Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre to present first-ever museum exhibition of American Pop Art in India

The Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre is all set to present a groundbreaking exhibit of seminal American Pop Art pieces from the 1960s onwards.

Curated by Lawrence Van Hagen, the show – which has been named POP: FAME, LOVE AND POWER – will be the first-ever museum exhibition of American Pop Art in India.

POP: FAME, LOVE AND POWER is expected to take audiences on an art-filled historical journey through the golden years of the Pop Art phenomenon, tracing three themes intrinsically tied to the origins of the movement: Fame, Love and Power.

The exhibition will present works by twelve of the biggest names in American Pop Art, including Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, and Robert Rauschenberg to name a few. The exhibition will open at the Art House – the Cultural Centre’s dedicated visual art space – on December 1, 2023.

“This vivid, colorful, and imaginative exhibit fulfills the Cultural Centre’s promise of bringing the best of international art experiences to India. The showcase is special not only because it traces the incredible legacy of Pop Art, but because it has an unmistakable sense of fun about it. I’m especially excited to see it strike a chord with younger audiences and foster a culture of creativity with inspirations that go beyond time and space,” Isha Ambani said in a statement.
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Pop Art was a genre that flourished in America during the late 1950s, responding to rapid transformations of media and commercialism, the increasing rise in popular culture and ever-shifting consumer habits. The Pop Art movement aimed to blur the boundaries between “high” art and “low” culture.

The concept that there is no hierarchy of culture, and that art may borrow from any source was one of the most influential characteristics of the movement, and led artists like Andy Warhol and Roy Lichenstein to transform canned goods and comic books into powerful works of art. Since its inception, Pop Art has gone on to become one of the most recognisable and influential styles of modern art around the world.

POP: FAME, LOVE ANF POWER is a landmark exhibition for South Asia as a whole, with artworks drawn from the most notable museums, artist estates, art foundations and private art collections globally. The majority of these artists have never been exhibited in India prior to this exhibition, which creates a singular opportunity for Indian audiences to engage intimately with these artists and artworks for the very first time.

For this exhibition, the themes of Fame, Love and Power will span across the three floors of the Art House, offering visitors three unique spaces for discovery, with each floor dedicated to an individual theme. The fourth and last floor of the Art House will be dedicated to a unique immersive installation titled ‘Silver Clouds’ after Andy Warhol. Visitors of this exhibition will be immersed in one of Warhol’s only interactive art installation.

“The Pop movement arose out of a time in America of unprecedented change, both economically and culturally,” says curator Lawrence Van Hagen. “In many ways, India is going through a similar transformation into a global, powerhouse economy in its own right. I believe this exhibition will spark fascinating parallels between these ‘golden decades’ in the US and the global transformation India is having at this very moment.”

The first floor of Pop, dedicated to Fame where visitors will gather some of the most quintessential pieces of the Pop movement works which reflected the meteoric rise of celebrity culture in the 1960s and 1970s of America, as well as the cult of television, and the romance and myth of Americana.

Viewers will encounter four celebrity portals (Giorgio Armani, Aretha Franklin, Gianni Versace and Sylvester Stallone) of ‘Andy Warhol’ in dialogue with the artists own self- portrait as well as ‘45 Gold Marilyn’ an iconic silkscreen painting of Marilyn Monroe. Furthermore, this floor will also include several works by Ed Ruscha such as ‘Level as a Level’ (2002) from the Mountain series very much inspired by the artist’s obsession with Hollywood.

The second floor is dedicated to Love. The room will bring together five pioneers of the Pop movement who explored, questioned and rendered the theme of love— from Robert Indiana’s explorations of romance and passion to Keith Haring’s powerful statements on unity and human connection. This floor will showcase numerous iconic works by these artists –from a 6 feet Love Sculpture in direct juxtaposition to two intimate works by Tom Wesselmann from his bedroom series as well as ‘potrait of a women’ (1979) by Roy Lichtenstein. This floor explores the sense of love, unity, friendship, collaboration and idealization of beauty that artists capture within their subject matter.

The third floor explores the theme of Power. From Andy Warhol and Ed Ruscha’s obsession with branding and advertising to Robert Rauschenberg’s fascination with television and the rapidly changing media landscape, this floor will analyze Pop art’s relationship to the themes of power that pervaded the political, cultural and commercial landscapes of the mid-late 20th century.

On this floor, two masterpieces by Andy Warhol – Sixteen Jackies (1964) and Flowers (1964-65) – explore notions of power, symbolism and loss relating to Jackie Kennedy and John F. Kennedy. Also on the floor, Elaine Sturtevant’s pivotal Flower series challenge the power dynamics of appropriation and the act of imitation. Furthermore, viewers will discover two works by Robert Rauschenberg: Periwinkle Shaft (1979), a monumental and rarely shown nine meter collage painting alongside Gulch (1962), an early and important example of his combines.

The exhibition culminates on the fourth floor with an interactive and immersive experience titled Silver Cloud by Andy Warhol, created in 1966. This installation consists of a room full of floating metallic balloons. The balloons are inflated with a proprietary mixture of air and pure helium, enabling them to float mesmerizingly in the space between the floor and the ceiling.