precedent in earlier works.  Lichtenstein regularly paraphrases other pictures in his art, often reusing aspects of his own works, and <i>Reflections on Brushstrokes</i> is a typical example. 
<br/>
<br/>Lichtenstein, a leading figure of American <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/pop-art" title="Glossary definition for 'Pop art'"><span>Pop art</span></a>, is best known for his 1960s paintings derived from comic strip panels, such as <i>Whaam!</i>  1963 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/lichtenstein-whaam-t00897" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T00897</span></a>). The style of painting he developed highlighted the industrial printing methods used in the production of his source material. By reproducing the Benday dots of commercial printers, while harnessing them to decorative effect, Lichtenstein created works that had the appearance of having been mechanical produced.
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<br/>Throughout his career, Lichtenstein continued to base his imagery on materials sourced from popular culture and the mass media. There is an element of humour, then, in Lichtenstein reusing his own motifs as Pop artists might quote found imagery, along with the recognition that his own works had become part of this collective mass of visual culture. Each work in the <i>Reflections</i> series refers directly to one aspect of Lichtenstein’s <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/i/iconography" title="Glossary definition for 'Iconography'"><span>iconic</span></a> Pop and comic images: the blonde girl, the war comic, the brushstroke, as well as to the gilt frames of his <i>Emblatures</i> series of the mid 1970s or his <i>Reflections</i> series of images of mirrors. 
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<br/>This particular image also refers to Lichtenstein’s brushstroke paintings which he began in the 1960s, and returned to again and again in his work (see <i>Brushstroke</i> 1965, Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/lichtenstein-brushstroke-p07354" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07354</span></a>, for example). The brushstroke, as rendered by Lichtenstein, is a motif, a <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/caricature" title="Glossary definition for 'Caricature'"><span>caricature</span></a> of the grandiose <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/g/gestural" title="Glossary definition for 'Gestural'"><span>gestural</span></a> mark and its inherent meaning in an art historical context. With his stylised brushstrokes, Lichtenstein at once parodies the gravitas of the gesture in <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/abstract-expressionism" title="Glossary definition for 'Abstract Expressionism'"></a><a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/abstract-art" title="Glossary definition for 'Abstract art'"><span>Abstract</span></a> Expressionism and the spontaneity of action painting, and disconnects the work from the hand of the artist, from individual genius. By reducing all this to a series of coloured dots, something little more than decorative, Lichtenstein embodied all that Pop art stood for in one image. Adding his reflections to the image, Lichtenstein felt, further personified Pop’s self-referentiality. He viewed this combination of motifs as a culmination of all his ideas. “I like the idea of the brushstroke on (printed <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/canvas" title="Glossary definition for 'Canvas'"><span>canvas</span></a>), and then with reflections it is even better. That’s why I like <i>Reflections on Brushstrokes</i>. It shows all of the paint and it has the glass in front, and the canvas and brushstrokes, so it encompasses all that is art – more or less.” (quoted in Corlett, p.41)
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<br/>The production of the print run was technically complicated, combining a number of different printing processes, including <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/l/lithography" title="Glossary definition for 'Lithography'"><span>lithography</span></a>, <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/s/screenprint" title="Glossary definition for 'Screenprint'"><span>screen print</span></a>, and <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/r/relief" title="Glossary definition for 'Relief'"><span>relief</span></a> (<a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/woodcut" title="Glossary definition for 'Woodcut'"><span>woodcut</span></a>). Silver metallic plastic film was collaged on the surface of the print, and areas of the image are also <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/e/embossed" title="Glossary definition for 'Embossed'"><span>embossed</span></a>. The work was produced in an <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/e/edition" title="Glossary definition for 'Edition'"><span>edition</span></a> of 68 with 16 artist proofs. 
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<br/><b>Further reading:</b>
<br/><i>Print Matters: The Kenneth E. Tyler Gift</i>, Tate, 2004, reproduced p.59 in colour
<br/>Jane Kinsman, <i>The Art of Collaboration: The Big Americans</i>, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Australia, 2002, pp.26-47, reproduced p.40 in colour
<br/>Mary Lee Corlett, <i>The Prints of Roy Lichtenstein: A Catalogue Raisonné 1948-1993</i>, New York 1994, pp.40-41, 42, 121, 300, reproduced p.41, reproduced p.224 in colour
<br/>
<br/>Maria Bilske
<br/>December 2004</p>

Summary
2005-09-15T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT
<p>This is one of a group of seven prints on the theme of reflections. Lichtenstein regularly paraphrases pre-existing images in his art, often reusing aspects of his own works, and <i>Reflections on Brushstrokes</i> refers back to his 1960s <i>Brushstroke</i> paintings. One such close-up of a schematised brushstroke forms the base image of the present print. It is partly obscured by semi-abstract blocks of colour and pattern, both printed and collaged to the surface of the print, to simulate reflected light, as if the image were behind glass or reflected in another surface.</p>

Display caption
2008-06-02T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
abstraction colour emotions, concepts and ideas fine arts and music formal qualities frame gestural humour irregular forms natural phenomena non-representational objects paint, brushstroke pun reflection texture universal concepts