International Pop

Loyal fans of artists, celebrities and singers today do everything to show their support for the ones they idolize. As early as 1957, Richard Hamilton famously defined pop art as: ‘Popular, Transient, Expendable, Low-cost, Mass-produced, Young, Witty, Sexy, Gimmicky, Glamorous, Big Business.' You could apply many of those terms to work produced under the sign of contemporary art today, but not to the works in these two shows, with their dust, wood and old varnish.
In that arena, few stars can vie with the recent popularity of Bad Bunny, aka Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, a 25-year-old Puerto Rican singer and rapper who surprise-released his second album YHLQMDLG (or Yo Hago Lo Que Me Da La Gana, translation from Spanish: I do what I want) last weekend, announcing the album was coming just days before on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon.



The exhibit beguiles with a fresh combination of familiar, iconic pieces from American and British Pop artists — Andy Warhol's Sixteen Jackies”; Jasper John's Flag”; Roy Lichtenstein's Look Mickey”; International Pop Edward Ruscha's Felix” — with lesser known, sometimes completely unknown, work from artists working at the same time in Germany, France, Belgium, Iceland, Venezuela, Argentina, Japan, etc.

According to the catalog, the British artist Richard Hamilton coined the term in 1957, by which time his fellow countryman Eduardo Paolozzi had been making the kind of art it described — in this case collages of daily news clips, magazine advertisements and soft porn — for more than 10 years.
In the end, the Lewisville festival lost Wynne and his fellow organizers around $100,000; just a few months later, a death and general unpleasantness at the Rolling Stones' show at the Altamont raceway outside San Francisco (documented in the movie Gimme Shelter) put a dark cloud over huge festivals in general.

The main promoter, Angus Wynne — heir to the Six Flags amusement-park empire — and his partners, one of whom had produced that summer's Atlanta International Pop Festival, lost around $100,000 on the Texas festival, a 1985 Dallas Morning News article reported.
Held at the very same place where the legendary festival transpired, the 2017 celebration features performances by Jack Johnson, Phil Lesh & The Terrapin Family Band, Leon Bridges, Norah Jones, The Head and The Heart, Father John Misty, Regina Spektor, Gary Clark Jr., Jim James and many more.