Andy Warhol B. 1928 Pittsburgh, PA; D. 1988, New York City, NY Source: http://www.warhol.org/

“Once you 'got' Pop, you could never see a sign the same way again. And once you thought Pop, you could never see America the same way again.” - Andy Warhol from Popism: The Warhol ‘60s

“Popular, transient, expendable, low cost, mass-produced, young, witty, gimmicky, glamorous, big business.” British artist Richard Hamilton used this veritable shopping list of adjectives to describe what he coined as “Pop” art. Derived from popular culture, Pop art revolutionized the art scene in the late 1950s. From telephones to soup cans, what made things pop was their everyday avor and familiarity. Prior to the pop explosion, art was assumed to be something highbrow. Pop artists, however, loved the banal--the things that Warhol said, “anybody walking down Broadway could recognize in a split second.” The world of Pop that engaged Warhol was distinctly American and re ected the burgeoning commercialismA and vitality of post World War II America. Critics’ opinions dier regarding the social commentary in Warhol’s work. “The artist was deliberately evasive about his intentions and his work allows for diverse and often contradictory readings.”

Andy Warhol was born Andrew Warhola on August 6, 1928, in a two-room row house apartment in Pittsburgh. He earned a BFA degree in Pictorial Design at Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) in 1949 with the goal of becoming a commercial illustrator. During these years he worked in the display department at Horne’s department store.

Soon after graduating, Warhol moved to New York City to pursue a career as a commercial artist making his debut in Glamour magazine in September 1949. Warhol became one of the most successful illustrators of the 1950s, winning numerous awards. He had a unique, whimsical style of drawing that belied its frequent sources: traced photographs and imagery. At times Warhol employed the delightfully quirky handwriting of his mother, who was always credited as “Andy Warhol’s Mother,” Julia.

In the late 1950s, Warhol began to devote more energy to painting. His rst paintings were based on comics and ads. He became a celebrity in 1962 when he debuted his famous Campbell’s Soup Can series which caused a sensation in the art world. Shortly thereafter he began to produce avant garde lms and a large sequence of movie star and musician portraits.