1963
See also : USA Warhol USA by Warhol Celebrities by Warhol Elvis and Liz Lichtenstein Bacon Bacon 1963-70 Head triptych Mountains in China Modern China
1963 Car Crash by WARHOL
Intro
Andy Warhol achieves fame in 1962 by collecting and repeating images of consumer items and movie stars. The effect on his own psyche is negative : he keeps the impression of being alone in facing the risk of a sudden death. His daily practice of Catholicism will never allow him to overcome this morbid terror.
The American dream is not enough to express the world. Automobile is very popular in the USA, and a symbol of freedom. Car crash claims the death of more than 100 people per day. The readers of the newspapers do not feel concerned by the horrible news and illustrations from the disaster.
Andy reacts against this social issue that hurts his Catholic devotion. In 1963 he begins his Death and Disaster themes. He re-screens the images of the most terrible car accidents. The series also includes his blame against the electric chair. He would say much later: "Nobody in America has a normal life".
The American dream is not enough to express the world. Automobile is very popular in the USA, and a symbol of freedom. Car crash claims the death of more than 100 people per day. The readers of the newspapers do not feel concerned by the horrible news and illustrations from the disaster.
Andy reacts against this social issue that hurts his Catholic devotion. In 1963 he begins his Death and Disaster themes. He re-screens the images of the most terrible car accidents. The series also includes his blame against the electric chair. He would say much later: "Nobody in America has a normal life".
1
Silver Car Crash
2013 SOLD for $ 105M by Sotheby's
On November 13, 2013, Sotheby's sold for $ 105M from a lower estimate of $ 60M Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster), a diptych 267 x 416 cm overall, lot 16.
On the left, the image is repeated fifteen times in three columns and five rows, with some variations in the shades of gray. On the right, the area is empty, as if the horrific scene had an extension inviting for the destruction of other lives and other cars. Warhol made a similar use of the diptych in some pictures of Liz.
The pale green of the Burning car and the apparent incompleteness of its sequence in the bottom right corner put this image in the direct continuity of the Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster).
On the left, the image is repeated fifteen times in three columns and five rows, with some variations in the shades of gray. On the right, the area is empty, as if the horrific scene had an extension inviting for the destruction of other lives and other cars. Warhol made a similar use of the diptych in some pictures of Liz.
The pale green of the Burning car and the apparent incompleteness of its sequence in the bottom right corner put this image in the direct continuity of the Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster).
2
White Disaster
2022 SOLD for $ 85M by Sotheby's
White Disaster, subtitled White Car Crash 19 Times, executed by Warhol in 1963, is unquestionably the culmination of his Car Crash sub-series and arguably the culmination of his Death and Disaster theme.
This work is monumental, 370 x 210 cm, requiring to be viewed from below. The next larger Car Crash items are the diptych Double Disaster (Silver Car Crash), 230 cm high with the right element left blank, sold for $ 105M by Sotheby's in 2013, and the 270 x 420 cm Orange Car Crash 19 Times kept at the MoMA.
White Disaster is made of a single image printed 19 times in 7 rows of 3, 2, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3 in a chilling irregular contour. The frames in a row are slightly overlapping. They may have been variously contrasted.
Its single image displays a crushed car with a seated dead person viewed through the side door opened by the crash. Such a clearly outlined figure in a dead position within the car is rare in the rest of the series. The dead man of the Burning car sub-series had been ejected by that crash.
White Disaster is made in silkscreen ink and graphite on primed canvas with no color pigment. It is a difference with the Silver Car Crash prepared in silver spray paint. Some other works are orange or green.
White is the most terrible choice because it reminds a newspaper and because it is the race of the dead old person. Such a disaster was so common in the USA of the 1960s that the source of the image has not been retrieved.
White Disaster was sold for $ 85M by Sotheby's on November 16, 2022, lot 114.
This work is monumental, 370 x 210 cm, requiring to be viewed from below. The next larger Car Crash items are the diptych Double Disaster (Silver Car Crash), 230 cm high with the right element left blank, sold for $ 105M by Sotheby's in 2013, and the 270 x 420 cm Orange Car Crash 19 Times kept at the MoMA.
White Disaster is made of a single image printed 19 times in 7 rows of 3, 2, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3 in a chilling irregular contour. The frames in a row are slightly overlapping. They may have been variously contrasted.
Its single image displays a crushed car with a seated dead person viewed through the side door opened by the crash. Such a clearly outlined figure in a dead position within the car is rare in the rest of the series. The dead man of the Burning car sub-series had been ejected by that crash.
White Disaster is made in silkscreen ink and graphite on primed canvas with no color pigment. It is a difference with the Silver Car Crash prepared in silver spray paint. Some other works are orange or green.
White is the most terrible choice because it reminds a newspaper and because it is the race of the dead old person. Such a disaster was so common in the USA of the 1960s that the source of the image has not been retrieved.
White Disaster was sold for $ 85M by Sotheby's on November 16, 2022, lot 114.
3
Green Burning Car
2007 SOLD for $ 72M by Christie's
Warhol searches and finds in the newspapers the most horrible photos of car accidents. One of them is particularly atrocious. It shows an accident that just happened on a street in Seattle. Chased by the police, a car overturned and caught fire. The driver was thrown onto a stake, taking the position of a lynched man.
The worst element in this image is possibly not its violence. Just behind the dying man, a passerby quietly walks away, his hands in his pockets. Exploiting this indecency, Newsweek integrated this photo into an article on a social theme, in June 1963. We can imagine the horror that this image caused for the highly sensitive Andy.
Warhol used this specific photo four times in repeated screen prints on a white painted background and once on a gloomy pale green background. Green Car Crash, also named Green Burning Car I, is a 229 x 203 cm assembly of four columns and three rows of this image, with varied contrasts. The reading ends on the nothingness : the last block at the bottom right is blank.
Green Car Crash was sold for $ 72M by Christie's on May 16, 2007 from a lower estimate of $ 25M, lot 15.
The worst element in this image is possibly not its violence. Just behind the dying man, a passerby quietly walks away, his hands in his pockets. Exploiting this indecency, Newsweek integrated this photo into an article on a social theme, in June 1963. We can imagine the horror that this image caused for the highly sensitive Andy.
Warhol used this specific photo four times in repeated screen prints on a white painted background and once on a gloomy pale green background. Green Car Crash, also named Green Burning Car I, is a 229 x 203 cm assembly of four columns and three rows of this image, with varied contrasts. The reading ends on the nothingness : the last block at the bottom right is blank.
Green Car Crash was sold for $ 72M by Christie's on May 16, 2007 from a lower estimate of $ 25M, lot 15.
1963 Elvis by WARHOL
1
Triple
2014 SOLD for $ 82M by Christie's
There is indeed a place for contemporary art in Los Angeles. In 1957 Walter Hopps founds the Ferus Gallery. Ferus is a word that sounds good and is easily spelled, like Kodak had been for Eastman. In New York around Castelli, Pop Art becomes the wonder of the time. Irving Blum joins Ferus and ensures from 1958 the link with the east coast.
In 1962 Blum exhibits at Ferus the complete series of 32 Campbell's Soup Cans by Andy Warhol. The introduction of mechanized techniques into a creative process is incongruous and even scandalous. The promises of sale are so low that Blum buys the full set. It has not been disjointed and is currently at the MoMA.
Blum perseveres. In 1963 Ferus again dedicates an exhibition to Warhol's series. The new theme is provided by the cinema, the specialty of Los Angeles : Warhol exhibits Elvis. There is no better candidate than the King of Rock and Roll to simulate the trepidation of the new generation.
In this exhibition all the images of Elvis Presley originate from a single 1960 newspaper clipping promoting a film titled Flaming Star. Featured as a cowboy, Elvis is standing full front, the gun in his right hand. This image is now identified as the Elvis - Ferus Type.
Andy made all these impressions on a silver paint which stages the screen of a movie theater. He prepares them as a single roll 2.08 m high. The images are irregularly spaced and sometimes overlapping. The artist sends the uncut roll to Ferus with the frames, with no other instruction than to make a tight arrangement of all this set, thus evoking the film strip or the movement. He is too busy to participate in the mounting and does not accept Blum's invitation.
22 Ferus Type paintings have survived, with single, double or multiple figures. On November 12, 2014, Christie's sold for $ 82M the Triple Elvis (Ferus Type), 208 x 173 cm, lot 9.
Such a multiple picture provides an illusion of motion. Although the original image is unique, its layout reminds Marey, Muybridge and the Nu descendant un escalier by Duchamp. The three overlapping figures are of equal density but the momentum is provided by their uneven interval.
This piece and the Four Marlons of the same sale came from a German collection assembled for decorating a casino.
In 1962 Blum exhibits at Ferus the complete series of 32 Campbell's Soup Cans by Andy Warhol. The introduction of mechanized techniques into a creative process is incongruous and even scandalous. The promises of sale are so low that Blum buys the full set. It has not been disjointed and is currently at the MoMA.
Blum perseveres. In 1963 Ferus again dedicates an exhibition to Warhol's series. The new theme is provided by the cinema, the specialty of Los Angeles : Warhol exhibits Elvis. There is no better candidate than the King of Rock and Roll to simulate the trepidation of the new generation.
In this exhibition all the images of Elvis Presley originate from a single 1960 newspaper clipping promoting a film titled Flaming Star. Featured as a cowboy, Elvis is standing full front, the gun in his right hand. This image is now identified as the Elvis - Ferus Type.
Andy made all these impressions on a silver paint which stages the screen of a movie theater. He prepares them as a single roll 2.08 m high. The images are irregularly spaced and sometimes overlapping. The artist sends the uncut roll to Ferus with the frames, with no other instruction than to make a tight arrangement of all this set, thus evoking the film strip or the movement. He is too busy to participate in the mounting and does not accept Blum's invitation.
22 Ferus Type paintings have survived, with single, double or multiple figures. On November 12, 2014, Christie's sold for $ 82M the Triple Elvis (Ferus Type), 208 x 173 cm, lot 9.
Such a multiple picture provides an illusion of motion. Although the original image is unique, its layout reminds Marey, Muybridge and the Nu descendant un escalier by Duchamp. The three overlapping figures are of equal density but the momentum is provided by their uneven interval.
This piece and the Four Marlons of the same sale came from a German collection assembled for decorating a casino.
2
Double
2019 SOLD for $ 53M by Christie's
A Double Elvis in a normally contrasted overlapping, 208 x 122 cm, was sold for $ 53M by Christie's on May 15, 2019, lot 23 B.
Another Double Elvis 208 x 122 cm deliberate displays an extreme difference of contrast between the two overlapping printings which creates an illusion of flicker. It was sold by Sotheby's on May 9, 2012 for $ 37M and by Christie's on May 17, 2018, lot 9 B, also for $ 37M.
An Elvis 2 Times 207 x 180 cm in silkscreen ink and paint was sold for $ 37M by Sotheby's on May 12, 2021, lot 4. The silver paint of the background provides a high reflectivity. Please watch the video shared by Sotheby's.
Another Double Elvis 208 x 122 cm deliberate displays an extreme difference of contrast between the two overlapping printings which creates an illusion of flicker. It was sold by Sotheby's on May 9, 2012 for $ 37M and by Christie's on May 17, 2018, lot 9 B, also for $ 37M.
An Elvis 2 Times 207 x 180 cm in silkscreen ink and paint was sold for $ 37M by Sotheby's on May 12, 2021, lot 4. The silver paint of the background provides a high reflectivity. Please watch the video shared by Sotheby's.
1963 The Unwanted Contribution of Picasso to Pop Art
2013 SOLD 56 M$ including premium
In 1961, around Leo Castelli, the Abstract Expressionism is already going to saturation. New ideas were required. By exploring the pop art, Lichtenstein and Warhol demonstrated that despite Duchamp, despite the Surrealists, despite the Bauhaus, the modern imaging was still to be created.
Each one in his own way, these two competing artists designed images that the public can understand and love, inspired by consumerism, magazines, posters and comics.
From those early days, Roy Lichtenstein appropriates works of art. He wants to identify this action as a tribute to his predecessors, but his approach is too subtle for believing such a statement.
Picasso expressed deep feelings with a perfectly mastered drawing and adjusted colors. Lichtenstein's genius is to appreciate that Picasso's art is recognizable by the general public, but too complicated to retain. He plagiarizes it, bringing his personal techniques with colors alternately flat and by dots.
Dora Maar is the woman with flowered hat, painted by Picasso in 1939-1940. As Lichtenstein painted her in 1963, she had become pitiful to earn her place in the popular imaging.
The Lichtenstein canvas, 127 x 102 cm, is one of the most illustrative examples of Pop Art. It is for sale by Christie's in New York on May 15 The press release tells that it is expected in excess of $ 30M. Here is the link to the catalog.
POST SALE COMMENT
The result, $ 56M including premium, may seem huge for an appropriation. It reinforces the fact that the pop art of the early 1960s was one of the most important artistic revolutions.
Each one in his own way, these two competing artists designed images that the public can understand and love, inspired by consumerism, magazines, posters and comics.
From those early days, Roy Lichtenstein appropriates works of art. He wants to identify this action as a tribute to his predecessors, but his approach is too subtle for believing such a statement.
Picasso expressed deep feelings with a perfectly mastered drawing and adjusted colors. Lichtenstein's genius is to appreciate that Picasso's art is recognizable by the general public, but too complicated to retain. He plagiarizes it, bringing his personal techniques with colors alternately flat and by dots.
Dora Maar is the woman with flowered hat, painted by Picasso in 1939-1940. As Lichtenstein painted her in 1963, she had become pitiful to earn her place in the popular imaging.
The Lichtenstein canvas, 127 x 102 cm, is one of the most illustrative examples of Pop Art. It is for sale by Christie's in New York on May 15 The press release tells that it is expected in excess of $ 30M. Here is the link to the catalog.
POST SALE COMMENT
The result, $ 56M including premium, may seem huge for an appropriation. It reinforces the fact that the pop art of the early 1960s was one of the most important artistic revolutions.
1963 The Solemn Visit of Mona Lisa in America
2015 SOLD for $ 56M including premium
Mona Lisa made a solemn visit to the United States in early 1963. The painting was received by the President and Mrs. Kennedy with the honors due to a queen. Its stay was managed in two steps: the National Gallery in Washington and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
This event is a triumph for culture and for trans-Atlantic friendship. Jacqueline Kennedy who thought and required this operation has a European sensibility and desires to fight America's reputation of cultural backwardness. André Malraux, French Minister of Culture, accepted the risk.
The American art is changing. Andy Warhol, like Norman Rockwell before him, is attentive to all symbols that can move the Americans. His technique of silkscreen art is developed. Executed in the previous year, the anaglyphic Statue of Liberty was already a synthesis of his blending of culture, politics and art.
A curator at the Metropolitan invited Warhol to interpret Mona Lisa. This approach is highly remarkable because Andy was still unknown two years earlier. It demonstrates the impulse and the need of the Americans to enter modern life during the Kennedy presidency.
Andy chooses three themes from a picture taken in a magazine: full image, bust and hands, and realizes the screens in several sizes. He mixes the screens in all orthogonal positions, even overlapping some of them, and separately uses with no addition the four basic colors of printing: cyan, magenta, yellow and black. The famous Leonardo's picture confronts altogether the techniques and the disorders of the industrial civilization.
The largest multiple Mona Lisa realized by Warhol, 320 x 208 cm, is for sale at Christie's in New York on May 13, lot 26B. The estimate is not published, but this lot is expected in the region of $ 40M. Warhol's Liberty referred above was sold for $ 43,7M including premium by Christie's on November 14, 2012.
I invite you to play the video shared by Christie's.
This event is a triumph for culture and for trans-Atlantic friendship. Jacqueline Kennedy who thought and required this operation has a European sensibility and desires to fight America's reputation of cultural backwardness. André Malraux, French Minister of Culture, accepted the risk.
The American art is changing. Andy Warhol, like Norman Rockwell before him, is attentive to all symbols that can move the Americans. His technique of silkscreen art is developed. Executed in the previous year, the anaglyphic Statue of Liberty was already a synthesis of his blending of culture, politics and art.
A curator at the Metropolitan invited Warhol to interpret Mona Lisa. This approach is highly remarkable because Andy was still unknown two years earlier. It demonstrates the impulse and the need of the Americans to enter modern life during the Kennedy presidency.
Andy chooses three themes from a picture taken in a magazine: full image, bust and hands, and realizes the screens in several sizes. He mixes the screens in all orthogonal positions, even overlapping some of them, and separately uses with no addition the four basic colors of printing: cyan, magenta, yellow and black. The famous Leonardo's picture confronts altogether the techniques and the disorders of the industrial civilization.
The largest multiple Mona Lisa realized by Warhol, 320 x 208 cm, is for sale at Christie's in New York on May 13, lot 26B. The estimate is not published, but this lot is expected in the region of $ 40M. Warhol's Liberty referred above was sold for $ 43,7M including premium by Christie's on November 14, 2012.
I invite you to play the video shared by Christie's.
1963 Sir George and the Petty Thief
2017 SOLD for $ 52M including premium
At the turn of the 1960s the art world is demanding changes. Abstraction has taken up too much space and cancels the psychological observation. Francis Bacon then enjoys the top level of fame to such an extent that his sado-masochistic impulses are reversed : after Peter Lacy's death, Francis desires to dominate a young male muse.
George Dyer meets perfectly this new need. His powerful body evokes the masculine nudes sculpted by Michelangelo. His shabby life as a petty thief innocent of art excites Francis who creates the unverifiable story of their first encounter in 1963 during a burglary in his studio. Francis sometimes nicknames 'Sir George' this magnificent lover.
George has a weak personality that he vainly tries to offset by tobacco, drugs and alcohol. The colossus with feet of clay becomes for Francis a subject of study of the human contradictions. As ever Francis seeks through his models the mirror of his own complexity.
Francis grabs his brushes to deepen this new quest. He likes the series on a homogeneous background for their possibility of varying the expression. His very first study for a portrait of George is a triptych of 35 x 30 cm elements displaying the head in life size, painted in 1963.
Francis twists nose and cheeks and adds vivid colors to better reveal the tensions but the overall features remain perfectly superimposable to the photographs of George. On a black background and with no information on the garment, this triple head that comes out of the shadows with an empty gaze is one of the most profound testimonies by Bacon on the psychological misery.
This triptych is sold by Christie's in New York on May 17, lot 38 B in the post-war and contemporary art evening sale. This lot is the subject of a special publication in 134 pages with an introduction by Brett Gorvy. The February 24 press release announces an estimate between $ 50M and $ 70M. Please watch the video shared by Christie's.
George Dyer meets perfectly this new need. His powerful body evokes the masculine nudes sculpted by Michelangelo. His shabby life as a petty thief innocent of art excites Francis who creates the unverifiable story of their first encounter in 1963 during a burglary in his studio. Francis sometimes nicknames 'Sir George' this magnificent lover.
George has a weak personality that he vainly tries to offset by tobacco, drugs and alcohol. The colossus with feet of clay becomes for Francis a subject of study of the human contradictions. As ever Francis seeks through his models the mirror of his own complexity.
Francis grabs his brushes to deepen this new quest. He likes the series on a homogeneous background for their possibility of varying the expression. His very first study for a portrait of George is a triptych of 35 x 30 cm elements displaying the head in life size, painted in 1963.
Francis twists nose and cheeks and adds vivid colors to better reveal the tensions but the overall features remain perfectly superimposable to the photographs of George. On a black background and with no information on the garment, this triple head that comes out of the shadows with an empty gaze is one of the most profound testimonies by Bacon on the psychological misery.
This triptych is sold by Christie's in New York on May 17, lot 38 B in the post-war and contemporary art evening sale. This lot is the subject of a special publication in 134 pages with an introduction by Brett Gorvy. The February 24 press release announces an estimate between $ 50M and $ 70M. Please watch the video shared by Christie's.
1963 How Francis viewed Henrietta
2015 SOLD for $ 48M including premium
A portrait of Henrietta Moraes by Francis Bacon was sold for £ 21.3M including premium by Christie's on February 14, 2012. It comes back for sale on May 13 in New York, also at Christie's, lot 23B.
Here is my previous discussion (slightly modified) of this lot :
They were not only boys in Soho drinking clubs. Francis Bacon looks at the girls although he is not sexually concerned with them.
They do not sit in his studio. He requires the photos by John Deakin to prepare the paintings of these friends but it is his usual practice for males or females, in close up faces or full length in the nude.
His two muses are Muriel Belcher and Henrietta Moraes. A painting made in 1961, showing one of them or a mixing of both, was sold for £ 8.3 million including premium by Sotheby's on 29 June 2011. In discussing this work in this column, I had indicated that the woman looked like a crouching piece of meat.
The figure of Henrietta coming for sale is an oil on canvas 165 x 142 cm painted in 1963. Perhaps in an effort to appreciate heterosexuality, the artist displays the woman naked on a bed with a pillow.
Henrietta, 33 years old, is not a monster. Francis appreciated that fact and this painting in lavish colors is a rare example of female eroticism in his art.
Here is my previous discussion (slightly modified) of this lot :
They were not only boys in Soho drinking clubs. Francis Bacon looks at the girls although he is not sexually concerned with them.
They do not sit in his studio. He requires the photos by John Deakin to prepare the paintings of these friends but it is his usual practice for males or females, in close up faces or full length in the nude.
His two muses are Muriel Belcher and Henrietta Moraes. A painting made in 1961, showing one of them or a mixing of both, was sold for £ 8.3 million including premium by Sotheby's on 29 June 2011. In discussing this work in this column, I had indicated that the woman looked like a crouching piece of meat.
The figure of Henrietta coming for sale is an oil on canvas 165 x 142 cm painted in 1963. Perhaps in an effort to appreciate heterosexuality, the artist displays the woman naked on a bed with a pillow.
Henrietta, 33 years old, is not a monster. Francis appreciated that fact and this painting in lavish colors is a rare example of female eroticism in his art.
1963 Infinite Scenery by Pan Tianshou
2018 SOLD for RMB 290M including premium by China Guardian
narrated in 2020
Pan Tianshou spent his entire career teaching art. Specialist in ancient Chinese painting, he was director of the National Academy from 1945 to 1947 and then from 1957 until his public humiliation by the Red Guards in 1966.
Since the 1920s, he developed an innovative technique of painting with his fingers to create a wash, which he completes with a brush for a great boldness in the distribution of details. The artist enters his paper placed on the ground to produce works of very large format.
His drawings have an extremely expressive jerky line. For landscapes, he is the painter of summits, with pines shaken by the wind and eagles and crows proud of their domination.
On November 24, 2018, China Guardian sold for RMB 290M including premium a very high hanging scroll, 360 x 150 cm, made in 1963 in ink and color on paper. Three titles have been proposed : Infinite scenery, Infinite scenery in dangerous peaks, View from the peak.
The composition includes a foreground with a shrub and a series of rocks that lead to the summit. The view is free towards another mountain of which only the upper part has been drawn, the impression of a majestic height being accentuated by the center of the image which is left blank.
Realized in 1958 with the same technique and an equally spectacular composition, a horizontal scroll 140 x 364 cm titled Pine after rain was sold for RMB 206M including premium by the same auction house on November 20, 2019. It is illustrated in the post sale press release of the auction house.
Since the 1920s, he developed an innovative technique of painting with his fingers to create a wash, which he completes with a brush for a great boldness in the distribution of details. The artist enters his paper placed on the ground to produce works of very large format.
His drawings have an extremely expressive jerky line. For landscapes, he is the painter of summits, with pines shaken by the wind and eagles and crows proud of their domination.
On November 24, 2018, China Guardian sold for RMB 290M including premium a very high hanging scroll, 360 x 150 cm, made in 1963 in ink and color on paper. Three titles have been proposed : Infinite scenery, Infinite scenery in dangerous peaks, View from the peak.
The composition includes a foreground with a shrub and a series of rocks that lead to the summit. The view is free towards another mountain of which only the upper part has been drawn, the impression of a majestic height being accentuated by the center of the image which is left blank.
Realized in 1958 with the same technique and an equally spectacular composition, a horizontal scroll 140 x 364 cm titled Pine after rain was sold for RMB 206M including premium by the same auction house on November 20, 2019. It is illustrated in the post sale press release of the auction house.
