Andy Warhol: how was the controversial life of the most iconic pop art artist

Andy Warhol: how was the controversial life of the most iconic pop art artist

 

 He was one of the most important and, 35 years after his death, he is still one of the most desired by millionaire collectors in the world.

The controversial and eccentric Andy Warhol was one of the most prominent artists of the 20th century. He became the most iconic of pop art, since through his works, he criticized the superficiality of the American consumer society (such as the serigraphs on the faces of the most famous movie stars of that time or the works with cans of Campbell's soup).

35 years after his death, he continues to be one of the most beloved artists by collectors in the world. This was demonstrated in 2021, when he joined the Big Six (a select group of the most expensive at auction record) along with Claude Monet, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Gerhard Richter.

The Beginning

Born on August 6, 1928, in Pennsylvania, his childhood was marked by a neurological disease called "Syndeham's chorea" (which caused him involuntary seizures and pink spots on his skin).

This condition caused Warhol to spend long periods in hospitals or at his home, where he began to distract himself with different activities to while away the time. One of them was art: he began to draw and collect photos of the protagonists of the most famous television short films of that time.

Over the years, the Great Depression ruined Andy's family. But, in 1934, his father managed to find a job as a construction worker and that allowed them to move to a better neighborhood. There, in 1945, Warhol graduated from Schenley High School and won the Scholastic Art and Writing Award (a competition that rewarded young talent in the field of art and narrative).

This recognition made Andy want to become an art teacher. That is why he began studying art education at the University of Pittsburgh, although he eventually enrolled at Carnegie Mellon University, where he studied Commercial Art.

First jobs

After obtaining his degree in Artistic Design, Warhol moved to New York to pursue commercial and advertising art. In the late 1940s, he designed shoes for Glamor magazine and in the 1950s, he worked as a designer for the prestigious Israel Miller footwear firm.

As the American photographer John Coplans confessed, “nobody drew shoes like Andy did. He somehow gave each shoe a temperament of its own, a kind of sly Toulouse-Lautrec sophistication, but the shape and style were accurately conveyed and the buckle was always in the right place.”

 

While working in the shoe industry, the artist developed a technique that later made him famous, known as "dry line." It consisted of applying ink to paper and then drying it while it was still wet. This allowed him to repeat a basic image as many times as he wanted and to create different variations of the original.

From this innovation, Warhol became the designer most sought after by the big firms (among them, there were Columbia Records, Vogue or Tiffany & Co.).

 The Ultimate Stardom

For 1952, the Hugo Gallery in New York organized the artist's first exhibition, called "Fifteen drawings based on the work of Truman Capote". During the following years, his designs were transformed because he had incorporated some of his photographic techniques that he had discovered during his advertising period.

After seeing that Warhol overflowed with artistic talent, the experts at the Museum of Modern Art in New York (MoMA) decided to include one of his works in a collective exhibition.

 

By 1963, he opened an art studio called “The Factory” (in Spanish, “La Fábrica”). It was located on the fifth floor of 231 East 47th Street in Midtown, Manhattan (New York, United States). In addition to being known for producing art in the same way that a factory produces objects in a chain, he was also known for throwing huge parties full of celebrities.

 

 

At that time, between 1960 and 1970, he created some of his most iconic works that are recognized to this day: the work with Campbell's soup cans (composed of 32 canvases) and the Diptych of Marilyn Monroe (which contains 50 images of the interpreter ).

His Sudden Death

In 1967, a woman named Valerie Solanas presented him with the script for a play she had written. But the artist lost the manuscript among a multitude of texts that he had yet to read; to apologize, she offered him a role in her film “Yo, un hombre” (because, in addition to his plastic works, he ventured into the cinema as a director).

At first, the woman seemed to agree, but then she threatened and violently accused Warhol. This led to Solanas entering La Fábrica on June 3, 1968 to shoot Warhol and Mario Amaya, an art critic who was there, several times.

The artist survived the serious injuries caused by the shots, although they affected his lungs, spleen and esophagus. After this, he spent the rest of his life in great suffering, both physical and mental. In turn, Solanas was diagnosed with schizophrenia and spent three years in prison, charged with reckless assault.

From there, Warhol's health began to deteriorate. In 1973, he suffered from severe pain caused by gallstones. By the end of 1986, he had worsened, and by 1987 tests confirmed that his gallbladder was severely damaged.

The doctors had told her that it was necessary to remove it, because if it was not done, she would become gangrenous and that would cause her death. After this, she underwent a five-hour intervention. And when it seemed that he was going to recover, she experienced a sudden arrhythmia that ended up taking her life.

On February 22, 1987, at the age of 58, she passed away at the New York Hospital. The iconic artist was buried in his trademark silver wig and sunglasses, alongside his parents, at St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Cemetery in Pittsburgh.