We’ve been bursting with excitement to share a bit of postal news with you: one of the sculptures in our collection is on a stamp!
The US Postal Service recently featured Standing Explosion (Red) in one of five stamps commemorating Roy Lichtenstein’s colorful Pop art. This celebrates what would’ve been the artist’s 100th birthday.
At the announcement ceremony, the stamp’s dedicating official, Thomas Marshall, explained that “the Postal Service uses its stamp program to raise awareness and celebrate the people who represent the very best of our nation. Roy Lichtenstein certainly deserves this recognition because of the remarkable creativity and innovation he demonstrated throughout his career.”
Dorothy Lichtenstein, the artist’s widow and president of the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation, was also in attendance. She said, “I think it’s an honor, and more people will find out about Roy. I think he would have really loved it.”
The stamps feature the 1965 sculpture Standing Explosion (Red) from the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas; the 1966 canvas Modern Painting I from the Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation in Los Angeles; the 1972 painting Still Life With Crystal Bowl from the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York; and two paintings from private collections, Still Life With Goldfish (1972) and Portrait of a Woman (1979). USPS.
Lichtenstein was a leading force in the Pop art movement, which drew on popular culture for inspiration. From the late 1950s through the 1960s, this movement flourished in the United States and Britain, sourcing its aesthetic from advertisements, Hollywood movies, and comic books.
Standing Explosion (Red) is an early example of Lichtenstein’s sculptural work and resembles explosions in comics. The work uses bold primary colors, heavy outlines, and perforated sheets of steel, which mimic the look of Ben-Day dots—a technique used to print comic illustrations.
The sculpture will be on view soon in our Contemporary galleries. See the work at the museum, and then get your stamp from USPS to mail a little piece of Crystal Bridges to friends and family!
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