אל על | אטמוספירה

Long before the world became addicted to screens and the relentless stream of images they generate, Wesselmann had already changed the rules of the game.

Installation view (photo: Elad Sarig)

One of the leading figures of American Pop Art in the 1960s, Tom Wesselmann (1931–2004) created bold, direct images that were as seductive as the culture they reflected. Beauty, advertising, and desire merge in his work into a dazzling visual language, creating a world in which the image is larger than life. Red lips, a bouquet of flowers or a pack of cigarettes became, in his hands, striking and compelling visual icons whose powerful presence draws its force from billboards, magazines, and consumer culture and reimagines the tradition of painting. Wesselmann was born in 1931 in Ohio, USA. He initially studied psychology before turning to art and moving to New York, where he lived and worked for most of his career, developing a distinctive visual language that was sensual, bold, and unmistakably his own. Alongside Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein, Wesselmann was among the artists who redefined the very notion of the image in the twentieth century. Against the backdrop of the sexual revolution of the 1960s and an unprecedented flood of imagery from magazines, television, and advertising, he embraced the codes of popular culture, presenting familiar motifs in vibrant colors and monumental compositions. At the heart of the exhibition—drawn from the Marie and Jose Mugrabi Collection, one of the world’s foremost private collections of

contemporary art—are Wesselmann׳s iconic series Great American Nude , Still Life , and Bedroom Paintings. In these works, the human body, everyday objects, and domestic interiors become images in which idealization, irony, and critical reflection on the culture of spectacle converge. It is a world in which the boundaries between the intimate and the public, and between reality and fantasy, become blurred. Wesselmann׳s work continues to resonate with and influence generations of artists. In today׳s cultural landscape—marked by a plurality of voices alongside a renewed conservative turn and ongoing debates surrounding censorship and the limits of representation—the exhibition offers a contemporary reading of the ever-changing image of the body. It presents Wesselmann׳s work alongside that of Warhol, Lichtenstein, Alex Katz, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, and Mickalene Thomas, creating a conversation across generations about the enduring place of the body as a site of desire, power, and representation.

TEL AVIV MUSEUM OF ART Tom Wesselmann: All Out—From the Marie and Jose Mugrabi Collection Curator: Shahar Molcho | Assistant Curator: Alma Lion Exhibition on view until December 26, 2026 Museum opening hours: Mon, Wed 10:00—18:00 | Tue, Thu 10:00—21:00 | Fri 10:00—14:00 | Sat 10:00—18:00 To purchase tickets online, visit tamuseum.org.il