Pop Art’s Influence On Consumer Culture, Society And Contemporary Design Practice From The 1960’s to Present Day

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In this essay I will be discussing Pop art’s influence on consumer culture, society at the time and on contemporary design practice from the 1960’s to present day. Throughout history design has often been misinterpreted as merely aesthetics however design has had a significant role within political, cultural, social and economic movements over the decades. As explained by Press & Cooper, Design is not just some construction of industrially manufactured objects, but also a sphere of consumption and impact on the life of society.

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In saying this, designers are on the forefront of radical change, they serve people to make their lives easier, better and more colorful, while good design highlights pleasing aesthetics, its purpose does not lie solely to pleasing the eye. For example, Pankina explains how designers impose a special ethical responsibility as they are at the center of design, production, distribution and consumption processes.

Designers have the power to influence public opinion, Design acts in this case as ‘a specific project mechanism functioning in the socio-economic system’, as it provides an opportunity to manipulate the public consciousness.

In a sense this is what graphic designers do, depending on where their moral conscious lies, they create content to fuel consumerism and mass production of commodified goods sometimes without intentionally doing so. This has remained the same throughout design history however, how the consumers react to this has changed as has to what extent they understand the impacts design has on economic and social processes. Consumption is a social, cultural, and economic process of choosing goods, and this process reflects the interests of modern society this can be exemplified at different rates throughout design history.

Post World War II, saw a shift a in consumer culture, suddenly people didn't have political unrest to worry about, domestic life was glamorised and the influence of television fuelled a materialistic perspective by having consumers wanting to achieve that perfect standard of status by purchasing products. One of the most influential driving purposes for this shift being private affluence, people began craving social status, the ‘American Dream’ was something to strive towards, people wanted their own homes with appliances such as washing machines, ovens, cars and televisions. This shift in societies’ outlook meant designers had moral responsibility for creating good design in which would serve to make people’s lives easier.

All these social and economic changes were bound to have an effect on taste and preference within early 1950’s society, the goods you sought were a reliable indicator of a person’s social class. Upper class sought antiques and heirlooms that asserted their social class whereas the middle class opted for repro-antique commodified ‘kitsch’ goods. These Kitsch goods were a representation of consumerism at the time as people began purchasing obsolete items as opposed to collecting antiques as they would have done a decade ago.

As stated by McCracken, consumers perceive the world in terms of cultural categories of meaning, it is the culture in which individuals are engaged that creates the meaning of everyday products and constitutes the way in which meanings move through society to consumers. Furthermore meaning consumer behavior is not only shaped and influenced by designers but the consumers themselves within society decide what is going to be popular and worth consuming, hence trends and fads are created. So whilst yes, designers do create the trends and objects worth consuming, however it is the consumers who create those cultural categories for society to adhere to. For example McCracken explains, ’Cultural meaning flows continually between its several locations in the social world, aided by the efforts of designers, producers, advertisers, and consumers’. Furthermore emphasizing how designers of the pop art movement helped to shape change cultural connotations attached with not only what was considered popular design but also the influence of consumerism at the time.

Hoggart mourned the loss of what he considered to be the good values and balanced life style of the working class, which disappeared since the growth of mass media magazines, cinema and worst of all television. The blame is so easily given to designers as they are on the forefront of enforcing, sometimes without meaning to, social, political and economic reforms. As explained by Pankina, design has always solved problems, which is true, however sometimes with obsolete designs once the problem has been temporarily solved, there becomes the issue of disposal and that product often lives on longer than the designers intention, therefore becoming a crisis of human and nature relations. Although half a century ago consumers lacked the environmental knowledge we know now, furthermore meaning people made less conscious decisions when purchasing obsolete items.

Because of this shift in consumer demand for mass produced items, designers’ motifs also shifted, from concern of utilitarian needs to an emphasis on an objects emotional, psychological and social role. From this shift around the 1960’s arose Pop Art culture which took on the modernist approach to seek out and differentiate individuals and groups. The movement belongs to Post World War II consumerist society, it appealed to the youth as it was trendy, humorous, full of sex appeal, impactful and relevant. Pop art was successful yet controversial as a design movement, as it stood to reject both the supremacy and pretensions of the “high art”. Thus pop art became a cultural event making it popular with young people seeing as it reflected social and political situations at the time.

In the process of design, product and its advertising takes on a symbolic value that controls the perception of the consumer. Design occupies a certain place in the system of culture, production and consumption. As designers we do not help the consumption rate of obsolete items by creating advertisements to fuel consumer growth. However this demand would still exist even without excessive advertisements as society manages to attach meaning to certain cultural products in which we characterize the world to find our own place within society. Pop art just so happened to open people’s eyes to consumerism, it did so by mimicking and highlighting the familiarity mass produced items such as the Campbells soup tins.

Along with a sense of Post-World War II optimism, consumerism co-existed with pop art as during this time many families were worried even more about “Keeping up with the Jones’” which essentially meant attaining the American dream influenced style of life. Increased advertisements were being seen through sources such as radios, televisions, magazines, and newspapers. As the consumption of mass produced items was on the rise, the movement of Pop art was there to highlight and remind society of their consumption habits and as an expression for artists to express the individual ideas of mass consumerism.

All creative outputs from the movement had a commonality of an interest in mass-media, mass production and mass culture. Hence how Pop art was closely linked to consumerism it highlighted the sheer power and influence of the mass media for example, Andy Warhol was one of the driving forces behind pop art, he was famous for his Marilyn Monroe screen prints and detailed prints of everyday consumer items.

Warhol is credited for subtly recreating, stylistically the number of advertisements that had become so predominant throughout the 1960’s. Warhol depicted a new type of art that highlighted and also criticized the consumption habits of consumers at the time. For example, the use of popular imagery can be seen as an attack on the pretentiousness of fine art and a celebration of mass media and design. However with some of Warhols work, Pop Art can appear more critical of popular culture itself, revealing themes of consumerism, greed, vanity and the sense of immediate gratification all of these traits can be seen at a greater extent within today’s society and contemporary design. Pop Art’s popularity lay also within its rights to be accessible and relevant to everyone, unlike high end art at the time. This was a movement that takes similar form to the work of Picasso which he had done something similar forty years previously when he created 'real world' images onto his still life works therefore emphasizing the idea again of humans creating cultural meaning.

Pop art not only influenced the field of design it also influenced music, film and fashion at the time as pop art looked at popular culture London’s Carnaby street was a focal point for the movement throughout the ‘swinging sixties’. The street ranged from pop art typography within shop signs, to Mary Quants’ influential rah-rah and disco boots being worn by every second woman. The street also possessed graphic colorful shapes on the sidewalk thus representing the playfulness of the movement itself distancing itself from prior more sophisticated design movements. Stylistically the movement is still influential in design today as its traits were distinct and easily identifiable if it appears within design today.

The movement was so controversial given its revolutionary social uprising, for example pop arts colorful art works mimicked the effects of LSD, made people more aware of consumerism and rejected fine art. This revolution meant the Establishment and older generation were outraged, therefore it’s understandable how Britain’s younger generation were so entranced by pop art as it was the cool new trend. Meaning is generated by social norms, the more people who conform to it the more that begin to follow, furthermore emphasizing the sheer popularity and influential effects of the pop art movement throughout the 1960’s.

Although pop art was a movement that occurred throughout the 1960’s and gradually faded out of fashion, Pop arts influences still remain within design today. For example, by satirizing cultural behaviors it captures and preserves the past in a way that fine art didn't, pop art is so distinguishing it demonstrates a movement that was so diverse and popular within society. It continues to represent a lack of conformity, something that could be a useful within today’s consumerist society. In terms of today’s influence pop art has taught designers not to be so serious with their work, design can be an extremely powerful tool, yet also a fun and interactive way to make light heart of what’s going on within society at any given time.

Its distinguishing colors, everyday subject matter, dots and strong lines still feature in design today. The style is extremely distinguishable when seen within design today because of the sheer uniqueness of its characteristics, thus emphasizing how influential the movement was and still is today. The meaning behind pop art, which is social commentary and accessibility, remain intact in today’s art. For example comics in newspapers and expressionist art is used to represent comically political situations happening today such as Trumps power in 2018 or posters of Obamas campaign back in 2008, its particular association with political references is a predominant trend. Its characteristics can also be recognized with street art and murals seen plastered over cities, usually this is in the form of propaganda similar to what it was used for in the 1960’s. It seems although the content of pop art differs today the emphasis behind it still stands today.

To conclude, although the pop art movement did not change the structure of society the meaning and influence the movement had proved radical changes to the way design is observed, made and consumed within society today. Pop made us less conservative, more tolerant and taught us design and arts can be fun, relevant, relatable and not so high brow.