Pauline Boty (1938-1966) was one of the relatively few women artists to be involved in the Pop Art movement. Boty studied at Wimbledon School of Art and the Royal College of Art, where she met and worked with the key figures of Pop Art. After graduating in 1960 and before her tragically early death in 1966 at the age of only 28, her collages and large canvases were exhibited in a number of group shows and in her first solo exhibition was held at the Grabowski Gallery in 1963.
She featured with Derek Boshier, Peter Blake and Peter Philips in the BBC film 'Pop Goes the Easel' in 1962. David Mellor exhibited Boty’s work in his important show on the 60s at the Barbican in 1993 and again in a joint Anglo-French exhibition, held in Brighton in 1997. In her work, Boty explored cultural constructions of femininity and artistic identity. Radical in her thought and a rebel by nature, Boty broke with all conventions and is now hailed as a pioneer of feminism.
A major retrospective exhibition was held at Whitford Fine Art and Mayor Gallery, London, Nov-Dec 1998. During 2013-2014 Pallant House Gallery Chichester hosted "Pauline Boty: Pop Artist and Woman" and in 2014 Wolverhampton Art Gallery hosted a retrospective of her work.
Public collections include
Tate Gallery, London
National Portrait Gallery, London
Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Wolverhampton
Muzeum Sztuki w Lodzi, Lotdz
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington
Bibliography
TATE, Sue. Pauline Boty: Pop Artist and Woman. Wolverhampton Art Gallery & Museums, UK
WATLING Sue and David MELLOR. Pauline Boty: The Only Blonde in the World. Whitford Fine Art, The Major Gallery, London, 1998
The Sixites: Britain and France, 1962-1973: The Utopian Years, edited by David MELLOR and L. GERVEREAU, London, 1997
David, MELLOR. The Sixties Art Scene in London. London, 1993
RIDEAL, Liz and Kethleen SORIANO. Madam and Eve, Women Portraying Women. London, 2018
MDENICOV, L. Melissa, 'The Sound and Look of Melodrama in Paulin Boty's Pop Paintings' in Pop Art and Popular Music, New York, 2018
Solo Exhibitions
2014, Pauline Boty and Pop Art, Muzeum Sztuki, Lodz, Poland
2013 - 14, Pauline Boty: Pop Artist and Woman, Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Wolverhampton and touring, Pallant House, Chichester
1998, Pauline Boty - The Only Blonde in the World, The Mayor Gallery and Whitford Fine Art, London
1963, Pauline Boty, Grabowski Gallery, London
Group Exhibitions
2016, Pop Art Heroes Britain, Whitford Fine Art, London
2013, When Britain went Pop! British Pop Art: The Early Years, Christie's Mayfair, London
2005 - 2006, British Pop, Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, Bilbao
1996, Les Sixties: Great Britain and France 1962 - 1973, Musée d'Histoire Contemporaine, Paris and Museum and Art Gallery, Brighton
1995, Post War to Pop, Whitford Fine Art, London
1993, The Sixties Art Scene in London, Barbican Art Gallery, London
1982, Pop Art, Galeria 'Pro', Koszalin, Poland; Miedzy Hiperrealizmem a Pop-Artem, Museum Regionalne, Radomsko, Poland
1981, Realizm Spoleczny Pop-Artu, Muzeum Sztuki, Lodz, Poland
1966, Spring Exhibition, Cartwright Memorial Hall, Bradford
1965, Spring Exhibition, Cartwright Memorial Hall, Bradford; Contemporary Art, Grabowski Gallery, London
1963, Pop Art, Midland Group Gallery, Nottingham
1962, New Approaches to the Figure, Arthur Jeffress Gallery, London; New Art, Congress House, London
1961, Blake, Boty, Porter, Reeve, AIA Gallery, London
1960 - 61, Modern Stained Glass, Arts Council Tour
1959, Young Contemporaries, RBA Galleries, London
1957, Young Contemporaries, RBA Galleries, London