Sunrise: Separation Drawing for Red
1965
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
black felt-tip pen, collage, and graphite on paper
Dimensions
image: 45.7 x 60.8 cm (18 x 23 15/16 in.) sheet: 52.7 x 66.5 cm (20 3/4 x 26 3/16 in.)
Classification
Drawing
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Director's Discretionary Fund
Accession Number
1999.11.5
Art Historical Context
Roy Lichtenstein's *Sunrise: Separation Drawing Red* (1965) is a captivating preparatory work from the peak of the Pop Art movement when the artist was reimagining everyday imagery from comics and advertisements through a fine art lens. As a leading figure in Pop Art alongside Andy Warhol, Lichtenstein drew inspiration from mass media, employing bold outlines, Benday dots, and commercial printing techniques to blur the lines between high art and popular culture. This drawing served as a color separation study—likely for a related painting or print—isolating the red tones in a dramatic sunrise ...
About the Artist
Roy Lichtenstein
Roy Lichtenstein was born on October 27, 1923, in New York City to Milton Lichtenstein, a real estate broker, and Beatrice Werner Lichtenstein, a homemaker with musical training, in an upper-middle-class German-Jewish family. Growing up on the Upper West Side, he displayed early artistic talent, sketching jazz musicians and visiting museums like the Museum of Modern Art. In 1939, he studied painti...