Brought to you by Marie Selby Botanical Gardens
Now through June 27, Selby Gardens’ Downtown Sarasota campus is showcasing Pop Art icon Roy Lichtenstein’s take on Monet’s garden.
Roy Lichtenstein made his name by applying his Pop Art interpretation to cultural icons like Mickey Mouse and images from American advertising. Yet, he was also fascinated by landscapes and the popular art form of Impressionism. Starting in the 1960s, he paid homage to — and radically reimagined — Monet’s Impressionist works.
Roy Lichtenstein: Monet’s Garden Goes Pop! showcases the legendary Pop artist’s take on several staples of the public imagination: Claude Monet’s paintings of his garden and surroundings at Giverny. The display of these large-scale, rarely seen artworks will be accompanied by a complete transformation of the Downtown Sarasota campus’s 15 acres into Monet’s garden at Giverny as imagined through the aesthetic of Lichtenstein.
“It is like stepping into Lichtenstein’s world – if he had created a world based on Monet,” says Jennifer Rominiecki, president and CEO of Selby Gardens. “Our horticultural team took the principles that Lichtenstein applied to his artwork and applied them to our interpretation of Monet’s garden at Giverny. This innovative, immersive interpretation has never been done before.”
Familiar components of Monet’s garden at Giverny appear at Selby Gardens – but with a new spin. The iconic Japanese Bridge spans Selby Gardens’ koi pond but looks as if Lichtenstein painted it. A mix of 2D and 3D elements playfully reimagine Monet’s home or his much-painted water lilies. These surprising intersections between Impressionism and Pop Art engage visitors as they move through the gardens en route to the Museum of Botany & the Arts.
Within the Museum, viewers admire Lichtenstein’s Water Lilies with Reflections series, a limited edition of large-screen prints created in the latter years of his career that reinterprets the extreme painterly sensibilities of Monet’s famous Water Lilies. Printed on metal, Lichtenstein’s Water Lilies series uses flat areas of color, Ben-Day dots, and the reflective qualities of the material to imply motion and the movement of light. Earlier works from Lichtenstein’s Haystack series and archival photographs of Lichtenstein at work and at home are also on view.
Admission to Roy Lichtenstein: Monet’s Garden Goes Pop! is included with all-access admission to Selby Gardens’ Downtown Sarasota campus: $25 adults, $15 children 4-17, and free for members.
