A study of mass production in art – Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol (1928-1987) was of Slovakian ethnicity, born and raised by Russian parents in Pittsburgh, USA. Warhol is noted for his valuable contributions in advancing gallery art to “non-art” everyday items, such as the soup can or vinyl records. His glorification of the kitsch and the mundane was the beginning of the Pop Art movement in America, which broke down the barriers of elitist art and made creativity an accessible part of everyday life for all. If Kitsch is fashionable today, Lichtenstein and Warhol are not a few reasons for it. Both are the combination of Marx and Engel of Commercial Art.

Andy Warhol is known as a commercial artist. However, his real claim to fame is his successful attempt to bring creative respectability to the visual arts in mass-produced commercial items. Warhol began his career designing vinyl record covers. His presentation of Pop Art in the form of “Campbell Soup Cans” in New York paved the way for the glorification of the hitherto neglected area of ​​product design. Often considered the cousin of avant-garde art, Andy helped transform commercial art from soap box lids, soup cans, plastic containers, and advertising into a respectable, bona fide art form.

His visually “in your face” images became the iconic remnants of capitalism and Andy Warhol defiantly worshiped the gods of capitalism through those images. Warhol’s motivation for this capitalist cult was his basic and unwavering idea that mass production is the greatest leveler in today’s society. Andy Warhol often clarified the fact that “A can of Coke enjoyed by the president is the same as the one made by the bum on the street. Therefore, the can of Coke turns out to be a supreme work of art.”

Andy Warhol constantly worked to develop a certain style of work, distinctly different from that of Roy and other great Pop Art artists. Working on the subjects he loved and dealt with routinely, Andy Warhol turned everyday items, street objects and tools into simplified yet intricate pieces of art. Warhol would work diligently on these regular items to give them a unique new look. The first reaction when seeing a work by Warhol would be the typical pleasant and surprised exclamation.

Raised quintessentially on a steady dose of a great American dream, Andy Warhol dabbled (often successfully) in books, movies, and philanthropy. He often made rules and then brazenly broke them. Andy Warhol did everything that prissy and proper Parisian artists abhorred. He made screen prints of paintings and mass produced them. He made simple sketches and sold them at exorbitant prices. Furthermore, he was a closet homosexual who was also an Orthodox Christian.

Despite the fact that his artworks were the subject of controversy, Andy Warhol successfully secured a place in the hall of fame. His selective representation of everyday icons and images as art showed the rare spark of creativity in him. Rest, it’s all just the fine details, which Warhol would otherwise have trampled on, as he would have walked from mortality to the pantheon of the Gods of Arts.