Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Andy Warhol Collection of Work


About the Museum


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The Andy Warhol Museum, front facade, 1994, photo by Paul Rocheleau.
The Andy Warhol Museum is a vital forum in which diverse audiences of artists, scholars, and the general public are galvanized through creative interaction with the art and life of Andy Warhol.  The Warhol is ever-changing, constantly redefining itself in relationship to contemporary life using its unique collections and dynamic interactive programming as tools.

Read more at warhol.org: http://www.warhol.org/museum/about/#ixzz1teuYgWVa

early work


Although best known for his silkscreen paintings, Andy Warhol was also an excellent draughtsman. Drawing was a constant part of his artistic practice. As a child he took classes at the Carnegie Museum of Art, and he won several awards for drawings he produced in high school. At Carnegie Institute for Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University), where Warhol earned a degree in pictorial design, his offbeat, nontraditional and sometimes irreverent drawing style did not always meet his professors’ academic standards. At one point they forced him to do extra work over the summer to remain in good standing at school. Upon graduation, Warhol moved to New York to begin his commercial design career.
In the 1950s Warhol used a “blotted line” technique to develop a signature style for his illustrations. Blotted line combines drawing with very basic printmaking, and it enabled Warhol to create a variety of illustrations along a similar theme. The process had many complex components. First, Warhol copied a line drawing onto a piece of non-absorbent paper, such as tracing paper. Next he hinged this piece of paper to a second sheet of more absorbent paper by taping their edges together on one side. With a nib pen, he inked over a small section of the drawn lines. He then transferred the ink onto the second sheet by folding along the hinge and lightly pressing or “blotting” the two papers together. Larger drawings were made in sections, and completing a large blotted line drawing took time and multiple pressings. The process resulted in the dotted, broken and delicate lines that are characteristic of Warhol’s illustrations. Warhol often colored his blotted line drawings with watercolor dyes or applied gold leaf. He also used hand-carved rubber stamps to create patterns. He employed all of these techniques in his burgeoning success as a commercial illustrator such as his award-winning and whimsical designs for I Miller shoes or the high end leather company Fleming Joffe. During the decade he also filled many sketchbooks with freehand drawings—mostly done in ballpoint pen—of friends and still-life objects. Wild Raspberries and A Gold Book are two books of drawings from this era.
While making a name for himself in New York, Warhol participated in the exciting metropolitan cultural life of the city. Despite his success as a commercial artist, Warhol longed to be known as a fine artist. He went to dance and opera performances, galleries, museums, and the New York Public Library, where he researched images that he later transformed in his work. In 1956, he left the United States for the first time and traveled around the world—visiting Japan, Cambodia, India, Egypt and Italy. After this enlightening experience, Warhol decided that his ambitions exceeded the bounds of the commercial art world. For the first time since his student years, he returned to painting on canvas. He began to make friends in the contemporary art world of downtown Manhattan—this scene embraced new forms of all arts, including dance, performance and film.
Early Work: Points of View
“Working with Andy, by the way, was a very uncomplicated, very pleasurable, kind of experience from the point of working with a thorough professional. He was always on time. He always did what he said he was going to do. He did not have a big ego about his work. If we liked it, it was great. If we wanted to make a change, it was just fine with him. Andy was very, very smart, he got totally involved in a project. Andy was never superficial. People who say that about him were completely off.”
Teddy Edelman, art director of The Edelman Leather Company
“…I would draw I. Miller shoes on tracing paper, and Andy would make corrections. Andy then made a drawing from that and blotted it. Over the years, he got so busy that he didn’t have time to blot it, so I would blot it. Andy’s mother signed his handwriting, so she had over the years become tired of that, and I would fake it. Another reason why he liked it [the blotted line technique] so much [was that] by having your master drawing with which you made your blot, you could keep blotting it and redrawing it and reblotting it each time and make duplicate images.”
Nathan Gluck, commercial art assistant, interviewed by Partick Smith, Warhol: Conversations about the Artist
“One Sunday…we went down to the flower market and bought some irises and came back and spent the afternoon drawing…He would just draw one line and then leave it, and when I would draw things, I was always erasing, changing, and improving. And he never improved on anything. Rather than do that, he would draw a new one, which is something I never thought of doing in those days.”
Charles Lisanby, interviewed by Patrick Smith on Nov. 11, 1978

work gallery

Highlights of the collection include student works from Warhol's years at Carnegie Tech (now Carnegie Mellon University); commercial art and sketchbook drawings from his early years in New York City; masterpieces of Pop art, such as his portraits of Marilyn, Liz, Elvis, Campbell's Soup Cans, Brillo Boxes and Flowers, and Cow wallpaper and Silver Clouds; examples of great series, such as his paintings on the subject of Death in America, Maos, Skulls, and Rorshach; commissioned portraits and photographs from the 1970s and 80s; and monumental late works--including hand-painted representations of popular imagery, collaborations with the young artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, and the Last Supper and Camouflage series. Punctuating this collection are Warhol's self-portraits from throughout his career.
























 

andy warhol biography


Early Life

Andy Warhol was born Andrew Warhola on August 6, 1928, in a two-room row house apartment at 73 Orr Street in Pittsburgh. His parents, Carpatho-Rusyn immigrants Andrej and Julia Warhola, had three sons. Andy was their youngest.
Devout Byzantine Catholics, the family attended mass regularly and observed the traditions of their Eastern European heritage. Warhol’s father, a laborer, moved his family to a brick home on Dawson Street in 1934. Warhol attended the nearby Holmes School and took free art classes at Carnegie Institute (now The Carnegie Museum of Art). In addition to drawing, Hollywood movies enraptured Andy and he frequented the local cinema. When he was about nine years old, he received his first camera. Andy enjoyed taking pictures, and he developed them himself in his basement.
Andrej Warhola died in 1942, the same year that Andy entered Schenley High School. Recognizing his son’s talent, Andrej had saved money to pay for his college education. Warhol attended Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) from 1945 to 1949. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Pictorial Design with the goal of becoming a commercial illustrator. During these years he worked in the display department at Horne’s department store.

Success is a Job in New York – The 1950s

Soon after graduating, Warhol moved to New York City to pursue a career as a commercial artist. His work debuted in Glamour magazine in September 1949. Warhol became one of the most successful illustrators of the 1950s, winning numerous awards. He had a unique, whimsical style of drawing that belied its frequent sources: traced photographs and imagery. At times Warhol employed the delightfully quirky handwriting of his mother, who was always credited as “Andy Warhol’s Mother,” Julia Warhola left Pittsburgh in 1952 and lived with her son for almost 20 years before her death in Pittsburgh in 1972.
Warhol rewarded himself for his hard work by taking a round-the-world vacation with his friend Charles Lisanby from June 16 to August 12, 1956. They toured Hawaii and many countries in Asia and Europe. It was Warhol’s first trip abroad and a significant event in his life.
Serendipity 3, a trendy restaurant and ice cream parlor located on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, was a place where Warhol sometimes exhibited his work. He often held parties there--his friends could gorge themselves on the restaurant’s signature “frrrozen hot chocolate” while helping Warhol hand-color his self-published artists’ books.

Factory Years – The 1960s

In the late 1950s, Warhol began to devote more energy to painting. He made his first Pop paintings, which he based on comics and ads, in 1961. The following year marked the beginning of Warhol’s celebrity. He debuted his famous Campbell’s Soup Can series, which caused a sensation in the art world. Shortly thereafter he began a large sequence of movie star portraits, including Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley, and Elizabeth Taylor. Warhol also started his series of “death and disaster” paintings at that time.
Between 1963 and 1968 Warhol worked with his Superstar performers and various other people to create hundreds of films. These films were scripted and improvised, ranging from conceptual experiments and simple narratives to short portraits and sexploitation features. His works include Empire (1964), The Chelsea Girls (1966), and the Screen Tests (1964-66).
Warhol’s first exhibition of sculptures was held in 1964. It included hundreds of replicas of large supermarket product boxes, including Brillo Boxes and Heinz Boxes. For this occasion, he premiered his new studio, painted silver and known as “The Factory”. It quickly became “the” place to be in New York; parties held there were mentioned in gossip columns throughout the country. Warhol held court at Max’s Kansas City, a nightclub that was a popular hangout among artists and celebrities. By the mid-1960s he was a frequent presence in magazines and the media.
Warhol expanded into the realm of performance art with a traveling multimedia show called The Exploding Plastic Inevitable, which featured The Velvet Underground, a rock band. In 1966 Warhol exhibited Cow Wallpaper and Silver Clouds at the Leo Castelli Gallery.

Exposure – The 1970s

Warhol self-published a large series of artists’ books in the 1950s, but the first one to be mass-produced was Andy Warhol’s Index (Book), published in 1967. Two years later he co-founded Interview, a magazine devoted to film, fashion, and popular culture. Interview is still in circulation today. His later books include THE Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B and Back Again) (1975), Exposures (1979), POPism (1980), and America (1985). Most of his books were based on transcribed conversations.
In 1974, Warhol started a series of Time Capsules: cardboard boxes that he filled with the materials of his everyday life, including mail, photos, art, clothing, collectibles, etc. The artist produced over 600 of them and they are now an archival goldmine of his life and times.
Throughout the 1970s Warhol frequently socialized with celebrities such as Jackie Kennedy Onassis and Truman Capote, both of whom had been important early subjects in his art. He started to receive dozens—and soon hundreds—of commissions for painted portraits from wealthy socialites, musicians and film stars. Celebrity portraits developed into a significant aspect of his career and a main source of income. He was a regular partygoer at Studio 54, the famous New York disco, along with celebrities such as fashion designer Halston, entertainer Liza Minnelli, and Bianca Jagger.

The Last Supper – The 1980s

In 1984, Warhol collaborated with the young artists Jean-Michel Basquiat, Francesco Clemente, and Keith Haring. Warhol returned to painting with a brush for these artworks, briefly abandoning the silkscreen method he had used exclusively since 1962.
In the mid-1980s his television shows, Andy Warhol’s T.V. and Andy Warhol’s Fifteen Minutes were broadcast on New York cable television and nationally on MTV. He created work for Saturday Night Live, appeared in an episode of The Love Boat and produced music videos for rock bands such as The Cars. Warhol also signed with a few modeling agencies, appearing in fashion shows and numerous print and television ads.
Warhol was a prolific artist, producing numerous works through the 1970s and 1980s. His paintings, prints, photographs, and drawings from this period include: Mao, Ladies and Gentlemen, Skulls, Hammer and Sickles, Shadows, Guns, Knives, Crosses, Dollar Signs, Zeitgeist, and Camouflage. Warhol’s final two exhibitions were his series of Last Supper paintings, shown in Milan and his Sewn Photos (multiple prints of identical photos sewn together in a grid), exhibited in New York. Both shows opened in January 1987, one month before his death.

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