Art Watch with Andy Warhol

Posted by Boca Raton Luxury Home Specialist on Monday, April 4th, 2016 at 6:18pm.

Andy Warhol Painting at Boca Raton Museum of Art

The legacy of Andy Warhol still lives on.  From now until May 1st, you can revel in some of his famous prints at the Boca Museum of Art.  You will learn about this incredible artist, and soon know how he changed the face of fashion, design and American pop culture. Here's a few highlights about this creator you may find to be interesting.  

Entrepreneur and venture capitalist Marc Bell donated the Warhol collection that is currently displayed at the Boca Museum.  Bell is no stranger to the art world, nor the Real Estate market.  In 2014 his 'Star Trek Mansion' located at 3682 Princeton Place in Boca Raton sold for over $35 million dollars.  Bell has exquisite taste for the finer things in life. A replica of the control panel taken from the movie "Star Trek" makes up the movie room of the house sold.  Bell loves art and his collection of Warhols and was kind enough to allow us the opportunity to see these historical paintings.

Inside of Marc Bells Home in Boca Raton

Warhol wasn’t only a painter. You may also know that he was a celebrity, an entrepreneur, a social commentator, an innovator and a film maker.  All these gifts wrapped up in one of the most successful artists of his time, is nothing less than amazing.

His birth name was Andrew Warhola.  He grew up in a small home Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  He was the youngest of three boys born of his immigrant parents from Slovakia. Today, he’s noted as having the largest museum in the United States that’s dedicated to only one artist. It is at this museum, where you can see some of the most memorable pieces created by this enigma.  The world-class artist is mostly known for his silkscreen of soup cans and celebrities, but there's much more to him. 

This artisan was using computers to create his work before anyone else.  He was able to perfect his craft by using an ancient device called an Amiga, that was equipped with a chipset of graphics. This technology was not used much back then.   During 1984 Warhol was introduced to this new technology. He managed to perfect this media for only a couple years before passing away in 1987.  But his real fame exploded after displaying his work at the Stable Gallery in 1964.

Located at 26 Water Street in Damariscotta, Maine, the Stable Gallery is still open.  This tiny gallery style museum continues to impress people with work from both local and established artists.  The small Victorian gallery focuses on giving exposure to the art community today.  It must have been quite an incredible experiencing showing work from the odd and cunning Warhol in such a modest setting. 

Almost anyone will agree Warhol was a controversial artist. He was also a genius before his time.  There are many notable pieces of work, some still being shown today.  Including his films like “Chelsea Girls” and the “Exploding Plastic Inevitable” (EPI). EPI was a multimedia event that was organized by Warhol himself.  This popup event was at a place you could hear bands like Velvet Underground and see a film produced by Warhol and was known as a trendy celebration.  These were considered posh events that were attended by celebrities, musicians, and other artists. 

Painting by Andy Warhol

The film created by Warhol introduced profound ideology such as someone sleeping.  The video titled “Sleep” was a five-hour video of someone sleeping.  It was this type of ingenuity that helped to create a name for the famous artist.

It’s well known that Warhol was loved by many people in the music world as well.  Front Men such as Mick Jagger and David Bowie were some of Warhol's closest followers.  To be the subject of one of Warhol's lithographs was a real honor and you can see paintings of both of these famous singers. 

Some other celebs that were fortunate to be his subjects were Elizabeth Taylor and Marilyn Monroe.  Many of these paintings weren’t in the market for long and almost always bought by affluent preservationists.

If you’re fortunate enough to own an Andy Warhol painting, you know that it’s nothing short of mysterious.  You can ask yourself a million times over why soup? Why Brillo boxes? The explanation is simple given his history as a designer in the advertising world.

Incredibly enough, Mr. Warhol moved to New York City in the 50’s to pursue a career as a commercial illustrator.  He got his first job creating ads for a shoe manufacturer. It’s hard to imagine, but his shoe ads were seen in Glamour Magazine in 1949. This was the onset of his career.

New York had become the international capital of “modern art”, this was the perfect place for Warhol to be. He studied people like Jasper Johns, James Harvey and Roy Lichtenstein. It’s clear that his inspiration came from such influential craftsmen as these talented masters.

Warhol was also a fan of current events and it’s been noted that Warhol was friends with presidential runner Donald Trump.  The two met at a birthday party that was held for attorney Roy Cohn.  In a book titled “The Andy Warhol Diaries” Andy wrote the following:

Andy Warhol

“It was the first tryout, and I was supposed to be there at 12:00 but I took my time and went to church and finally moseyed over there around 2:00. This is because I still hate the Trumps because they never bought the paintings I did of the Trump Tower.” (The Andy Warhol Diaries, 549). 

It was obvious from this that he wasn’t very fond of the Trumps because they didn’t buy any of the paintings he did of the Trump Towers.  You can read more about Andy in the blog for the Warhol Museum. 

In 2014 Warhol's collection sold for a mere $653 million dollars. Another interesting point to note.  During that same time, they found tons of his work saved onto floppy discs from that old Amiga computer of his.  The person who managed to buy the floppies is unknown, but you can certainly guess the price for such a collectible item was in the millions.

You can visit Boca Museum to see why this man had such a gift., without traveling to Pennsylvania. However, you can see most of his work displayed at the Warhol Museum, located in Pittsburgh, which is a part of the Carnegie Museum.  Be sure to make time to become better acquainted with Andy and his work. You won't be sorry you did.

Once you wrap your mind around this incredible man’s talent, you can understand why he’s one of the most admired men of the twentieth century.  From Campbell Soup Cans to producing some of the most controversial films of all time, this is a man that showed the world how to think out of the box.

There’s no doubt his most famous quote supersedes his timeline. 

“In the future everybody will be world famous for fifteen minutes.”  Andy Warhol

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