Of the series he created one of them was the Flowers series. From the seven paintings it contained, this one was the most popular. The source image for the series was photographs published in an issue of Modern Photography by Patricia Caulfield.
Banana (1966)
In the 1960s Andy Warhol was associated with the band The Velvet Underground and he became their manager in 1965. This print of banana featured on the cover of the debut album of the band, titled The Velvet Underground & Nico and Warhol’s Banana became one of the most recognizable pieces of pop artwork.
Coca-Cola (3) (1962)
The Coca Cola bottle is an iconic American object which caught the eye of Warhol. Warhol created several works on the Coke bottle. Coca Cola (3) is a hand painted work unlike his later silkscreens. The painting was sold for $57.2 million making it one of Warhol’s most expensive paintings ever sold.
Self Portrait (1986)
This famous work belongs to the last series of self-portraits which Warhol painted in the year before his death. It is one of the five versions (green, blue, purple, yellow and here, red) of the set. The image of the old artist with the crazy wig is one of the iconic images of the twentieth century.
Eight Elvises (1963)
A 12 foot painting of eight identical, overlapping images of Elvis Presley in cowboy attire, Eight Elvises is a unique painting. It was not mass-produced like most of Warhol’s works. In 2008, it was sold for US$100 million to make Warhol only the fifth artist to have a painting sold for at least $100 million. The sale broke the record for a Warhol painting and the price paid for Eight Elvises is still the maximum for a painting by Warhol. It remains one of the most expensive paintings ever sold and is considered one of Warhol’s masterpieces.
Big Electric Chair (1967)
In 1963, the last two executions by electric chair in New York State took place. The same year Andy Warhol obtained a photograph of the empty execution chamber. He used it to create a series of paintings depicting the electric chair as a metaphor of death. By creating this piece, he was commenting on the controversy surrounding the death penalty in the 1960s. Big Electric Chair is the most famous painting of the series.
Mickey Mouse (1981)
Warhol created a Myths-series which contained a series of silk-screened portraits of ten fictional characters taken from popular culture. All the portraits were inlaid with diamond dust which made them shine with soft, wavering light. Disney’s Mickey Mouse was one of the characters he picked and its prints became hugely popular.
Campbell’s Soup Cans (1962)
Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans consist of thirty-two canvases, one of each of the 32 varieties offered by the company at the time. It is the work of art that led to pop art becoming a major art movement in the USA.
Marilyn Diptych (1962)
Marilyn Monroe died in August 1962. In the following weeks, Warhol made this masterpiece which contains fifty images of Marilyn, all based on the same publicity photograph from the 1953 film Niagara. The 25 images on the left side of the work are vividly colored while the 25 on the right are in black and white with an effect of fading. Considered an iconic symbol of pop art, Marilyn Diptych was named the third most influential piece of modern art in a survey by The Guardian.
