Hamilton, Richard (1922– )

English artist, a pioneer of pop art. His collage Just What Is It That Makes Today's Homes So Different, So Appealing? (1956; Kunsthalle, Tübingen, Germany) is often cited as the first pop-art work: its 1950s interior, inhabited by the bodybuilder Charles Atlas and a pin-up, is typically humorous, concerned with popular culture and contemporary kitsch.

He was particularly concerned with the photographic image, which he skilfully combined with oil paint in his Portrait of Gaitskell as a Monster of Filmland (1963; Arts Council of Great Britain). In other works he has taken images from various sources, usually commercial, to create a composition as in Interior II (1964; Tate Gallery, London). For his Cosmetic Studies (1969) fragments of fashion photographs were collaged to make a single face. He was given his first comprehensive retrospective exhibition in 1970 at the Tate Gallery, London, also shown at the Kunsthalle, Berne, Switzerland. In 1974 he had retrospectives at the Guggenheim Museum, New York, as well as in Munich and Tübingen. He exhibited frequently during the 1980s and 1990s, and had another exhibition at the Tate Gallery in 1992. In 2003 he had a retrospective in Barcelona, Spain.

His series Swingeing London 67 (1967) comments on the prosecution for drugs of his art dealer Robert Fraser and the singer Mick Jagger. Collected Works, an anthology of his writings, was published in 1982.