The Louis Vuitton Foundation’s massive exhibition dedicated to Pop artist Tom Wesselmann comes at the perfect time. It’s a joyful explosion of colors, a manifestation of life energy and humor, as well as a statement on contemporary culture. The Louis Vuitton foundation is not only exploring Wesselmann’s work, which has not been shown so lavishly in quite some time - apart from a smaller show in 2023 at Nice’s Musée Matisse dedicated to its nudes - but it is also looking at Wesselmann’s predecessors and followers.
The Foundation’s show comes at the right moment. Over the past 3 decades, Wesselmann has been overshadowed by his Pop Art contemporaries - Warhol, of course, but also Claes Oldenburg, Roy Lichstenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, as well as a younger generation of artists like Jeff Koons, Ai Weiwei, Sylvie Fleury or Yayoi Kusama. It’s the perfect moment to rediscover this artist who forged his own way.
The exhibition is showing 150 works by Wesselmann, but also 70 works from 35 other artists. These artists help us understand the roots of the Pop Art movement and of Wesselmann’s own work, but they also show the echo pop art continues to have today.
Tom Wesselmann’s work, which spans half a century, is infused with the energy and optimism of post war America. That’s why he did not consider himself a “Pop artist”. Wesselmann noted that he used everyday objects for his work, but was not criticizing them as consumer objects. His work does not have the irony of Warhol’s work or Claes Oldenburg and his soft sculptures.“I dislike labels in general and ‘Pop’ in particular,” he explained, “especially because it overemphasizes the materials used.”
Pop Forever brings together the early collages, enormous still lives, the Great American Nudes as well as his Smokers series. It also shows us the artist’s drafts of his great works, smaller drawings and paintings taking us into the artist’s mind.
After school, Wesselmann started after school as a cartoon artist selling his work to cartoon magazines. His series Great American Nudes, started in 1961 after he had a dream about the colors of the American flag - red, white and blue - and he decided to use only these colors plus colors associated with patriotism - gold, for example. That series brought him the attention of the art world.
The Louis Vuitton Foundation’s show follows the evolution of Wesselmann’s work, from the first works to his drop outs and his shaped canvases. In his drop outs, the image of a woman’s body is left in the negative. With the shaped canvases, Wesselmann paints on canvases the edges of which follow those of the subjects and objects.
His Still Lives series incorporates objects of everyday life. But whereas still lives have traditionally been of modest size, his still lives are enormous, billboard size.
In his Standing Still Lives, we are confronted with monumental objects of daily life. Like an optical illusion, we seem to shrink in presence of these works - keys or a toothbrush become twice the size of a human being.
The Louis Vuitton Foundation also takes us to now and shows how Wesselmann has been an inspiration to a younger generation of artists like Mickalene Thomas, whose work is featured in the show. So Pop Forever spans a century, from Marcel Duchamp all the way to artists like Thomas or Tomokazu Matsuyama. Quite a trip it’s been!
~Jean-Sébastien Stehli
Pop Forever, Tom Wesselmann &... Fondation Louis Vuitton. fondationlouisvuitton.fr. Until Feb. 24, 2025.
