In 1949, he moved to New York, where he dressed department store windows and worked as a commercial artist, designing magazines and advertisements. During the 1950s, he began producing loose, blotted-ink drawings of shoe advertisements, and after exhibiting these, RCA Records hired him to design album covers and promotional materials. Unusually, he began exploiting his commercial printmaking processes as fine art images. One of the elements of these processes was that he left in mistakes, so smudges, smears and off-registered marks became a feature of his art.
In 1962, he had his first New York solo Pop art exhibition that included his Marilyn Diptych, 100 Soup Cans, 100 Coke Bottles and 100 Dollar Bills. These mass-produced images of things seen every day, such as Brillo pad boxes, Campbell’s soup cans, comic strip characters, movie stars and Coca-Cola bottles, presented as fine art, were accessible to the masses, reflected the era of consumerism he was living in, and announced that art was for everyone. Concurrently, he founded a studio, “The Factory,” which became a meeting place for New York’s avant-garde. There, he produced his art and short underground films. In 1964, he took part in a New York exhibition, “The American Supermarket,” that was presented as the interior of a typical American small store, except that everything in it was created by six Pop artists. Warhol’s print of a can of Campbell’s soup exhibited there cost $1,500 and each autographed can sold for $6.
The show triggered the question of what is art? Warhol was making the point that celebrity—whether a person or a brand—had replaced true values. His series, whether of Marilyn Monroe, dollar bills or soup cans, were to point out the public’s obsession with fame, branding, and society’s excesses in a media-saturated culture. His ideas transformed art, its culture, the way it is made, and what is acceptable in the art world.
Key Works
Campbell’s Soup Cans 1962, THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART, NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK, US
Marilyn Diptych 1962, TATE MODERN, LONDON, UK
Green Coca-Cola Bottles 1962, WHITNEY MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART, NEW YORK, US
Elvis 1963, THE NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART, WASHINGTON, DC, US
Brillo Box 1964, TATE MODERN, LONDON, UK
Where to see, What to see
Around the world, there are countless places where you can see the most wonderful works of art. The locations might be large or small, public or private, secular or religious, unassuming or overwhelming. So the following list is by no means comprehensive, nor is it in any particular order, but it is simply some of the most popular art galleries and museums in various countries, with just some of their collection highlights, to inspire you.
Musée du Louvre, Paris, France important works include: Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci, 1503–19; Portrait of Baltassare Castiglione, Raphael, c.1514–15; The Fortune Teller, Caravaggio, c.1600; The Lacemaker, Vermeer, 1669–70; Liberty Leading the People, Delacroix, 1830; The Raft of the Medusa, Géricault, 1818–19; The Wedding at Cana, Veronese, 1563; Et in Arcadia Ego, Poussin, 1637–8; St. Sebastian, Mantegna, c.1431; Grand Odalisque, Ingres, 1814; The Oath of the Horatii, David, 1784; Self-portrait, Chardin, 1771.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, US important works include: Ia Orana Maria, Gauguin, 1891; The Gulf Stream, Homer, 1899; The Merode Altarpiece, Robert Campin (The Master of Flemalle), 1425–30; The Musicians, Caravaggio, c.1595; View of Toledo, El Greco, c.1604–14; The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne, Dürer, c.1519.
The National Gallery, London, UK important works include: The Ambassadors, Holbein, 1533; Bacchus and Ariadne, Titian, 1520–3; Bathers at Asnières, Seurat, 1884; Samson and Delilah, Rubens, c.1609–10; The Sunflowers, van Gogh, 1888; The Arnolfini Portrait, van Eyck, 1434; The Baptism of Christ, della Francesca, 1450; The Virgin of the Rocks, da Vinci, c.1491–1508; Still Life: An Allegory of the Vanities of Human Life, Steenwyck, c.1640; The Agony in the Garden, Mantegna, c.1455.
The Vatican Museums, Rome, Italy important works include: The Sistine Chapel Ceiling, Michelangelo, 1508–12; The School of Athens, Raphael, 1509; The Deposition, Caravaggio, c.1600–4; Stefaneschi triptych, Giotto, c.1320.
The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia important works include: Danaë, Rembrandt, 1636; The Stolen Kiss, Fragonard, c.1780; The Lunch, Velázquez, 1617; The Dance, Matisse, 1910.
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, Italy important works include: Madonna and Child with Angels, Filippo Lippi, c.1465; The Birth of Venus, Botticelli, 1486; Doni Tondo, Michelangelo, 1506–7; Judith Slaying Holofernes, Gentileschi, c.1611–12; Adoration of the Magi, Leonardo da Vinci, 1481; Santa Trinità Maestà, Cimabue, 1280–90.
Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid, Spain important works include: The Third of May, 1808; Goya, 1814; Las Meninas, Velázquez, 1656; The Fall of Man, Titian, c.1570; Artemisia, Rembrandt, 1634; The Three Graces, Rubens, c.1635.
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands important works include: The Nightwatch, Rembrandt, 1642; The Milkmaid, Vermeer, c.1660; Self-portrait, Rembrandt, 1629; Interior with Women beside a Linen Cupboard, de Hooch, 1663; Self-portrait, van Gogh, 1887.
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria important works include: The Tower of Babel, Brueghel, 1563; Infanta Margarita Teresa in a Blue Dress, Velázquez, 1659; Madonna of the Meadow, Raphael, 1506; The Art of Painting, Vermeer, 1665–6; Susannah and the Elders, Tintoretto, 1560–2.
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, USA important works include: Portrait of a Lady, van der Weyden, c.1460; The Assumption of the Virgin, Poussin, c.1626; The Plum, Manet, 1878; The Artist’s Garden at Vetheuil, Monet, 1880; Open Window Collioure, Matisse, 1905; The Family of Saltimbanques, Picasso, 1905; The Railway, Manet, 1872; The Loge, Cassatt, 1882; Symphony in White No. 1, the White Girl, Whistler, 1862.