Warhol in New York: a fresh experience for audiences old and new

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NEW YORK, Nov 12, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – His Marilyn Monroe paintings and
oversize soup cans are cultural icons, but in an exhibition opening Monday,
New York’s Whitney Museum hopes to paint a new, more complex picture of Andy
Warhol.

These days, few dare to tackle the king of pop art: he has already been
the subject of hundreds of exhibitions and retrospectives.

But under the guidance of chief curator Donna De Salvo — who worked with
Warhol before his death in 1987 — the modern and contemporary art museum is
doing just that.

De Salvo believes America’s last Warhol retrospective — in 1989 at New
York’s Museum of Modern Art — “changed much of our thinking about Warhol but
also left much unanswered.”

Now the Whitney, located on the banks of the Hudson River in the city’s
Meatpacking District, hopes to seduce both experts and newcomers — “no easy
task,” according to director Adam Weinberg.

From Campbell soups to Coca-Cola, Andrew Warhola — to use his birth name
— played with the icons of his time, while tirelessly documenting his own
life and work, to the point of becoming a brand himself.

Spanning three floors, “Andy Warhol — From A to B and Back Again” will
present the silver-haired artist’s career as a whole, from his early
advertising illustrations to his abstract explorations.

And although the exhibition shows off his love of vibrant, repetitive
screen printing, it also presents Warhol as far from a one-trick pony.

Even if that style was key to his success, his films, collaboration with
graffiti prodigy Jean-Michel Basquiat, and his journey into the abstract —
such as his epic 1978 series “Shadows” — all act as proof otherwise.

It’s a multidimensional experience of a multidimensional artist: a
designer, painter, photographer, videographer, producer and magazine editor –
– not to mention curator of his own exhibitions.

– Distinctly political –

A significant part of the exhibition — which boasts over 300 works, from
100 institutions and collectors — is dedicated entirely to video, a medium
Warhol used to create documentaries, experimental films and even commercials.

It portrays a Warhol in constant creative motion, hungry for experience —
and reminds visitors that behind his aesthetics is a distinctly political
artist.

“The themes that preoccupied Warhol — mass media, celebrity culture,
entertainment and politics — these shape our life even more directly than
they did during his lifetime, making his work not only more prescient but
more relevant,” Weinberg said.

At the center of it all are concepts of power and representation: a
reflection built on Warhol’s experiences in advertising during the 1950s.

“Warhol is especially an artist of our time and I would argue even perhaps
for all time, especially in this selfie generation where everybody is the
star of their own photograph and movie,” Weinberg said.

He sees the overarching message as one of “a more complex and arguably
more powerful Warhol than previously understood.”

After the exhibit closes in New York on March 31, it will head in May to
San Francisco, and then to Chicago from October 2019 to January 2020.