Reference Material

Lichtenstein created and gathered various types of reference material, including cartoon and magazine clippings—stored loose or pasted into notebooks—and photographs he took of works in progress in his studio and of New York City architecture. The Roy Lichtenstein Foundation gifted most of these materials to the Archives of American Art Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. The catalogue raisonné team is currently reviewing, organizing and cataloguing items from the vast collection to be published on this website.

Guide to Entries: Comic Books

Lichtenstein’s lifelong interest in vernacular motifs is mostly known because of his appropriation of comic book imagery. The artist cut and carefully preserved hundreds of clippings from over 250 comic books published between the late 1930s and the 1980s. Throughout the years, he stored a large number in notebooks and sketchbooks, others were kept loosely at the studio. Some clippings have been found adhered to their related artworks.

Processing of Materials

RLF staff processed the artist’s comics collection in various iterations from 1999 until 2023. Multiple numbering systems were devised to organize objects and associations made between imagery and artworks. When connections with artworks were identified, but no physical items were extant in RLF Archives, at times the related comic books were purchased, or photocopies and digitally prepared images were made and added to the archival files. These steps were not always fully documented.

From 2023–2026, the RLCR team conducted a comprehensive review of all comic book holdings in the RLF Archives, systematically classifying and re-numbering the material for publication. Any comic imagery the authors determined as closely related to an artwork is hyperlinked with that artwork. The result of this research was published as a study resource with the online catalogue raisonné in October 2026.

Organization of Entries

Each comic book has an umbrella entry with the full citation of the book. In 2026, the authors made every effort to determine the names of all the artists (writer, penciller, inker, colorist, letterer, etc.) who contributed to a story from which Lichtenstein saved a clipping. The Grand Comics Database was consulted when the information was unavailable in the published book. Names and roles derived from that source are marked with an asterisk.

Comic book holdings in the RLF Archives are summarized describing any physical material related to a book. In 2023, the Foundation donated these to the Archives of American Art, accessible here: Roy Lichtenstein Foundation records and Roy Lichtenstein papers.

In rare cases when clippings from the artist’s studio are not part of the RLF Archives, because Lichtenstein adhered them to an artwork, this is noted.

Terminology

Terms used to describe the materials:  

Panel is a single frame in a story 

Panel detail refers to a detail the artist cut from a panel  

Silhouetted panel describes a digitally prepared image of a panel/panel detail that reproduces the shape of a cutout found in a comic book in the RLF Archives holdings 

Clipping is the panel/panel detail the artist cut from a comic book  

Cutout is the space left in the comic book after a panel/panel detail was cut or torn from the page. When an extant clipping could be matched to its cutout, the two are listed as related. 

Comic book covers trimmed along the top edge only—a standard commercial practice for cancelling unsold stock or re-sale unrelated to Lichtenstein's clipping process—are not identified as cut. Only cuts made by the artist to produce clippings are recorded.

Description of Clippings

All extant clippings, as well as additional clipping imagery visible in archival photographs of Lichtenstein’s studio, are catalogued.

When no extant clipping exists in the RLF Archives to match the related cutout in a book, the authors reviewed an uncut book copy, prepared (“silhouetted”) a digital panel image and added it to this section.

When Lichtenstein referenced the imagery of an extant comic clipping, but the book and full panel from which it was cut was not in the RLF Archives, the authors located the source and prepared a digital panel for illustration. In this process, the whole book was reviewed to determine any additional imagery related to his artwork.

When the artist re-cut a comic panel, likely to use the images separately, these clippings are combined in a single panel entry.

Illustrations of Clippings

When multiple clippings with the same panel imagery exist as loose and pasted items, both are illustrated in the same entry. 

Where only cutouts exist but no physical clippings are extant, digitally prepared panels from another comic book copy are used as illustration. These have been silhouetted to match the shape of the cutout. A second image in the related entry shows the full page with that cutout. 

Comic images referenced in artworks for which no extant clipping or cut book is found in the RLF Archives are illustrated with a digitally prepared full comic panel, e.g., REF CB062.01.

When both sides of a loose clippings show full panels or were referenced by the artist they are illustrated in separate entries labeled with .R and .V.  

All clippings are oriented as they appear in their source comic book, regardless of any angle at which the artist may have referenced a motif in his work. 

Related Artworks

Until 2023, the Foundation’s website (Imageduplicator.com) paired clippings and artworks as referential or possibly inspirational. The catalogue raisonné team determined and hyperlinked previously and newly identified references with artworks only when they are closely related. 

Panels and panel details can be viewed alongside their related artworks from the artwork entry page by clicking on “Compare with artwork.” This view includes an option to compare at relative scale.

Numbering

Comic Book Numbers

In May 2025, the RLCR team assigned alphanumeric Reference (REF) and Comic Book (CB) numbers to the comic books. These numbers follow the format: REF CB001, REF CB002, etc.

The three-digit number of a comic book reflects its place in the chronological sequence of all comic books documented at the time of numbering, with CB001 indicating the oldest publication. Books added after the initial numbering (up to REF CB240) received the next available number in ascending sequence, independent of their date.

Books published in the same month of the same year are numbered in alphabetical order within that month.

Clippings Numbers 

Panels and panel details have sub-numbers (.01, .02, etc.), sequenced in the order they appear within the book, reading left to right and top to bottom.

These sub-numbers may carry a suffix indicating the following:

S: Studio
The panel was clipped by the artist or his studio assistants and is extant in the RLF Archives; it was stored loosely or is found adhered to an artwork

NB: Notebook
The clipping was pasted into one of the artist's notebooks

PC: Photocopy
A photocopy made by previous RLF staff. Photocopies may be illustrated in the absence of any extant clippings.

R/V: Recto/Verso
Indicates the recto or verso of a panel or panel detail, determined by the order the clippings appear in the comic book

[none]: No physical object is held by the RLF Archives; the imagery is a digitally prepared illustration

When a comic book source could not be determined, “unkn” is added, e.g., REF CB-unkn1. 

Alternate Numbers 

All numbers previously assigned by RLF staff to material with the image illustrated in a clipping, whether that is in an extant, a photocopied or a digitally prepared clipping, are listed alphabetically in brackets following the REF number.

RLFA
Asigned by RLF Archives staff to RLFA holdings. Each physical item, such as single copies of the same comic book issue and individual clippings, received its own RLFA number.

SRC
Assigned to panel images (rather than to a single physical item) by RLF staff, used to organize materials for the former RLF website Imageduplicator.com.

Absence of any alternate number indicates newly researched material by the RLCR team.

View in Notebook  

Comic clippings which the artist pasted into his notebooks are hyperlinked under “View in Notebook.” 

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