Alex Katz, Sylvie Fleury, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein & James Rosenquist: SEA, POP & SUN Group show at the Fondation Carmignac

The Fondation Carmignac presents Sea, Pop & Sun, a dazzling ode to the freedom and vitality of the 1960s and 1970s that summons the Pop spirit. The exhibition at the Villa Carmignac, nestling between pine trees and the sea, reveals sun-drenched, sensual, soaring works of Pop Art, which continues to radiate its electric energy today.

With its name inspired by the title of Serge Gainsbourg’s provocative hit, the exhibition invites us into the dreamworld of a seaside escape, and a time when the sexual revolution was overturning conventions, morals were shifting, and everything seemed possible. The South of France and its beaches were more than mere holiday postcards; they were gateways to new horizons of freedom and transgression.

Here, far from the cities and bathed in the light, colors and scents of the Mediterranean, Pop Art reveals unexpected facets. No longer drawing on everyday objects or urban advertising, it turns instead to new motifs: the sky, the sea, the sun and the spirit of summer. While acknowledging its roots in the consumer society, Pop Art here acquires a renewed sensuality and intensity, at times verging on the cosmic, from these shores and summer scenes.