Andy Warhol
The Pop Arts' movement began in the late 50's and early 60's. Dubbed, the founding father of the movement, Andy Warhol brought forward society's obsession with mass culture and allowed it to become the subject of art itself. Using many techniques such as isolation, repetition and colour placement, Warhol brought to the world of art his views on materialism, politics, economics and the media. Andy was quick to warn his admirers and critics, 'do not look any deeper than the surface of my art and my life' (Bockris 21). Andy Warhol produced works that defied the popular notion of what art should be. Warhol's works were meant to be taken at face value, for nothing more than what they portrayed on the surface. While he stressed this superficial attitude about his art, his works were often the cause of debate and influenced public opinion like no other cultural figure in North America ( Shanes 5 ). Through his series with common images, celebrities and death, Warhol teaches us that surface images have a lot to say about pop culture. By exploring and learning more about the artist who opened so many doors in the art world, one can see why looking at the surface of his works often meant seeing and understanding so much more about
( Gidal 28 ).' Warhol's death and disaster series was sparked when he was given a newspaper with a headline that read '129 DIE IN JET' ( Shanes 20 ). Andy decided to analyze and portray the cultural implications of viewing tragic images on a regular basis. Most of Warhol's disaster images show images taken from a newspaper repeated several times a long a blank canvas. By using this technique, once again he shows us his concern with the way society accepts tragedy when viewed through mass media. From a series of paintings called the Electric Chairs, Electric Chair ( Gidal 36 ) the object, the chair is the focal point of the piece. We are in no way confused about the message of the painting. In true Warhol style, it is not necessary to search for a deep meaning. The appearance of emptiness and loneliness is immediately visible. The only words in the picture, 'silence', are taken in subconsciously. The well chosen image makes a statement in itself. 'When you see a gruesome picture over and over again, it doesn't really have any effect Warhol's Campbell's soup cans are arguably some of his most famous works. Warhol wanted us to look at the simple image of the can for what it represented to our culture. He challenged "old fashioned" critics to overcome their ideas of art as complex and incomprehensible by using simple, common images. Warhol's selection of the soup can may be the most important part of the work he did with them. He wanted to display his view of America and to him eating Campbell's soup represented being American. Andy wanted to explore these common images that are part of our everyday lives,
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Approximate Word count = 1101
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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