Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1928. His parents had only recently moved to the United States from what is now Slovakia. As a child Warhol, was often sick, or thought he was sick, so he spent a lot of time in bed. During this time, Warhol drew many pictures. He also listened to the radio and collected pictures of celebrities.

After studying fine art in college, Warhol moved to New York City and began illustrating for magazines and creating advertisements. He became very popular, especially for his drawings of shoes.

During the 1960s, Warhol began creating the paintings he is best known for today. Warhol loved pop culture and he decided to paint what he loved. You may have guessed that he was a Pop Artist like Roy Lichtenstein. Warhol painted large pictures of Coca-Cola bottles, Campbell’s soup cans, and dollar bills. He also painted pictures of celebrities.

Because he was creating pictures of mass-produced items, Warhol thought it would be fitting to mass produce the artwork. He did this by creating screen prints rather than painting each picture separately. This allowed him to make many copies of each painting, but each copy was an original Warhol painting. Click here for an example.

Warhol founded “The Factory” which was his studio. At the Factory, he was always surrounded by people. Some of these people were in films that he made, some were writers or artists, some were celebrities. Warhol wanted to create an image for himself and he chose carefully the people in his circle.

Andy Warhol was criticized for turning art into a business. Many people didn’t like the idea that he was just making copies of the same picture to sell and make money. Warhol believed in what he was creating, though. He continued to make screen printed paintings of celebrities.

Warhol died in 1987.

Check out this great website all about Andy Warhol: Pop Mag Children’s Activity Book. I love the idea of a magazine about Andy Warhol because Warhol founded his own magazine, Interview. This is also a great place to see some of Warhol's artwork.
EDITED TO ADD: Create Your Own Andy Warhol Portrait,

Create Your Own Andy Warhol Masterpiece,
Fantastic Fiction Friday Starring Andy Warhol

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19 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think your blog is so neat and useful. I am an art teacher in Africa and I find your info incredibly useful. I like to teach the children art history and I came across your blog when I was searching for an artist. So, I just wanted to say thanks and I will bookmark your blog for future use :-)

Jessica said...

Thanks! I'm glad you're finding it useful. I always love to hear about teachers who think art history is important enough to spend precious time on in class.

Thanks for visiting!

Anonymous said...

very useful im a student i think this is really good thanl man

Anonymous said...

not jus jokin

Anonymous said...

thanx for the info. i have just started high school and needed a simple worded peace to get info from

Anonymous said...

omg i look so stupid i spelt peice wrong

Anonymous said...

I'm in year 9 at school and as i was studying Andy Warhol for my homework i came across your inforation. I must say that i used most of your information for my homework and i found it informative and useful !!! Thank you :)

Anonymous said...

cool...i understand why he created his work on a large scale now :D

Natalie said...

Used this information for homework,thank you very much :)

JD said...

Thanks! I'm writing an essay on teaching Warhol and your blog is one of the few places I've been able to find any useful information, all the books I've got are rubbish! Thanks!

Anonymous said...

well, i'm only in the seventh grade, but there are some interesting pionts in there. you are great at writing, but i must ask, where did you get all this information from, thanx

Anonymous said...

phew, theres one smart cookie):

chloexxxx said...

thanks find it helpful coz im was doing a art porject and i need help and it help alot:)

Anonymous said...

this was really helpful for my yr 7 art work wen my teacher said do a double page on andy warhol i thought oh no then i found this website thx a lot!!

Anonymous said...

oh my god thanks I had to do this for my homework xD im just copying it :3

Anonymous said...

This blog has been really helpful too me;I'm in Year 8 at my school, and had to do an art project incorporating Warhol into my assessment, but this website was clear and to the point!
-Thank you:)

Anonymous said...

very useful

Demi, georgina and lucy! said...

hi i'm in y8 in skwl abd we are doin a project on andy warhol so i copied and pasted some stuff from wikipedia but then i foud this an deleted it all and replaced it with this. The information was so useful i'll get top marks i think and i actually read before i copied and pasted it and even i like it and i'm not a great reader! xx

Anonymous said...

AMAZING!