Breaking the Recursive Structure in Post-War Appropriation Art:Remediation and Apparatus of Roy Lichtenstein

This paper points out that the explanatory framework for the appropriation of art in the second half of the 20th century, which responds to social phenomena in both content and form, has faced theoretical weakness and institutionalization difficulties. As the appropriation of art works, their creative methodologies, and the critical discourse surrounding them in the second half of the 20th century were incorporated into the systems of art education, art museums, art markets, and visual capitalism, the criticality initially advocated by appropriation art has gradually transformed into a new paradigm of self-circulation, consumable, and a “recursive structure” as described by Rosalind Krauss. This situation also has a sustained impact on today’s conceptual art creation. In response to this condition, this paper builds on Fredric Jameson’s Metacommentary, pointing out why the attempt to establish a “coherent, definite, universally effective” structuralist critical discourse for appropriation art, which views appropriation art as a site for metaphor, irony, and simple binary oppositions, which is the root cause of the current criticism dilemma. The paper advocates for a re-examination of the appropriation of art works and their critical discourse in the second half of the 20th century, introducing a media perspective and using detailed and historical text analysis methods to reactivate their critical potential. Subsequently, the paper introduces the theory of “remediation”, reviewing and extending Michael Lobel’s analysis of Roy Lichtenstein’s works—supplemented by discussions of artists like Peter Blake—to explore the possibility of a new form. of media reflection in the appropriation art of the second half of the 20th century. In this section, the paper demonstrates how Lobel reveals hidden narratives about the theme of “monocularity” and the confrontation between natural vision and visual machinery in Lichtenstein’s work, examining how the artist’s personal experiences and historical media environment influenced his practice. Subsequently, this paper will then draws on Vilem Flusser’s theory of “line and surface”, analysing the dimension of “scale” that has not yet been theorized in Lichtenstein’s works, suggesting that the enormous scale, together with the intentional addition of Ben-Day Dots, reflects the interactive tension between “imaginal fiction” and “conceptual fiction” in the modern visual mechanism, and enables his works to be viewed as an “apparatus” constituted through the viewer’s dynamic engagement. At the same time, a virtual medium—a “magnifying glass” structure—is embedded within this apparatus of vision itself. Finally, Lichtenstein’s later practice embodies a “translation” mechanism that not only aligns with Flusser’s foresight, but also serves as a metaphor for the future of operational images.