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Live Ammo (Ha! Ha! Ha!)

Artist Roy Lichtenstein (American, 1923 - 1997)

CultureAmerican

Date1962

MediumOil on canvas

DimensionsOverall: 68 x 68 in. (172.7 x 172.7 cm)
Overall, Frame: 68 1/2 x 68 1/2 in. (174 x 174 cm)

InscribedSigned on reverse: rf Lichtenstein; '62; PANEL 5 of 5;

Portfolio5 of 5 panels (set of 2 diptychs linked by a single center panel)

Credit LineGift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.

Object number71.676

Collections

Modern and Contemporary

On View

Not on view

DescriptionThis is an oil on canvas painting. It has a background comprised of Ben Day Dots, in this case uniformly spaced red dots; on the left side of the painting a P-51 Mustang fighter airplane (WWII era) blasts upward. Coming from the flight deck of the fighter plane, a balloon reads "HA! HA! HA!". The underside of the fighter plane is blue; the split rudder on the vertical tail has horizontal red and white stripes.

Label TextRoy Lichtenstein American, 1923–1997 Live Ammo (Ha! Ha! Ha!), 1962 Oil on canvas I am anti-experimental, and anti-contemplative, anti-nuance, anti-getting-away-from-the-tyranny-of-the-rectangle, anti-movement-and-light, anti-mystery, anti-paint-quality, anti-Zen, and anti all of those brilliant ideas of preceding movements which everyone understands so thoroughly. –Roy Lichtenstein A World War II fighter plane blasts upwards in the sky, the pilot cackling from the cockpit. The highly charged, emotional subject matter is at odds with Roy Lichtenstein’s impersonal techniques—the flat colors, strong graphics, and Ben-Day dots he borrows from comic books. The result is an “action painting,” but one entirely at odds with the raw, improvisational “action paintings” found in the previous gallery. In addition to the ironic commentary he makes about Abstract Expressionism, Lichtenstein subtly critiques the escalating violence seen during the United State’s involvement in Vietnam. Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. 71.676 ProvenanceThe artist; possibly Leo Castelli Gallery, New York, N.Y.; Dwan Gallery, Los Angeles, Ca., 1963; Ben Birillo, New York, N.Y.; Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., New York, N.Y., 1966; Chrysler Art Museum of Provincetown, Mass., 1966; Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. to the Chrysler Museum of Art, 1971. Exhibition History"66th American Exhibition," Art Institute of Chicago, Ill., January 11 - February 10, 1963. (Cat. no. 44). "Six Painters and the Object," Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, N.Y., March 14 - June 12, 1963. "Roy Lichtenstein," Leo Castelli Gallery, New York, N.Y., September 28 - October 24, 1963. "Three Hundred Years of American Art in the Chrysler Museum," Chrysler Museum at Norfolk, Va., March 1 - July 4, 1976. (Exh. cat. p. 246). "Emergence and Progression: Six Contemporary American Artists," New Milwaukee Art Center, Wis., October 11 - December 2, 1979; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, Va., January 16 - March 2, 1980; J. B. Speed Museum, Louisville, Ky., April 1 - June 29, 1980; New Orleans Museum of Art, La., July 25 - September 14, 1980. "American Art in the 20th Century: Painting and Sculpture, 1913-1993," Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin, Germany, May 8 - July 25, 1993; Royal Academy of Arts, London, England, September 16 - December 12, 1993. "Off Limits! Rutgers University and the Avant Garde, 1957-1963," The Newark Museum, Newark, N.J., February 18 - May 16, 1999. Published ReferencesLawrence Alloway, _Lichtenstein_ (New York: Abbeville Press, 1983), 23-24. In this publication it was mentioned as part of a series (see remark below). Dennis R. Anderson, _Three Hundred Years of American Art in the Chrysler Museum_, exh. cat., Norfolk, Va., 1975, 246. _The Chrysler Museum: Selections from the Permanent Collection, Norfolk, Virginia_, (Norfolk: Chrysler Museum, 1982), 110. Christos M. Joachimides and Norman Rosenthal, eds., _American Art in the 20th Century: Painting and Sculpture, 1913-1992_, exh. cat., Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin, Germany, and Royal Academy of Arts, London, England, 1993, 177. Also published in German with the title: Amerikanische Kunst im 20. Jahrhundert: Malerei und Plastik, 1913-1993. Kent Minturn, "Reviews," _Archives of American Art Journal_ 44, nos. 1-2 (2004): 47-51. Martha N. Hagood and Jefferson C. Harrison, _American Art at the Chrysler Museum: Selected Paintings, Sculpture, and Drawings_ (Norfolk, Va.: Chrysler Museum of Art, 2005), 232-233, no. 141. ISBN: 0-940744-71-6 Cristina Picazo,_iDevoramos pinturas! Una visita al Museo de Arte Contemporáneo_ Barcelona: Art Blume, 2005, 27, 44. ISBN: 84-95939-44-4 Jeff Harrison, _Collecting with Vision: Treasures From the Chrysler Museum of Art_ (London: D. Giles Ltd., 2007), 80, fig. 93. ISBN: 978-0-940744-72-1 Daniel Horowitz. _Consuming Peasures: Intellectuals and Popular Culture in the Postwar World._ Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012. p. 220, figure 8. ISBN: 978-0-8122-4395-6