The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao presents a focused exhibition that demonstrates the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation’s deep engagement with the Pop Art movement. With some 40 key works by the most significant Pop artists, the show also features a selection of contemporary pieces that explore the legacies of the movement.
The Guggenheim’s engagement with Pop art began early in Pop’s development. In particular, the 1963 exhibition Six Painters and the Object — curated by Lawrence Alloway, who had helped coin the term “Pop” in the late 1950s — provided institutional validation at a critical juncture. The Guggenheim Museum proceeded over the following decades to organize a series of important monographic surveys dedicated to the pioneers of Pop art including Jim Dine, Roy Lichtenstein, Claes Oldenburg, Robert Rauschenberg, and James Rosenquist, while simultaneously building a collection of iconic examples of the movement.
In addition to historic works, the exhibition will include a selection of works by contemporary artists who explore the legacies of the movement, engaging with the forms and languages of Pop art to critique and politicize themes, particularly the language of consumerism.
