THE FALSE RATIONALE OF "FOUND ART"

 Here's another one of my comments I'm preserving from a forum-post in case I'm moved to build on it later.                                                     

(1) I haven't read too much on the evolution and justifications of pop art. By sheer chance the other day, I happened to listen to a podcast arguing for a connection between the dadaism of the 1920s and the pop art of the fifties and sixties, in which the expert used Duchamp as an example of the former and Warhol as an example of the latter. I did seem to remember something about the use of "found art" in dada, and a quick search came up with an interesting quote from the first guy: 'In a few words, Marcel Duchamp aptly summarizes the work of this movement: “…an ordinary object could be elevated to the dignity of a work of art by the mere choice of the artist”.' So absent any further info, I'm going to guess that's a fair representation of the rationale of guys like Lichtenstein too. (2) I'm not personally wild about the rationale of "found art," but like anything else there could be good and bad examples thereof. I do not consider any popular art in any medium to qualify as "found art," however, for reasons I won't enlarge upon for now. (3) I don't consider the quality of any popular artworks defined by whether or not they are owned by a corporation. If Tony Abruzzo did an impressive illustration for DC's SECRET HEARTS romance comic, then it's an impressive illustration, regardless of whether Lichtenstein changed the image for his swipe or what his rationale for using the art may be. (4) I will agree that artists like Russ Heath have little justification to be torqued at seeing their art-panels excerpted in this manner. While there may be particular examples these days of comic book original art that may fetch high prices, there's also a lot of low-level art that would never reach that level in the comics market, much less be prized in the context of gallery art. The original art of guys like Heath and Abruzzo, done for formula comics, isn't "found art" in my opinion, but it's also not that impressive compared to the heights of better art done by other comics-artists. The context that Lichtenstein and others place on popular art in the new context of "pop art" is part of the concept that makes the gallery art exceptionally valuable, whether I personally validate that rationale or not. Anyway, good debate on the subject of swipes in this context.