Andy Warhol
Jessica Corbett (330)    
Andy Warhol Posters 'n' Pop
Posted Wednesday, March 14, 2007 (2 years 256 days ago.) Viewed 910 times.
Even from his early days in Pittsburgh, Andy Warhol demonstrated unique artistic talent. He began his successful career in magazine illustration and advertising, but became better known for his portraits. Andy Warhol portraits were, and continue to be, in a category of their own. They are more than mere pictures; they tell a fascinating tale of his personal and artistic circle, as well as a chronicle of many of the most talented, best-known and wealthiest public figures of the period. Warhol's celebrated subjects included tycoons, entertainers, fashion designers and drag queens. His most famous portraits of Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and Liza Minnelli are recognized all over the world.
Technique
Unlike traditional portraiture, Warhol relied exclusively on photographs to capture the image of his subjects. He often made use of photos from magazines and newspapers and, by employing photomechanical reproduction techniques, he was able to enlarge and transfer the image onto a canvas. He then painted patches of color to enliven the flat surface and to personalize the painting; thus, Andy Warhol portraits came to life.
Subjects
There was often a personal connection between Warhol and his subjects. For example, his Campbell's Soup Cans paintings stem from a childhood memory, a time when his mother often fed him Campbell's Soup. Other works functioned as a personal statement about art. Warhol painted dollar signs and dollar bills as a symbolic representation of the relationship between art and money. For Warhol, the "secret" of art was based on its undeniable connection to money. These unique pieces redefined the notion of art as a means of expression to art as a means of survival.
The 1960s
After his travels around the world, Warhol began to devote more energy to painting. He created his Coca-Cola paintings in 1961, and followed with a series of Campbell's Soup Cans in 1962. The soup cans caused a sensation in the art world and proclaimed Warhol a celebrity. That same year, he began a long series of celebrity portraits, including Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley, and Elizabeth Taylor. After announcing his retirement from painting in 1965 in order to pursue a career in filmmaking, Warhol took up painting again in 1966, and decided to expand his activities to include performance art in a traveling multimedia show.
The 1970s
Although Warhol was both successful and scandalous in the 1960s, he became somewhat of an entrepreneur in the 1970s as he devoted much of his time to portraying rich patrons for commissions. His clients included Mick Jagger, Liza Minnelli, John Lennon, Diana Ross, Brigitte Bardot, and Michael Jackson. In 1971, Warhol co-designed the Grammy-winning cover for The Rolling Stones' album Sticky Fingers, featuring a close-up photo of the torso of a man wearing blue jeans with a real working zipper. Subsequently, he received many more commissions to design music LP covers.
The 1980s
Warhol re-emerged as a critical and financial success in the 1980s, partially due to his affiliation and friendships with a number of prolific younger artists. In 1985, he was selected as one of the Absolut Vodka artists. Several of his paintings were used in advertisements, bringing his art to a much broader audience. During this period, all of his works were created with the help of paid assistants, managers, and friends.
Andy Warhol Portraits
After his tragic death in 1987, Warhol's estate was auctioned over a period of ten days to raise money for his visual arts foundation. Andy Warhol portraits of Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, Jackie O. and, of course, Campbell's Soup Cans, brought portraiture back into mainstream culture as an important art form.
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Posted Monday, January 08, 2007 (2 years 321 days ago.) Viewed 349 times.
Andy Warhol, born Andrew Warhola in 1928, is considered to be one of the principle founders of the Pop Art movement during the 1960s. An author, filmmaker and music producer, he is most known for his silk screens depicting commercial objects and celebrities. During his lifetime, working in his infamous studio that he dubbed ‘The Factory’ (a literal reference to ability to mass produce art itself), Andy Warhol and his team of “superstars" (a title he gave to his factory workers) produced a bevy of silkscreen prints, avant-garde experimental films, music and literature. His prints have become powerful visual icons, and whether they are meant to mock or embrace our highly commercialized society is still up for debate.
Campbell’s Soup Cans – 1962
This print, credited by some as the beginning of Andy Warhol’s celebrity career, consists of multiple near-identical drawings of Campbell’s Soup cans and can be seen today in New York’s Museum of Modern Art. It was this display with which Andy Warhol burst onto the New York art scene. The motivation behind this particular piece is, of course, debatable. Some theorize that the print reflects Warhol’s childhood memories (he wrote often of his mother serving him Campbell’s Soup), while others argue that Andy Warhol’s print is commenting on the high level of commercialization in the United States (of course, both could be correct). He continued throughout his career to draw, paint and print highly recognizable and commercial objects, like Coca Cola bottles. Money itself was even subject to his printing, and in 1985, he was one of the artists hired by Absolute Vodka to incorporate the alcohol bottle into his work.
Marilyn Monroe - 1964
As much as Andy Warhol seemed to adore highly commercial objects, he seemed to equally idolize celebrities. One of his most famous celebrity portraits is that of Marilyn Monroe, created in 1964. Using a style that is now almost unthinkingly associated with Warhol himself, he put together multiple portraits of her face, inverting, swapping and replacing the colors in each one, creating an brilliant neon splash. Other celebrities subject to his attention included Elizabeth Taylor, Judy Garland and Elvis Presley.
Warhol Album Cover Prints
During his long career, Andy Warhol also designed the cover art for numerous albums, including the Velvet Underground’s The Velvet Underground and Nico in 1967 (which he also produced) and The Rolling Stones’ Sticky Fingers in 1971 and Love You Live in 1977.
Article written by Jessica Corbett:
Jessica Corbett is an modern day artist and is the proud owner/author of the website Andy Warhol Posters 'n' Pop.
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Posted Wednesday, March 29, 2006 (3 years 241 days ago.) Viewed 2,039 times.
The Marilyns: Capturing a Legend
From his early childhood, Andy Warhol was fascinated by the myth of stardom. The seemingly exciting and decadent lives of the young and famous fuelled Warhol’s imagination. His attraction to the glamorous world of Hollywood in later years would become the inspiration for much of his artistic work, most notably, Warhol’s trademark silkscreens. Not only would Warhol become one of the most recognizable names in art, but his silkscreens of celebrities would also help to solidify the legendary careers of those he painted. The luminous Marilyn Monroe was the subject of endless fascination for Warhol, and together they made artistic history.
Marilyn Monroe by Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol was drawn to Marilyn Monroe. From the very first time Warhol watched her light up the silver screen, he was in awe. The attraction he had to Monroe was not simply because of her beauty though, in fact, he felt he identified with her in a way few others could. His perception of her was bi-fold: an object of desire and a role model. Because of his deep appreciation for her, Warhol was able to illuminate the hidden and quite often dark side of her personality in his work. The famous Marilyn Monroe silkscreens by Andy Warhol quite accurately portray the legendary actress’s beauty and sex appeal, but in a complex and unique way.
Marilyn Monroe Silkscreens
Tragically, in 1962, Andy Warhol’s celebrity muse Marilyn Monroe committed suicide. However, her legend would not die shortly after her death, Warhol completed a series of artistic works called “the Marilyns” to pay tribute to a woman he deeply admired. The initial colored pictures he created of Monroe were remarkably beautiful, but his most famous depiction of her came from a photograph. Using a publicity shot taken by Gene Korman for the film Niagara made in 1953, Warhol cropped the glossy photo to fit his canvas. He then made art history as it were when he silkscreened the composition for several paintings. Warhol reproduced several times over the image of Monroe’s face. In the process of reproduction, he invented a style he would later become fond of and would render it famous for silkscreening.
As Andy Warhol’s career skyrocketed, he would become famous for a number of brilliant and groundbreaking works. His art was unpredictable and shattered all preconceptions in the art world making him a legend. But even as the name of Andy Warhol became known the world over, his famous sikscreened images of Marilyn Monroe served as a reminder of his artistic beginnings. The great screen beauty who died a premature and tragic death not only inspired Warhol but also transformed his career and left an indelible mark on his life. The profound connection that Warhol had with Monroe was deeply felt in his work, and he was eternally grateful to have known a woman of such significant interior and exterior beauty.
Article written by Jessica Corbett:
Jessica Corbett is an modern day artist and is the proud owner/author of the website Andy Warhol Posters 'n' Pop.
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Posted Friday, February 17, 2006 (3 years 281 days ago.) Viewed 1,042 times.
During the second half of the twentieth century, popular culture and the mass media gained a huge significance in America. The style of art that was both a product and critique of the social milieu was known as pop art. No other artist is more identified with this artistic style as Andy Warhol. His signature soup cans and silk screens helped to define an entire artistic movement making Andy Warhol undoubtedly the “Prince of Pop” in the art world.
Emerging in the late 1950s in England and America, pop art sought to depict the images of mass media advertising, comic books, and consumer products. Pop art much like pop music aimed to appeal to a broad audience and rebelled against the idea of high or elitist culture. It was in this light-hearted environment that the Andy Warhol pop art phenomenon was born. Perhaps the most famous of Warhol’s pieces are his mass produced series of several photographs of movie stars, political figures and other well-known celebrities. His technique involved enhancing the photograph with a simple silk screening method and, upon close inspection of his finished work, it is apparent that the paintings are complete with imperfections. It was Warhol’s aim to produce a large number of the same painting, all of which with their own flaws and errors. By reproducing his flawed work, Warhol wanted to use the image of the celebrity in order to make a comment on American society. It was his belief that the image of the celebrity had become itself a brand. This celebrity brand was ever-changing and had replaced any sense of sacredness or solidity. A well-known example is the painting of Marilyn Monroe. Sadly, the famous Monroe prints were made all the more poignant when she tragically committed suicide the same month as the release of the prints.
The Andy Warhol pop art phenomenon may be best characterized by his ‘Campbell’s Soup Cans’ silk screen work. In fact, Warhol’s big break into widespread recognition came with the 1962 Los Angeles exhibition of his now famous depictions of the soup cans. Drawn from the mass marketing culture, the ‘Campbell’s Soup Cans’ appeared larger than life and made a definite statement about the consumer-driven society that had become so prevalent in America.
Andy Warhol defined pop art by changing the way that images are seen. His work was a close interaction between art and popular culture and his strategy was to combine the two by appropriating different well-known cultural images. Andy Warhol was a multi-talented artist who not only influenced the pop art movement, but also shaped and inspired countless artists to come.
Claes Oldenburg, and Roy Lichtenstein are presented alongside works by California artists Ed Ruscha, Wayne Thiebaud, and Robert Arneson, among others, underscoring the role of the West Coast in this pivotal movement.
Article written by Jessica Corbett:
Jessica Corbett is an modern day artist and is the proud owner/author of the website Andy Warhol Posters 'n' Pop.
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