The following year, 1922, Paul Warhol was born. Then in 1925 came John. Ands older brothers both grew up as typical American boys and followed in their father’s footsteps. (Steamboat 20) In 1942 when Andy was all of thirteen years old, his father died. Before Andresen’s death he made the decision to put his saved money towards Ands education. From early childhood Andy demonstrated artistic skill. Andy would sketch and color in books that his mother bought for him. He copied many of the images he saw in comic books, These sketches toreadors Whorl’s career and the work he would go on to do.
Andy decided to attend Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, PA, There, he majored in pictorial design. However, he flunked out after only one year due to his lacking English skills. Whorl’s life and work would later be summed up by the fact that he had such trouble with words. Andy was a visual person from day one. He went most of his life without writing anything down, including his signature, which was often signed by apprentices. Andy managed to get back into school after winning art awards. (Rodney) Andy graduated from Carnegie in 1949 and decided to move to New York.
This is even Andy dropped the “a” from Warhol and began going by Warhol. Andy moved to New York With fellow painter Philip Pearlstine. After a year Of living with Pearlstine and some other roommates Warhol moved his mother from Pittsburgh to live With him in an apartment The dependency on her is seen up until her death. His first work in New York was very design oriented. Andy designed women’s shoes and storefronts. He won three Art Directors Club Awards and used his “business art” to make his money. Andy still did commercial work up until 1968 when he used commissions as his main source of income. (Rodney)
Warhol first emerged onto the fine art scene in 1962 with a solo show at the Freer Gallery in Los Angles. This show promoted his first run of soup cans. Thirty-two different flavored soup cans were displayed. The paintings were listed at S ICC each, not even one of the paintings sold and the whole lot purchased by the gallery owner. (Steamboat 62) The next show put on by Warhol was in New York. Here he had portraits of Marilyn and Elvis, as well as the disaster series. From here, Whorl’s career as an American artist took off and he made millions through his famed portraits. Warhol also enjoyed working with hydrotherapy and film.
His popularity avgas huge and everyone wanted Warhol to put his spin on their product or logo. Andy became a New York socialite in the seventies and frequented clubs like the notorious Studio 54, where Andy avgas a regular. His reputation also got him involved with the music industry, doing work for both the Velvet Underground and The Rolling Stones. Warhol continued to push the envelope throughout the seventies and endorsed artists like Jean-Michelle Basque and Keith Haring up until his death in 1987. On February twenty-second, nineteen eighty-seven Andy Warhol was pronounced dead.
The cause of Ands death was a gallbladder infection. The surgery he was undergoing was described as routine and went according to plan. However, when recovering, something went wrong killing Warhol. Andy Warhol left behind a world that was just beginning to see what he had been seeing his entire life. Whorl’s influence had already spread across the entire country and would continue to grow forever. When Warhol died he had been working on a “Last Supper” series, which was never presented to the public. Andy Warhol had been hiding more religious paintings than any other Armenian artist, That’s right,
Andy Warhol has created more religious paintings than any other American painter, ever. It was said that the world wouldn’t be the same without Warhol, However, his influence is still dominant today. (Rodney) Warhol worked in a consistent style throughout the majority of his career, Manipulating photographs through the use of vibrant colors and random placement of ink made his silk-screens truly stand out. I personally prefer the later work that Andy created in the early eighties including his “Absolute Warhol” vodka advertisement, Which is a very colorful rendition Of the popular liquor total.
In the piece I chose to study, “After the Party”, Andy used a photograph of a table after it had been eaten at. The painting was done in 1979 and was printed in a series Of two hundred. The print is primarily black with minimal white and colored highlights. When the original was created I am sure that numerous pictures were taken of this image with different exposures. Through the use of the silk-screen Warhol was also able to create this contrasting black and white image. Now that the world has programs like photos altering images to have a similar appearance is a very easy task.
This is part of the reason I see Whorl’s work as such a fine art. He didn’t have the technology we do now to create something that appears relatively easy to do, The use of color in “After the Party” is very minimal, however, I feel that it is very effective in bringing out the curves throughout the image. What I like most about the color is the transitions between primary colors starting with red on the left, fading to yellow, and then to blue on the right side of the canvas, The highlights seem to be very random yet they provide a feeling of depth in this seemingly flat Image,
My solution to the in-class still life was to create a similar contrasting white and black image. The problem was confronted with was how to get a black and white photograph. With the help of modern technology was able to take a digital picture in color with my friends camera, I then transferred the picture to my computer where I used Adobe Photos CSS to alter the image. Although didn’t come out with the exact picture wanted the image created is quite close. From here it was relatively easy to transfer the picture to the canvas through the use Of a grid.
Although it involved much more skill than using silk-screens the hot-realistic process was much easier than had anticipated. Since Whorl’s palette in this piece is primarily black and White it was very easy for me to match this portion of the assignment. The only change I made to the black was adding a little brown to make the black appear warmer. As far as the white went I mainly used lighter strokes with slightly watered down white to create a wash feel Adding the color to my piece was by far my favorite part of the project, It was like I had the finished painting with just the finishing touches to add.
The only problem ran into here was where to place the gaslights. I looked to Whorl’s piece for help and stuck to the main curves on rounded objects, which there were plenty of in this composition. Overall think I have created a very successful piece that I am personally very happy with. The only change might consider making is having more white space to be even more like Warhol. I enjoyed this assignment much more than the first and feel that have learned a lot more about one of my favorite artists. Similar to most of Whorl’s work I simplified the objects was working with to large shapes filled with flat color.
