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Andy Warhol (American, 1928 to 1987)

Andy Warhol, a son of an immigrant coal miner and arguably the most influential visual historian of the twentieth century, Andy Warhol was born in 1928 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Warhol moved to New York City in 1949 where he became a successful illustrator, painter, film-maker, and author and kept the company of socialites and street people alike. In a meaningful departure from Expressionism, Warhol embraced popular culture and commercial processes.

In the 1960s he switched from painting to silkscreen prints which were produced serially, often in bright colors with off-set effects. This process allowed Warhol not only to create art out of the mass-produced but also to mass produce the art itself. The series of silkscreens produced in the 1960s ranged from the banal to the tragic with images of soup cans and Brillo pads, celebrity portraits of Marilyn, Jackie, and Elvis, and electric chairs and guns.

Information courtesy of Heritage Auction Galleries, May 2008.