Middle school art students at the Renaissance Charter School at Palms West have recently been learning about how commercial brands, logos and icons can be elevated to the level of fine art.
“Pop art” was an artistic movement that began in the mid-1950s with forerunners such as Andy Warhol, James Rosenquist and Roy Lichtenstein.
For decades prior to the movement, “high art” was identified as artwork that focused on more traditional themes such as classic history or religion.
The purpose of the pop art movement was to take commercial images and popular culture icons and elevate them to the category of “high art.” Pop artists would take recognizable brands and everyday objects and reproduce them in order to celebrate the art of popular culture and everyday life.
The students worked in groups to incorporate these artistic ideals into giant candy bar sculptures. Each student created an individual layout of a candy bar, drawing from observation and replicating the logos and labels onto a piece of paper. They then formed groups of four and used their layouts to create three-dimensional cardboard sculptures.
ABOVE: Students with their candy sculptures.
