Andy WARHOL (1928-1987)
Except otherwise stated, all results include the premium.
See also : Top 10 USA Celebrities by Warhol Elvis and Liz USA by Warhol Later Warhols The Woman Groups Christianity Animals
Chronology : 20th Century 1960-1969 1962 1963 1964 1966 1980-1989 1986
See also : Top 10 USA Celebrities by Warhol Elvis and Liz USA by Warhol Later Warhols The Woman Groups Christianity Animals
Chronology : 20th Century 1960-1969 1962 1963 1964 1966 1980-1989 1986
Intro
1962 is the year of the first exhibitions dedicated to Warhol in Los Angeles and New York. Suddenly, from nowhere, appeared the seminal Warholian themes of contemporary art: the Campbell's soup, Marilyn, the dollar.
Warhol's contribution is to introduce in art such popular images that are instantly recognizable by everyone, and yet are paintings. Doing it he actually created current art, or still better the art of the current world.
He operated at all scales the fruitful idea of multiples, for which he is helped by the silkscreen printing technique in two complementary ways: separate similar works with variations of colors, and juxtaposition of identical patterns on the same work.
Warhol's contribution is to introduce in art such popular images that are instantly recognizable by everyone, and yet are paintings. Doing it he actually created current art, or still better the art of the current world.
He operated at all scales the fruitful idea of multiples, for which he is helped by the silkscreen printing technique in two complementary ways: separate similar works with variations of colors, and juxtaposition of identical patterns on the same work.
1962 Coca-Cola
2012 SOLD for $ 57M by Christie's
In 1962, Warhol's art focuses on the American consumer society synthesized in four themes: the dollar, Marilyn, the soup cans and the bottles of Coca-Cola.
Coming from the advertising, he now stands out completely. The Campbell's soup cans have an extraordinary feature : the box is singled in the image, with no added text and nothing to embellish. The models differ only by their labels.
The artist turns advertising into derision. He painted the same year a Campbell's can torn to be destroyed. This remarkable indicator of the artistic intention of Warhol has been sold for $ 11.7M by Christie's on May 9, 2006, despite its small size, 51 x 41 cm.
For Warhol, the Coca-Cola bottle in a single model with no variant is the common point between all Americans without any social distinction. The US President, Liz Taylor and the observer of the art of Warhol see and use this object in the same way. It is a symbol of equality. At the same time, Warhol is also studying the soup cans which he stages in incredible positions with dimensions similar to those of humans.
Equality is socially too important for joking, and the bottle of Coca-Cola, even when oversized, remains standing with the utmost seriousness. For this reason, variations are not appropriate and this bottle is the rarest among the top iconic symbols of the first year of Warhol.
The early Coca-Colas by Warhol are made singly by hand in black, without recourse to the silkscreen.
Soup and coke were linked in the mind of Warhol. A simple watercolored drawing, 60 x 45 cm, also made in 1962, shows the can upside down over the neck of the bottle. It was sold for $ 2.8M by Sotheby's on May 15, 2007.
The idea of multiples is already another key of the world of Warhol. Coca-Cola (3), casein on cotton 176 x 137 cm, has exactly the same figure as (4) but in a smaller size. (3) was sold for $ 57M from a lower estimate of $ 40M by Christie's on November 12, 2012. This artwork is illustrated in the article shared by Bloomberg.
Coca-Cola (4), acrylic on canvas 208 x 144 cm was sold for $ 35M by Sotheby's on November 9, 2010.
Coming from the advertising, he now stands out completely. The Campbell's soup cans have an extraordinary feature : the box is singled in the image, with no added text and nothing to embellish. The models differ only by their labels.
The artist turns advertising into derision. He painted the same year a Campbell's can torn to be destroyed. This remarkable indicator of the artistic intention of Warhol has been sold for $ 11.7M by Christie's on May 9, 2006, despite its small size, 51 x 41 cm.
For Warhol, the Coca-Cola bottle in a single model with no variant is the common point between all Americans without any social distinction. The US President, Liz Taylor and the observer of the art of Warhol see and use this object in the same way. It is a symbol of equality. At the same time, Warhol is also studying the soup cans which he stages in incredible positions with dimensions similar to those of humans.
Equality is socially too important for joking, and the bottle of Coca-Cola, even when oversized, remains standing with the utmost seriousness. For this reason, variations are not appropriate and this bottle is the rarest among the top iconic symbols of the first year of Warhol.
The early Coca-Colas by Warhol are made singly by hand in black, without recourse to the silkscreen.
Soup and coke were linked in the mind of Warhol. A simple watercolored drawing, 60 x 45 cm, also made in 1962, shows the can upside down over the neck of the bottle. It was sold for $ 2.8M by Sotheby's on May 15, 2007.
The idea of multiples is already another key of the world of Warhol. Coca-Cola (3), casein on cotton 176 x 137 cm, has exactly the same figure as (4) but in a smaller size. (3) was sold for $ 57M from a lower estimate of $ 40M by Christie's on November 12, 2012. This artwork is illustrated in the article shared by Bloomberg.
Coca-Cola (4), acrylic on canvas 208 x 144 cm was sold for $ 35M by Sotheby's on November 9, 2010.
Masterpiece
1962 Gold Marilyn
MoMA
After his first solo exhibition in July 1962 in Los Angeles, Andy Warhol, a former advertising illustrator turned artist and the painter of Coca Cola bottles and Campbell's cans, manages to develop a quick and repeatable technique to produce paintings : silkscreen printing over a painted surface. With such a process, he will make multiple images either dispositioned side by side on the same canvas or featured in different colors on separated canvas.
He makes his first trials with photographs of teen stars, Natalie Wood, Troy Donahue and Warren Beatty. The sudden death of Marilyn Monroe on August 5 is a major shock to the American dream. Magazines explore frantically the last periods of her life.just at that time. Warhol appreciates that the image of the actress who had mingled tragedy and glamour was a perfect theme for the development of his art beyond cats and soup cans.
Marilyn was dazzling. Andy chooses a film still made in 1952 to exalt his new posthumous muse. He copies the same image four times, in two columns and two rows, for a total size that now would seem small, 73 x 55 cm. In addition to the nice smile, the yellow hair before the orange background is expressing that death should not take its toll on the actress.
The early trials do not meet the productivity required by Warhol. The series of twelve single Marilyn 51 x 41 cm are made with a single screen printing over acrylic paints of various colors. Two of these paintings are monochromatic. They are the precursors of the global imaging desired by Warhol.
The White Marilyn was sold for $ 41M by Christie's on May 13, 2014. Here are two results for colored variants. The Lemon Marilyn was sold for $ 28M by Christie's on May 18, 2007, lot 18. The Orange Marilyn was sold for $ 16.3M by Christie's on November 15, 2006, lot 32.
This series of twelve is contemporary with the Gold Marilyn currently at the MoMA, where the single silkscreen portrait surrounded by a halo occupies the center of a monumental canvas 211 x 145 cm.
That fabulous Gold Marilyn confirms that Warhol chose the theme of Marilyn through a mystical impulse and not by worldliness or desire to shock. A deep believer, he will come much later to religious iconography, preferring to show a preaching Christ rather than dying on the cross. His choice of an early picture of a Marilyn resplendent before the tragic events of her life matches the same idea.
He makes his first trials with photographs of teen stars, Natalie Wood, Troy Donahue and Warren Beatty. The sudden death of Marilyn Monroe on August 5 is a major shock to the American dream. Magazines explore frantically the last periods of her life.just at that time. Warhol appreciates that the image of the actress who had mingled tragedy and glamour was a perfect theme for the development of his art beyond cats and soup cans.
Marilyn was dazzling. Andy chooses a film still made in 1952 to exalt his new posthumous muse. He copies the same image four times, in two columns and two rows, for a total size that now would seem small, 73 x 55 cm. In addition to the nice smile, the yellow hair before the orange background is expressing that death should not take its toll on the actress.
The early trials do not meet the productivity required by Warhol. The series of twelve single Marilyn 51 x 41 cm are made with a single screen printing over acrylic paints of various colors. Two of these paintings are monochromatic. They are the precursors of the global imaging desired by Warhol.
The White Marilyn was sold for $ 41M by Christie's on May 13, 2014. Here are two results for colored variants. The Lemon Marilyn was sold for $ 28M by Christie's on May 18, 2007, lot 18. The Orange Marilyn was sold for $ 16.3M by Christie's on November 15, 2006, lot 32.
This series of twelve is contemporary with the Gold Marilyn currently at the MoMA, where the single silkscreen portrait surrounded by a halo occupies the center of a monumental canvas 211 x 145 cm.
That fabulous Gold Marilyn confirms that Warhol chose the theme of Marilyn through a mystical impulse and not by worldliness or desire to shock. A deep believer, he will come much later to religious iconography, preferring to show a preaching Christ rather than dying on the cross. His choice of an early picture of a Marilyn resplendent before the tragic events of her life matches the same idea.
1962 Men in her Life
2010 SOLD for $ 63M by Phillips de Pury
The artistic language explored by Andy Warhol in 1962 is absolutely new. Objects from the mass consumption have their place in art in the form of series because they constitute an imaginary world understandable by everybody, and too bad if it is trivial. When he appreciates the advantage of screen printing to flood the art world with his pictures, he multiplies the dollars, more precisely the images of banknotes.
The world is fake and the celebrities are ephemeral. Warhol multiplies the Marilyns after the death of the actress as if she were a new Madonna. It is not enough for him. He will attack both the artificial life of the stars and the lies of photographs and newspapers.
Precisely, an article published by Life on April 13, 1962 summarizes the pathetic trajectory of the top movie star of the moment, Liz Taylor. After two divorces, she had been the widow of Mike Todd and it is clear that her fourth marriage, with Eddie Fisher, will not last. One of the photos cut from Life had been taken at the Epsom Derby in 1957. It shows two married couples whose destinies will soon collapse, Todd and Taylor and Fisher with Debbie Reynolds.
Made in the fall of 1962, Men in her Life is a black and white silkscreen on canvas 215 x 212 cm based on that happy image which is copied 38 times in seven rows. The artist varied the contrasts, from saturated to clear. A classic reading from left to right and from top to bottom transforms this unique theme into an agonizing narration, with a gradual deterioration in the quality of the image and in its cropping and with the jagged appearance of the right edge.
The variety of contrasts and framings opens the way for the Elvis Ferus-type of the following year. The title makes the actress appear as a man-eater, anticipating the morbid atmosphere of Death and Disaster and especially the mosaics of images of Car Crash, also from 1963. Again in 1963 the seriously ill Liz will succeed Marilyn in Warhol's pantheon.
Men in her Life was sold for $ 63M by Phillips de Pury on November 8, 2010, lot 15.
The world is fake and the celebrities are ephemeral. Warhol multiplies the Marilyns after the death of the actress as if she were a new Madonna. It is not enough for him. He will attack both the artificial life of the stars and the lies of photographs and newspapers.
Precisely, an article published by Life on April 13, 1962 summarizes the pathetic trajectory of the top movie star of the moment, Liz Taylor. After two divorces, she had been the widow of Mike Todd and it is clear that her fourth marriage, with Eddie Fisher, will not last. One of the photos cut from Life had been taken at the Epsom Derby in 1957. It shows two married couples whose destinies will soon collapse, Todd and Taylor and Fisher with Debbie Reynolds.
Made in the fall of 1962, Men in her Life is a black and white silkscreen on canvas 215 x 212 cm based on that happy image which is copied 38 times in seven rows. The artist varied the contrasts, from saturated to clear. A classic reading from left to right and from top to bottom transforms this unique theme into an agonizing narration, with a gradual deterioration in the quality of the image and in its cropping and with the jagged appearance of the right edge.
The variety of contrasts and framings opens the way for the Elvis Ferus-type of the following year. The title makes the actress appear as a man-eater, anticipating the morbid atmosphere of Death and Disaster and especially the mosaics of images of Car Crash, also from 1963. Again in 1963 the seriously ill Liz will succeed Marilyn in Warhol's pantheon.
Men in her Life was sold for $ 63M by Phillips de Pury on November 8, 2010, lot 15.
1963 Car Crash
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
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.
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.
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.
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.
1964 Shot Marilyn
2022 SOLD for $ 195M by Christie's
In 1964 Andy Warhol revisits his quintessential Marilyn with a more sophisticated screening process for an increased luminosity and detail. He prepares five paintings 102 x 102 cm each in acrylic and silkscreen ink on linen, with respective red, orange, light blue, sage blue and turquoise backgrounds.
He is still stacking them at The Factory when a woman asks him the authorization to shoot them. She is the friend of the usual photographer of The Factory and Andy accepts. She does not come with a camera but with a revolver and shoots the stack of four at the level of Marilyn's forehead. They are now known as the Shot Marilyns despite being repaired with no evidence left from the hole. The turquoise had been spared. Andy fired the photographer.
Shot Orange was sold for $ 17.3M by Sotheby's on May 14, 1998. It was rumored in December 2017 to have been sold for $ 250M to the financier Kenneth Griffin. Shot Red was sold by Christie's to a Japanese bidder for $ 4M in 1989 and privately acquired by Philip Niarchos in 1994 for a reported $ 3.6M. Shot Light Blue was acquired in 1967 by Peter Brant. Spared from the shot, the Turquoise was rumored in 2007 to have been sold to Steven Cohen for $ 80M.
Coming from the collection of the Ammann dealer brother and sister team, Shot Sage Blue Marilyn was sold for $ 195M by Christie's on May 9, 2022, lot 36A.
He is still stacking them at The Factory when a woman asks him the authorization to shoot them. She is the friend of the usual photographer of The Factory and Andy accepts. She does not come with a camera but with a revolver and shoots the stack of four at the level of Marilyn's forehead. They are now known as the Shot Marilyns despite being repaired with no evidence left from the hole. The turquoise had been spared. Andy fired the photographer.
Shot Orange was sold for $ 17.3M by Sotheby's on May 14, 1998. It was rumored in December 2017 to have been sold for $ 250M to the financier Kenneth Griffin. Shot Red was sold by Christie's to a Japanese bidder for $ 4M in 1989 and privately acquired by Philip Niarchos in 1994 for a reported $ 3.6M. Shot Light Blue was acquired in 1967 by Peter Brant. Spared from the shot, the Turquoise was rumored in 2007 to have been sold to Steven Cohen for $ 80M.
Coming from the collection of the Ammann dealer brother and sister team, Shot Sage Blue Marilyn was sold for $ 195M by Christie's on May 9, 2022, lot 36A.
1964 Race Riot
2014 SOLD for $ 63M by Christie's
The publication by Life magazine on May 17, 1963 of photos of the repression of race riots in Alabama shocked America and the world. The United States are seen as a country in civil war. The land of racial hatred.
This report possibly had the strongest political impact in the history of the press. Kennedy understood that the reforms of laws and behaviors are inevitable. The road will be long, but civil peace will eventually settle. These photos made by Charles Moore for Associated Press are the Guernica of America.
At the same time, Andy Warhol releases the real meaning of his own artistic message. Consumerism is an artifact, advertising is a technique which however has the merit of having shown the expressive power of the multiple image.
Andy chose his press photos around the theme of death in America. The gathering of the Death and Disaster series reveals the true reason of the post mortem portrait of Marilyn. Warhol's message did not receive the same immediate impact as Guernica's. It took almost half a century before the multiples of the Car Crash are pushed toward the top position in the art of the twentieth century.
Recuperating the photos published by Life, the Race Riot by Warhol is his most political image, using a historical event in progress. He hates violence and fears death. The running Black is the victim, the dog excited to bite is the symbol of horror.
After painting a few units of the Race Riot, Warhol made in 1964 a multiple 2 x 2. In the top register, white color is the truth and blue is chilling. On the down side the double red is blood.
This quadruple Race Riot, 152 x 168 cm overall, was sold for $ 63M by Christie's on May 13, 2014.
This report possibly had the strongest political impact in the history of the press. Kennedy understood that the reforms of laws and behaviors are inevitable. The road will be long, but civil peace will eventually settle. These photos made by Charles Moore for Associated Press are the Guernica of America.
At the same time, Andy Warhol releases the real meaning of his own artistic message. Consumerism is an artifact, advertising is a technique which however has the merit of having shown the expressive power of the multiple image.
Andy chose his press photos around the theme of death in America. The gathering of the Death and Disaster series reveals the true reason of the post mortem portrait of Marilyn. Warhol's message did not receive the same immediate impact as Guernica's. It took almost half a century before the multiples of the Car Crash are pushed toward the top position in the art of the twentieth century.
Recuperating the photos published by Life, the Race Riot by Warhol is his most political image, using a historical event in progress. He hates violence and fears death. The running Black is the victim, the dog excited to bite is the symbol of horror.
After painting a few units of the Race Riot, Warhol made in 1964 a multiple 2 x 2. In the top register, white color is the truth and blue is chilling. On the down side the double red is blood.
This quadruple Race Riot, 152 x 168 cm overall, was sold for $ 63M by Christie's on May 13, 2014.
1966 Marlon
2014 SOLD for $ 70M by Christie's
Andy Warhol was an interpreter of the society of his time. He was a film buff and the pictorial images which made him famous in 1962 were a last resort. Even Elvis, the king of music hall, is reappropriated in 1963 through an image taken from a movie. Warhol multiplies the cinematographic experiences as producer and director and announces in 1965 that he will devote himself entirely to cinema, with a clear tendency for the underground.
The star actor of the Warhol generation is Marlon Brando. In 1953 in The Wild One, Brando and his gang of bikers embody the rebellion against the established order. The young man is the archetype and the archangel of the new rebels without a cause. Andy reappropriates a publicity still on which the modern gang leader rides his Triumph. With his leather jacket and his cap, he is the archetype of the new lawless thug. Andy makes in 1963 a single painting, on a silver background.
This image is reused by Warhol in 1966 in the circumstances of the new threats against the American dream. The challenge is everywhere, against the war in Vietnam, for racial equality, against the social establishment, for non-violence. He seems to have chosen to revisit this theme himself, without a commission from a dealer or a prompting by a friend.
He prepares eight opuses of this Marlon by screen printing on raw unprimed linen, bringing a strange color as well as a great shine, with or without the large empty margin designed to unbalance the reading of the image. Only three of them are repeated images.
The two by two quad 206 x 165 cm without margins has no equivalent in that theme. It was sold for $ 70M by Christie's on November 12, 2014, lot 10.
A double Marlon, 213 x 243 cm, was sold for $ 32.5M by Christie's on May 13, 2008, lot 12. The left margin, much larger than the image, and the monochromy position this view in the following of the disasters, as if Andy had made his choice between his attraction to the first movies played by Marlon and the threats brought by the thugs.
With a green left margin, a simple Marlon, 104 x 117 cm, was sold for $ 23.7M by Christie's on November 14, 2012, lot 14.
The star actor of the Warhol generation is Marlon Brando. In 1953 in The Wild One, Brando and his gang of bikers embody the rebellion against the established order. The young man is the archetype and the archangel of the new rebels without a cause. Andy reappropriates a publicity still on which the modern gang leader rides his Triumph. With his leather jacket and his cap, he is the archetype of the new lawless thug. Andy makes in 1963 a single painting, on a silver background.
This image is reused by Warhol in 1966 in the circumstances of the new threats against the American dream. The challenge is everywhere, against the war in Vietnam, for racial equality, against the social establishment, for non-violence. He seems to have chosen to revisit this theme himself, without a commission from a dealer or a prompting by a friend.
He prepares eight opuses of this Marlon by screen printing on raw unprimed linen, bringing a strange color as well as a great shine, with or without the large empty margin designed to unbalance the reading of the image. Only three of them are repeated images.
The two by two quad 206 x 165 cm without margins has no equivalent in that theme. It was sold for $ 70M by Christie's on November 12, 2014, lot 10.
A double Marlon, 213 x 243 cm, was sold for $ 32.5M by Christie's on May 13, 2008, lot 12. The left margin, much larger than the image, and the monochromy position this view in the following of the disasters, as if Andy had made his choice between his attraction to the first movies played by Marlon and the threats brought by the thugs.
With a green left margin, a simple Marlon, 104 x 117 cm, was sold for $ 23.7M by Christie's on November 14, 2012, lot 14.
1986 Sixty Last Suppers
2017 SOLD for $ 61M by Christie's
Shy and famous at the same time, Andy Warhol was discussing with friends throughout his career before selecting his most popular themes. The story of the dollar at the very beginning of his realization of multiples is typical. In 1985 the gallery owner Alexander Iolas suggests a new theme of interpretations of Leonardo's Last Supper to be exhibited in Milan across the street from the permanent location of the original.
Warhol is working hard on this project that had everything to seduce him. For devout Catholics the Last Supper is the founding act of the mystical Christianity by which Christ announces his death and resurrection and especially his sharing with the whole mankind.
Warhol had himself something like a resurrection in 1968 when his heart restarted after the assassination attempt. He felt that he was going to die during the surgical operation of his gallbladder which was inevitable but was constantly postponed by him. This intuition was right.
In that impulse Warhol realized about 100 variations around Leonardo's Last Supper in 1986 while about 20 were enough for the Milan exhibition. He did not take as model the original painting but two poor photographs of old copies. This final project brilliantly terminates his own pop art revolution by which the visual message and the ability to copy and multiply it are more important than the skill even when the artist is Leonardo himself.
This series includes a few monumental pieces in a perfect repetition that reaches the infinite. Christ 112 times in yellow which is a reproduction of a detail measures 203 x 1069 cm. This artwork was sold for $ 9.5M by Sotheby's on May 14, 2008.
On November 15, 2017, Christie's sold for $ 61M a multiplication of the entire picture, Sixty Last Suppers, lot 13 B. This 295 x 998 cm canvas which is undoubtedly the largest in the series and perhaps even in his entire career in terms of surface was not included in the Milan exhibition. Please watch the video shared by Christie's.
Warhol is working hard on this project that had everything to seduce him. For devout Catholics the Last Supper is the founding act of the mystical Christianity by which Christ announces his death and resurrection and especially his sharing with the whole mankind.
Warhol had himself something like a resurrection in 1968 when his heart restarted after the assassination attempt. He felt that he was going to die during the surgical operation of his gallbladder which was inevitable but was constantly postponed by him. This intuition was right.
In that impulse Warhol realized about 100 variations around Leonardo's Last Supper in 1986 while about 20 were enough for the Milan exhibition. He did not take as model the original painting but two poor photographs of old copies. This final project brilliantly terminates his own pop art revolution by which the visual message and the ability to copy and multiply it are more important than the skill even when the artist is Leonardo himself.
This series includes a few monumental pieces in a perfect repetition that reaches the infinite. Christ 112 times in yellow which is a reproduction of a detail measures 203 x 1069 cm. This artwork was sold for $ 9.5M by Sotheby's on May 14, 2008.
On November 15, 2017, Christie's sold for $ 61M a multiplication of the entire picture, Sixty Last Suppers, lot 13 B. This 295 x 998 cm canvas which is undoubtedly the largest in the series and perhaps even in his entire career in terms of surface was not included in the Milan exhibition. Please watch the video shared by Christie's.
