Playful Still Lifes Inspired by Warhol and Pop Culture

Mexico City-based photographer Paul Fuentes has long found influence in the work of Andy Warhol, bringing the tenets of Pop Art—irony, kitsch, and appropriation— boldly into the 21st-century.

Using the tools of digital photography, Fuentes creates clever visual limericks. A tin can appears—perhaps in reference to Campbell’s, and like Warhol’s soup cans, the still lifes are deceptively simple. Although the concept will emerge from the artist’s consciousness in a flash, inspired by everything from wordplay to scenes in film, they require an average of two hours of post-production work. While they are certainly fun, Fuentes’s playful concoctions are also labor-intensive, with the most challenging being the work that incorporates ink in water.

Using leitmotifs like food, paint, and commonly advertised products (perfume, cigarettes, laundry machines) to comment on mass consumption, the artist marries the panache and style of Warhol and Lichtenstein with the abundance of the Instagram generation.

All images © Paul Fuentes

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