Kunstmuseum Basel showcases unpublished prints by Roy Lichtenstein

Unpublished prints by Roy Lichtenstein at the Kunstmuseum in Basel Keystone-SDA

The Kunstmuseum Basel is staging an exhibition dedicated to the print work of the American pop art pioneer, Roy Lichtenstein. Numerous prints donated by the artist’s foundation are on display for the first time.

The exhibition “Sweet Dreams, Baby!” brings together around 50 works spanning all periods of the artist’s career, the Kunstmuseum Basel announced on Thursday. The museum is presenting a major donation from the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation to the public for the first time.

In 2023, to mark the centenary of the artist’s birth, the foundation distributed around 100 prints to three European institutions: the Albertina in Vienna, the British Museum in London and the Kunstmuseum Basel. The Basel museum received 33 works, making its print and drawing collection one of the most significant collections of Lichtenstein’s work outside the United States.

Among the works on display in Basel are the printed Paper Plates (1969), a reinterpretation of Vincent van Gogh’s The Sower (1985) and the monumental Wallpaper with Blue Floor Interior (1992). The exhibition is complemented by prints by Lichtenstein acquired as early as the 1960s, alongside a loan from a private collection.

A love of experimentation

Throughout his career, Roy Lichtenstein created over 350 silkscreen prints, etchings, lithographs and woodcuts or linoleum engravings, all characteristic of his colourful visual world. Known for his comic-strip aesthetic, he transposed the language of consumer goods, advertising brochures and shop windows into his work. Initially dismissed as trivial, his style quickly won over a wide audience, not least thanks to the reproducibility of printmaking.

Roy Lichtenstein’s interest in printmaking dates back to his student years, explains the Kunstmuseum Basel. The museum is exhibiting six examples from the late 1940s and early 1950s that bear witness to his early experiments with various techniques. His first posters and invitations for his exhibitions at the Leo Castelli Gallery in New York, printed cheaply and in large numbers, helped to raise his profile.

From the late 1960s onwards, the artist collaborated with renowned printing workshops and produced series and individual prints of great technical mastery. The work Portrait (1989), for example, required eighteen printing stages combining four different techniques: lithography, woodcut, screen printing and a wax-based process specially developed for the project.

The exhibition “Sweet Dreams, Baby!” is being held in the annexe of the Kunstmuseum Basel from August 22, 2026 to March 14, 2027.

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Translated from French, reviewed by an English Department journalist.