Similarly, Warhol was also famous for his exploitation of popular images like advertising objects and portraits of Hollywood icons for his work. He was known for using iconic images like the American Flag, Targets, maps, numbers and letters as his artwork which clearly showed his cross with Abstract Expressionism, where paintings had no recognizable content at all. Rather the American Flag becomes one of his signature emblems. This was not the first time that Johns painted the American Flag. It was a rather quick process and required rapid brush strokes and allowed Johns to create layers of textures in the piece highlighting the contrasts between the depicted image of the flag.

He used the technique of known as encaustic painting, which involves mixing of colorful pigments with warm wax, to paint the American Flag on respective canvases. The painting has a sculpture like quality as it is five inches deep and seems to enter the space of the viewer. Let us first talk about the ‘Three Flags (1958)’ by Johns, here three canvases are superimposed on one another in what appears to be reverse perspective, projecting toward the viewer. In particular I will be juxtaposing the ‘Three Flags (1958)’ by Johns and the ‘32 Campbell’s Soup Cans (1962)’ by Warhol to further investigate the similarities and contracts. So when I visited the Whitney Museum of American Art for this assignment, I was intrigued by the similarities and contrasts between the Neo-Dadaism and Pop Art and decided to explore this further through the comparison of a work of a Neo-Dada artist, Jasper John, and a work of a Pop Art artist, Andy Warhol.

Thus, in the late 1950s, there was a major shift art world Neo-Dada and Pop Art came into existence as almost a reaction against the seriousness of Abstract Expressionism.

While viewers might hope to connect with the vibe of the Abstract Expressionist work, they could never fully understand the work’s meaning since it originated int the inner sanctum of the artist’s primal mind. This style was inherently personal, having been derived from the subconscious of the artist who made it. For most of the 1940s, Abstract Expressionism had been at the forefront of the American Art scene.

Three flags jasper johns