ROY LICHTENSTEIN CRYING GIRL

In the 1960s, ROY LICHTENSTEIN created "fantasy drama" artworks of women in love affairs with domineering men. Artworks like CRYING GIRL portray innocent "girls next door" in a variety of tenuous emotional states.

PABLO PICASSO'S depictions of weeping women may have been a influence on thses works. Lichtenstein said “Picasso's always been such a huge influence that I thought when I started the cartoon paintings that I was getting away from Picasso, and even my cartoons of Picasso were done almost to rid myself of his influence.”

In 1964, Françoise Gilot published Life with Picasso, a forthright memoir of her 10-year relationship. Roy Lichtenstein turned to his then-girlfriend, Letty Eisenhauer, and said: “I worry about the day that you do a Gilot to my Picasso.” But, it wasn't until after his death and when she finally spoke about their brief relationship. She didn’t reveal him to be an egotistical painter, rather she gave more insight into his secret inner world and painful personal life. "Take his series of crying girls. I think Roy was always very angry with Isabel. So occasionally, in his paintings, I think that he revealed something of himself," she said.

Isabel Wilson was Roy Lichtenstein’s first wife. According to the couple, his new teaching position at the State University of New York at Oswego in 1958 was the beginning of the decline of their relationship. The brutal upstate winters took a toll on Roy Lichtenstein and his wife, and they divorced in 1965.

Did his failing relationship inspire the “fantasy drama” artworks? Roy Lichtenstein kept much of his personal life private, but this quote by Roy Lichtenstein could bring some light on the situation; “Personally, I feel that in my own work I wanted to look programmed or impersonal but I don't really believe I am being impersonal when I do it. And I don't think you could do this.”

CRYING GIRL (1963) by Roy Lichtenstein is an original offset lithograph and is referenced in Corlett II.1. Crying Girl is hand signed in pencil and none were numbered. For more information about Roy Lichtenstien or Crying Girl please contact the gallery. Call for Value