Roy Lichtenstein’s Composition prints are a late-career series from 1995–1996 that translate the improvisational energy of jazz music into his signature Pop Art style. The series is a literal and playful visual pun on the term “composition,” referring to both musical and artistic structure.

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Introduction

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In the Composition prints, Lichtenstein changed the usual linear structure of sheet music. The prints show musical staves and notes. These are freed from their horizontal constraints and are presented as twisting, looping, and swirling black lines. The lively notes and swirling lines are set against fields of bright, flat color, including reds, yellows, and white. Lichtenstein’s iconic Ben-Day dots and diagonal stripes accentuate the colors. Those prints also show Lichtenstein’s ongoing interest in abstraction. For example, Composition IV is a more simplified version of the design, with only a few elements. This represents the final stage of the abstraction process.

The Composition prints reveal Lichtenstein’s lifelong passion for music, especially jazz. They also offer a commentary on the creative process. Lichtenstein played the clarinet in his youth and learned the saxophone in his 70s. The prints capture the freeform, improvised nature of jazz. They translate an auditory experience into a visual form. By flattening musical notation into a mechanically reproduced image, Lichtenstein questions the difference between different sensory modes. He explores how artistic structures, whether a painted brushstroke or a musical staff, can be abstracted and changed into art.

The title, Composition, is a clever pun. It refers both to the musical subject matter and the artist’s own arrangement of line, form, and color.

One edition of the prints, Composition III, was given in 1995 to the Friends of Art and Preservation in Embassies (FAPE). It was for distribution to U.S. embassies worldwide.

Roy Lichtenstein’s musical Composition series of 1996 brings the spirit of soul and jazz to screenprint. The work presents a synesthetic experience that bridges the gap between sight and sound, as sinuous lines of melodic sheet music weave their way across the composition. No longer fixed in their usual horizontal rigidity, crotchets and quavers break free of the staves as if to produce an auditory cacophony reflected in the busy, dynamic composition. With notes scattered arbitrarily across the page – even breaking into the margin – the curves of the flowing musical bars weave themselves together, conveying movement as the musical notation is set free.

“What I really want to do is music, but I won’t give up my day job!”

Music was one of Lichtenstein’s greatest loves, finding in it both an emotional release and a consistent source of inspiration. Trained in piano, flute and saxophone, Lichtenstein spent his teenage years frequenting music clubs around New York City; a time that coincided with the renewed era of jazz, which had a stronghold over the city’s music scene. The artist’s passion for jazz and soul infiltrated his lyrical compositions from as early as the mid-1960s. For instance, in The Melody Haunts My Reverie (1965) we see a blonde woman rendered in Lichtenstein’s classic Ben Day dot-style, exclaiming with a pained look on her face: “the melody haunts my reverie…” – a quote from Hoagy Carmichael’s 1927 song “Stardust”. The speech bubble is book-ended by three quavers positioned as musical quotation marks, blurring the line between speech and song and thus proposing an affinity between the visual and auditory.

In the Composition prints, Roy Lichtenstein presents arrangements of curving and looping musical staves; no longer fixed on their usual horizontal, linear orientation, the musical notation is set free. Two of the prints – Composition I and Composition III – are vertical in format, while Composition II and Composition IV have a landscape format. The notes and curving staves are set against area of primary colors and the artist’s signature diagonal lines and dots. Music was one of Lichtenstein’s great loves – he played the flute and saxophone and was particularly interested in jazz. These images therefore respond to the freedom and improvisatory nature of this form of music, as well as pointing to the artist’s own exploration of visual composition.

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Composition, 1996

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Composition I, Composition II and Composition III (a benefit print), are three works with musical subject matter produced at Gemini between January 1995 and March 1996. Composition I, II and III were already underway at Gemini when work on a fourth print with related musical imagery, RLCR 4371, Composition IV, printed at Brand X, was begun during the summer of 1995. Composition IV, also a benefit print, was completed first and signed in the fall of 1995. This is not an actual series but rather prints produced simultaneously on the same matter.

1. Composition I (Corlett 297)

2. Composition II (Corlett 298)

3. Composition III (Corlett 299)

4. Composition IV (Corlett 293)

 

 

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2025 Auction Results

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#7. Composition IV, 1996

Artnet Auctions: 11 April 2024
Estimated: USD 15,000 – 20,000
USD 20,000

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition IV, 1995
Screenprint in colors on Rives BFK paper
Signed, dated and numbered 89/120 in pencil

 

 

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2023 Auction Results

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#1. Composition I, 1996

Christie’s New-York: 20 April 2023
Estimated: USD 40,000 – 60,000
USD 69,300

ROY LICHTENSTEIN (1923-1997)
Composition I, 1996
Screen-print in colors on Lanaquarelle paper
Signed and dated in pencil, numbered 7/50 (there were also ten artist’s proofs)

#2. Composition III, 1996

Swann Auction: 8 June 2023
Estimated: USD 8,000 – 12,000
USD 25,000

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition III, 1996
Color screen-print on Lana Lanaquarelle Watercolor white wove paper
One of 36 numbered artist’s proofs, aside from the edition of 186
Signed, dated, inscribed “A.P.” and numbered 1/36 in pencil, lower right

 

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Composition I

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Christie’s New-York: 20 April 2023
Estimated: USD 40,000 – 60,000
USD 69,300

ROY LICHTENSTEIN (1923-1997)
Composition I, 1996
Screen-print in colors on Lanaquarelle paper
Signed and dated in pencil, numbered 7/50 (there were also ten artist’s proofs)

Christie’s New-York: 29 April 2018
Estimated: USD 40,000 – 60,000
USD 62,500

ROY LICHTENSTEIN (1923-1997)
Composition I, 1996
Screen-print in colors on Lanaquarelle paper
Signed and dated in pencil, numbered 8/50
(there were also ten artist’s proofs)

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Composition II

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Composition II

Medium: Screenprint in colors on Lanaquarelle watercolor paper
Year: 1996
Sheet: 35 1/2 x 44 7/8 inches (90.2 x 114 cm)
Image: 28 5/8 x 37 15/16 inches (72.7 x 96.4 cm)
Edition: 50
Artist’s Proofs: 12 AP
Publisher: Gemini G.E.L., Los Angeles
Printer: Gemini G.E.L., Los Angeles
Literature: Corlett 298, Gemini 1669

Roy Lichtenstein Catalogue Raisonne: RLCR 4497

Composition II, 1996 (RLCR 4497) | Catalogue entry | Roy Lichtenstein: A Catalogue Raisonné

Signed, dated and numbered in pencil with the publisher’s blindstamps and inkstamp on the reverse

Auction Results

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Freeman’s Hindman: 12 December 2025
Estimated: USD 30,000 – 50,000
USD 48,000

ROY LICHTENSTEIN (American, 1923–1997)
Composition II (Corlett 298; Gemini G.E.L. 1669), 1996
Screenprint
Signed, dated, and numbered 49/50 in pencil
Published and printed by Gemini G.E.L., Los Angeles, with their blindstamp

Pop Impressions: Prints from the Collection of Dorothy and Roy Lichtenstein
Sotheby’s New-York: 23 October 2025
Estimated: USD 30,000 – 50,000
USD 69,850
AUCTION RECORD FOR COMPOSITION II

ROY LICHTENSTEIN (1923 – 1997)
Composition II (Corlett 298; RLCR 4497), 1996
Screenprint in colors on Lanaquarelle watercolor paper
Signed in pencil, dated and inscribed AP 5/12
This impression is one of 12 artist’s proofs aside from the numbered edition of 50
With the blindstamp of the publisher, Gemini G.E.L., and with their inkstamp on the verso

Christie’s New-York: 16 April 2025
Estimated: USD 30,000 – 50,000
USD 63,000

ROY LICHTENSTEIN (1923-1997)
Composition II (Corlett 298), 1996
Screenprint in colors on Lanaquarelle watercolor paper
Signed and dated in pencil, numbered 48⁄50
(there were also twelve artist’s proofs)

Sotheby’s New-York: 28 July 2016
Estimated: USD 7,000 – 10,000
USD 37,500

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition II (C. 298), 1996
Screen-print in colors on Lanaquarelle watercolor paper
Signed in pencil, dated, numbered 16/50
(total edition includes 12 artist’s proofs)

 

 

 

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Composition III

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Phillips London: 6 June 2024
Estimated: GBP 10,000 – 15,000
GBP 21,590 / USD 27,527

Swann Auction: 8 June 2023
Estimated: USD 8,000 – 12,000
USD 25,000

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition III, 1996
Color screen-print on Lana Lanaquarelle Watercolor white wove paper
One of 36 numbered artist’s proofs, aside from the edition of 186
Signed, dated, inscribed “A.P.” and numbered 1/36 in pencil, lower right

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Composition IV

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Artnet Auctions: 11 April 2024
Estimated: USD 15,000 – 20,000
USD 20,000

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition IV, 1995
Screenprint in colors on Rives BFK paper
Signed, dated and numbered 89/120 in pencil

Phillips New-York: 15 February 2024
Estimated: USD 12,000 – 18,000
USD 20,320

Phillips New-York: 21 October 2021
Estimated: USD 8,000 – 12,000
USD 27,720

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition IV (C. 293), 1995
Screen-print in colors, on Rives BFK paper
Signed, dated and numbered 42/120 in pencil

Rago Auctions: 17 September 2021
Estimated: 15,000 – 20,000
USD 20,000

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition IV , 1995
Screen-print in colors, on Rives BFK paper
Signed, dated and numbered to lower right ’13/120 Roy Lichtenstein 95′

Phillips London: 15 June 2021
Estimated: GBP 6,000 – 8,000
GBP 16,880

ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Composition IV (C. 293), 1995
Screen-print in colors on BFK Rives paper
Signed, dated and numbered 39/120 in pencil