Gizella Varga Sinai was born in 1944 and was largely influenced creatively by the 1960s growing up. Artistically, the decade began with the twin movements of Pop and Minimalism emerging at a similar time. On one hand, Pop championed the visual culture of the mainstream and mass media, and of products and consumerism. Artwork by artists such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Tom Wesselmann and Claes Oldenberg was inspired by the popular culture of the rapidly developing Capitalism of the United States, using things like advertising, comic books and ideas surrounding celebrity culture as their primary visual inspiration. A parallel movement was established on the West Coast in California – a strain that also related to language in art, and is viewed as the very first developments of conceptual art. The 1960s were an explosive decade internationally, bearing witness to proliferation of modernist philosophies and trends.
