INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM
ON THE RECEPTION OF
POP ART IN BELGIUM
(1960-1970)
1-2 DECEMBER 2011
ROYAL MUSEUMS OF
FINE ARTS OF BELGIUM
Allen Jones Interviewed by Marco Livingstone
- Allen Jones & Marco Livingstone
Around 1960, British Pop Art Allen Jones was part of a group of young, mainly British artists studying at the Royal College of Art in the heart of London. Together with fellow artists of an older generation, they radically changed the face of British art in the 1960s, introducing a new and unconventional form of art based upon popular culture and consumerism. Jones particularly had a preference for glamour and style, and his subject matter focused on beautiful women visualized erotically and stereotypically as they were depicted in glossy magazines, advertisements and fetishist illustrations. In this interview, Pop Art specialist and independent curator Marco Livingstone will explore the heyday of British Pop Art with Jones, one of the movement's leading figures, and question him both about his personal journey and his perception of shared ideas and concerns at that time. What led him to start making Pop Art, and how was his work received? Who did he value and who influenced him personally? Was his young generation of artists looking abroad for inspiration, or within their own culture? What was their attitude to the ascendancy of the American art, and did they feel a connection with artists working in Continental Europe? During the interview, Livingstone will ask Jones to try to untangle the intercontinental connections between Britain, Continental Europe and the USA from the perspective of someone who was artistically intertwined with the birth of a new form of art. Afterwards, other lecturers will join in a discussion on the Zeitgeist of the 1960s.
