Roy Lichtenstein

“It started when I tried to photograph a print by Robert Rauschenberg that was under glass. But the light from a window reflected on the surface of the glass and prevented me from taking a good picture. But it gave me the idea … where the reflection would hide most of the work, but you could still make out what the subject was. … It portrays a painting under glass. It is framed and the glass is preventing you from seeing the painting.”
(Roy Lichtenstein, ‘A Review of My Work Since 1961’, in: G. Bader, Roy Lichtenstein, October Files, New York, 2009, p. 69.)

In 1988 Roy Lichtenstein began to work on a series of Reflection paintings, in which the central motif is obscured, as if seen through glass or reflected in a mirror. Lichtenstein revisited past subjects as well as other artists’ works for inspiration for the series. Work began in 1989 at Tyler Graphics Ltd. on the seven prints of the series which combine lithography, screenprint, and relief with collage and embossing.

In the Reflection series the motif is partially obscured by diagonal blocks of white filled with dots and diagonal dashes. The colour of the blue on white suggests a reflective sheen and the metallic PVC strip of collage in the center of the composition enhances the effect of light reflections.

'Mirrors are flat objects that have surfaces you can't easily see since they're always reflecting what's around them. There's no simple way to draw a mirror, so cartoonists invented dashed or diagonal lines to signify 'mirror'. Now, you see those lines and you know it means 'mirror' even though there are obviously no such lines in reality. If you put horizontal, instead of diagonal lines across the same object, it wouldn't say 'mirror'. It's a convention that we unconsciously accept’ (R. Lichtenstein quoted in: M. Kimmelman, ‘Roy Lichtenstein at the Met - Portraits, Talking with Artists at the Met, the Modern, The Louvre and elsewhere’, The New York Times, 31 March 1995, p. C1).

Lichtenstein's "Reflections" series differ from the artist's earlier works in that the series focuses on reflection and visual distortion of light rather than the comic book imagery. The series demonstrate Roy Lichtenstein's versatility as an artist and his ability to approach and explore different themes while still maintaining his unique and characteristic style.