The Lettermen

Blake was a leading figure in the British Pop Art movement of the 1950s and '60s. Pop Art brought humour to painting. Defying convention, no subject was too banal to be painted - the more familiar the better. Advertisements, cartoons, soup cans, washbasins, to name but a few, have all been immortalised by pop artists. The Lettermen shows a popular American group whose first hit song was Their Hearts Were Full of Spring. Blake copied the image from a promotional photograph on their record sleeve. He has distorted the original picture with bold, free brushstrokes, emphasising the physical qualities of the paint rather than imitating the blandness of the photograph. To add to the icon-like quality which Blake gives to the objects of popular culture in his work, he has painted the name of the group in lettering the size and style of billboard writing.