Andy Warhol

The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc., New York
Private Collection, New York

New York, Leo Castelli Gallery, Andy Warhol: Dollar Signs, January 1982 (LC# 1226)
Nice, Palais Massena, Andy Warhol, 1982
Beverly Hills, Gagosian Gallery, Andy Warhol: $, November 1997, p. 1, illustrated in color and illustrated in color on the cover
New York, Van de Weghe Fine Art, Andy Warhol Dollar Signs, September - November 2004, p. 47, cat. no. 10, illustrated in color

This painting is in very good condition overall. The image was made with two screens, and the horizontal seam where they meet at the center is slightly off register. There is a faint area of soiling located in the red 25 ½-27 ¼ inches from the left and 30 ¼-30 ¾ inches up from the bottom. Under ultraviolet light, each corner has some inpainting at the extreme edges as follows: --approximately 1 inch along the bottom of the left edge, 1 inch along the right edge and ---lower right corner, 1 3/8 inch along the bottom edge and 1 inch on the lower right edge --upper right corner, scattered in an area measuring 1 ¼ x ¾ inches --upper left corner, 1 7/8 inch along the top edge and ½ inch along the left edge The canvas is framed in a white painted wood shadow box frame under Plexiglas.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Executed in 1981, Andy Warhol's Dollar Sign is one of the most potent symbols of our time and, as a master at identifying and appropriating the zeitgeist of America in the 20^th century, Andy Warhol revisited this symbol many times throughout his career. One of the most instantly recognizable Warholian motifs, Dollar Sign reflects the complete synthesis of art and money within his oeuvre, as well as its creator's own apotheosis from artist to international superstar. First exhibited at Leo Castelli's Greene Street gallery in 1982, the monumental Dollar Signs afford insight into his enduring fascination with commodity culture. Pulsating through richly saturated layers of pure color, multiple impressions of the `$' motif throb against the saturated blood-orange background. Filling the expanse of the vast canvas, this larger-than-life symbol of wealth is rendered with the immaculate clarity of Warhol's perfected silkscreen technique.

Throughout his career, the dollar bill provided Warhol with a reference point for his examination of contemporary American consumer culture. As he explained, ``Americans are not so interested in selling. What they really like to do is buy''. (Andy Warhol, The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: from A to Z and Back Again, New York, 1975, p. 229). Like his Marilyn and Elvis paintings, Warhol's dollar paintings are all about desire. Within a society immersed in the pursuit of wealth, Warhol's art had become an acquisition that conferred status on its collector. As Warhol commented, ``I like money on the wall. Say you were going to buy a $200,000 painting. I think you should take that money, tie it up, and hang it on the wall. Then when someone visited you, the first thing they would see is the money on the wall.'' (Ibid., pp. 133-134). It both intrigued and amused Warhol that his art possessed powers similar to money; capable of stimulating desire and imagination simultaneously.

The subject of money in his oeuvre provides a recurring leitmotif with which to chart the changing times of his life. Rolled up dollar bills stuffed into soup cans had provided the subject for some of Warhol's earliest and most iconic drawings and paintings before becoming the subject for his first silkscreened series in early 1962. Lyrically understated in their frontal, deliberately flattened aesthetics, these first silkscreens belie Warhol's desire as an emerging artist to literally print money. Depicting dollar bills either individually or in serial multiplication, these seminal works sardonically laid bare the luxury of owning art.

Executed nearly two decades later, the monumental Dollar Signs of 1981 provide the ultimate expression of his lifelong fascination with consumerism. Like Warhol's first Pop paintings sourced from advertising images of marketing icons such as Coca-Cola bottles and Campbell's Soup cans, Dollar Sign similarly takes the symbol for the currency exchanged in the business transaction and presents it with all the brazen euphoria of that decade. By focusing on the unabashed icon of ``$'', Warhol hones in on arguably the biggest brand of all. One of the most recognizable logos anywhere in the world, it is both a symbol of the American Dream and an international denominator of wealth. Minus any specific denomination, it now has a more generalized and totemic status, particularly in this scale which towers above the beholder. Unlike the images of the 1960s, this motif is not appropriated from a specific source. Instead the two superimposed screens derive from his own drawings. The slanted dollar sign, used in the present work, is the fullest of his designs. There is something bold and powerful about its forceful presence in the royal blue, block-filled font of the underlying `$' which is set off by the green hues which electrify the composition. By the 1980s, Warhol's silkscreen process had become refined to such a degree that it is capable of registering with great nuance and precision the delicacy of Warhol's shading technique. In the green paint film, although it is mechanically produced, we can sense the strength of Warhol's draftsmanship which seemingly dematerializes the flatness of the canvas.

This, Warhol's last series of money paintings, metaphorically reveals that by 1981, Pop art was a historical triumph and an entrenched cultural phenomenon. They mirror his larger-than-life, personal exuberance and surpass mere pictorial depiction to become a form of cultural currency in themselves. Gleaming with the sparkling promise of prosperity, Dollar Sign dramatically prefigures the atmosphere of exuberance and extravagance that characterized the art world of the 1980s.