Andy Warhol Essay

Attention Getter: The American culture is so engulfed into consumerism that we take every day items and objects for granted we don 't necessarily realize the impact and importance to have on our life and how we live vicariously through them. Today I 'm going to talk about one man that took these concepts into his artistic ability and thereby created a whole new culture in what we see is art today. This man who is considered one of the fathers of pop art goes by the name of Andy Warhol.

When studying artists, styles of art and their respective time period, it is always important to find a few key artists that were responsible for the rise of new art trends. Traditionally, art has often a reflection of the most important elements within its respective time period, such as wars, religions, royalty, culture and expression. This is why the study of art history is needs to look deeper than simply understanding how certain artworks were created. Among the various artists studied in the course, Andy Warhol is definitely one of the most influential. Far ahead of his time in thinking and talented in several media forms, Warhol was a product of his time and defined his era with the use of his artwork, giving rise to other artists within the same time period. This paper will argue that Warhol was not only an influence to modern art, he defined the concept of "pop art", which combined consumerism and pop culture, creating works that questioned the norm of society at the time, while providing a strong influence to future artists. Warhol was hugely successful in his artistic efforts and several of his staple works will be discussed in regards to its significance and representation of its respective period of time, as well as Warhol’s influence on the history of art.

The sixties were a time of social and political change in America, and the art world was not left untouched. Early in the decade a new movement focused on popular culture and national icons began to develop. It was aptly named Pop art. "Many critics were alarmed by Pop, uncertain whether it was embracing or parodying popular culture and fearful that it threatened the survival of both modernist art and high culture..." (Stokstad 1101) Pop artists were not the first to make cultural statements with their work, however controversial art always draws criticism and attention. One of the most well known artists of the Pop movement was Andy Warhol, a young commerial illustrator from manhattan. Warhol's use of popular icons and brands as the focus

In Andy Warhol’s time he was seen as very commercial and not truly a defined artist. Warhol was very popular to average society but never quite Throughout his whole life he has had struggles with Sydenham’s chorea, terrible shyness, and lastly making artwork acceptable to other artists. And as we get farther from his time we see how much value and meaning there was in his work.

When considering the life and works of Andy Warhol, one thing is agreed upon for good or bad, he changed the visual construction of the world we live in. His window advertisements were the beginning of an era, where art would be seen in an array of forms away from the traditional paintings and sculptures of the old world. He made people see everyday material objects in a whole new light; through "Pop Art" he could transform mundane into extraordinary. He was a working man, a social climber, a builder, an acquirer of goods, and a known homosexual. These attributes all contributed to the interesting and complicated nature of his art.

Andy Warhol is one of the most famous and influential artists of the 20th century. Warhol like many other artists had a childhood experience that would forever change and help transform him into the adult he became. As a young boy Warhol had a nervous system disease that left him

mind" (Warhol xvi). Later on, he felt the diaries were a great way to explain

Andy Warhol being not simply a Pop artist, but an American artist who was known as the master of Pop Art, and about two of Warhol’s most famous paintings; Coca-Cola and Campbell’s Soup Cans. Andy Warhol was an artist and filmmaker, an initiator for the Pop Art movement in the 1960s. Warhol used mass production techniques to elevate art into the supposed unoriginality of the commercial culture of the United States. Warhol’s early drawings frequently recalls the Anglo-Saxon tradition of nonsense humor, a characteristically childlike exuberance, and the fact that Warhol was successfully earning a living in the advertising industry at the time was sufficient for many to dismiss his entire artistic output during this period as “commercial art”. Fifty years ago, Pop art captured the spirit of Warhol’s young art, but that basic structure has been (to most people) a revealing profitless movement for years. Pop art was a 1960s movement that focused on everyday objects, comic books and mediated images — now seems quaint and playful, but not Warhol. In the first part of Andy Warhol’s career he was an iconoclast, in the second, the artist as businessman. In 1960 Warhol’s graphic works underwent a fundamental change in terms of subject matter, accompanied at about the same time by a change in technique. Warhol’s graphic work covers areas not normally associated with the art of the twentieth century, and which might even be considered unique. In Andy Warhol’s paintings and prints of

Andy Warhol was the artist who wanted to use the methods around him that were developing. He was the artist who accepted the change of the culture. Similar to his idea about the development of technology, the mainstream of Pop art was to be more positive on creating new forms of expression rather than the Abstract Expression that was the traditional style of art in America at the time using new methods.

I was looking at a bunch of Warhol’s paintings and I was confused. I was just staring at them and I’m thinking “why don’t you look like a Warhol?’ Then I realize that these paintings are from when he was younger. This was before he defined his aesthetic. I believe this was his discovering phase then he goes into his silk screening phase. Andy Warhol used current icons from the world for his work. One of the famous icons was the Campbell’s soup can. In 1962 Warhol displayed his Campbell's soup piece, one canvas for each 32 types of Campbell's soup. In 1960, Warhol began producing his first canvases, which he based on comic strip subjects. In 1961, he started using the method of silk screening. Silk screening starts with a stencil drawing then transferred with glue onto silk. Warhol's first silkscreen was Campbell’s Soup cans. Campbell’s Soup was an icon in the 1960s that gave you a sense of comfort. In spite of that, Warhol’s Soup Can paintings were to provoke concern about value. At first glance it may seem like a joke but it’s actually a sophisticated and thought-provoking artistic statement. In the 1960s Andy Warhol made a sculpture that was extension of what Warhol had done with the Campbell's Soup Cans, Brillo Boxes. The Brillo Boxes were made out of wood but made to look accurately like the boxes found in the

One of his jobs was to design the weather map for NBC’s morning news. In 1952 Warhol held his first exhibit, it was not a financial success, but it enhanced Warhol’s reputation as a commercial artist. But his spare time was now taken up with pop art, inspired by Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg, two young pop artist, Warhol had come across in 1958. He began to paint, draw and print everyday objects such as, dollar bills, soup cans, postage stamps, comic strips, and soda bottles. According to Warhol, these were some of the consumer products “on which America is built.”

It is always evident when a person is different from others. They are not a blur amongst a group of people that can easily be looked over, like others. How they are different may be clear by the way they look but maybe their thoughts are what makes them interesting. Someone’s thoughts are difficult to find out just by a glance. There is a sense of curiosity to the disturbance of the ordinary. A maverick is a creative individual with a different mindset who is confident and bold. Commonly labeled an outcast they are someone who break the molds of societal norms that at the time are not encouraged but slowly become apart of the mainstream, alternating the traditional point of view. Frida Kahlo and Andy Warhol both contributed to different art movements. Frida Kahlo grew up with an illness and later experience what she would call two accidents that allowed her to start her innovative life. Kahlo changed societal norms having to do with sexuality, gender roles, and a new form of expression with private and personal subjects that at the time weren’t allowed to be talked about. Andy Warhol came from rags to riches because of his excellence in his artwork that was different and interesting from past artwork. He freely explored his sexuality and created the movement that made a huge change throughout America and the consumerist culture many parts of the world has been living in since the post war era. Both contributed to how current society is seen and what is now seen as normal

In order to discuss pop art I have chosen to examine the work and to some extent lives of Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol who were two of the main forces behind the American movement. I intend to reflect the attitudes of the public and artists in America at this time, while examining the growing popularity of pop art from its rocky, abstract expressionist start in the 1950s through the height of consumer culture in the 60s and 70s to the present day.

The people back in the 19th century really didn’t accept Van Gaogh’s truthful and emotionally morbid way of expressing the way of art is to himself. It finally was seen as art through the people’s eyes. This set a stage of art that is now known as Expressionism. It is best characterized by the use of symbols and a style that expresses the artist’s inner feelings about his subject. His style of painting is exemplified by a projection of the painter’s inner experience onto the canvas he paints on. Van Gogh’s paintings are done with his feelings that goes on in his life. (Mark Harden’s Artchive)

Vincent Van Gogh is one of the most famous artists of all time. He is known for his paintings and is hailed as the quintessential expressionist painter in history. Yet, Van Gogh lived one of the most troubling lives one could ever imagine. Almost every painting can be viewed as a look into his troubled soul. Van Gogh’s Paintings today can be sold for millions of dollars, but during his life time he sold a single painting for a measly 40 francs. Van Gogh’s legacy has left behind stories of greatness and sadness having to do with both his personal life and his career as an artist.