SOMETHINGS NEVER CHANGE… OR DO THEY?

If I did the math correctly, today would have been Andy Warhol’s 93rd birthday. So let’s celebrate with a quote.

As I looked at this quote attributed to Warhol, it reminded me of a recent article I read which made me wonder what he might think about the redesign of the soup cans he so famously painted.

WARHOL’S SOUP CANS

The Pop Art movement was known for “borrowing” from popular culture and the use of bright, vibrant, straight from the tube, colors. Pop art used these elements, in addition to their subject matter, to blur the lines between what art means and what we define art to be.

Warhol was certainly one of the artists at the forefront of the Pop Art movement. His series of soup cans are an iconic representation of Pop Art. It doesn’t get much more vibrant than larger-than-life soup cans with red and white labels.

Notice I wrote cans. Did you know, at the time Warhol began painting the soup cans, there were thirty-two varieties of soup in the Campbell’s line? Warhol painted all thirty-two varieties. That’s right. Thirty-two of those red and white labels.

HAS IT BEEN 50 YEARS? IT MUST BE TIME FOR A REDESIGN

It was recently announced that the iconic red and white labels are being redesigned. HERE is a link to an article that details some of the changes and some of the events related to the redesign.

WHAT NOW?

Well, the recent change caused me to reflect on this Warhol quote about how the people in a photograph never change. I guess, in this case, his paintings will serve the same purpose for the ubiquitous soup cans. I’m sure Warhol’s paintings were probably not exact replicas, but close enough. The paintings will never change even if the label does.

This is one of the things I enjoy about the arts. It documents our history, sometimes the results are playful, sometimes they are beautiful, sometimes they are emotive, sometimes they make statements… but rarely are they just a label.

TRIVIA

We already discussed that there were 32 paintings - one for each variety of soup offered when Warhol painted the cans, but here are five more tidbits of trivia for your next cocktail party - or a trip to the grocery store:

When Warhol’s soup can series was first exhibited, they were curated and hung on the gallery wall to look as if they were products on a shelf in the grocery store. Genius! Wouldn’t you love to see that original display?
A gallery owner near this first exhibit allegedly sold actual cans of soup as a message of protest about the exhibit.
Actor, Dennis Hopper and his wife, Brooke Hayward, were one of the first collectors to purchase a canvas - for a reported $100. The paintings now sell a good deal upwards of that number should you ever question the soundness of art as an investment.
The Springfield Art Museum had ten soup can prints in their collection. In 2016, seven of the soup can prints were stolen from the Museum.
Warhol’s continued his soup can work with a couple more iterations. However, the first series is his most famous.