ZHONG CHENG

Renowned pop artist, Tom Wesselmann was born in 1931 in the suburbs of Cincinnati. Up until 24 years old, his art education was merely his weekly art classes in grade eight and nine. After serving in the war, he returned to University of Cincinnati to study psychology and Academy of Cincinnati for arts. At the same time he began contributing cartoons to comic in magazines. Mid-1960, Tom Wesselmann’s works became a profound figure and representation of pop art and culture. He was known for his stylized collages of large images and lively shapes. He would re-illustrate images of nude women from advertising prints onto his canvas and create a “combined art” with the correspondence to room decors and furniture. The “Great American Nude” first brought to the attention of the world. As he painted, he enlarged the scales of certain human body parts and searched for meanings and representations through their language and lines. The more spontaneous and flat the forms, the more abstract they become. Using human body parts as topics, he had incorporated images with intricate patterns and everyday objects that inspired him. In terms, he was able to express creatively within his composition through his skills and means of work. Tom Wesselmann not only investigated the surface of real world but the rationality within.