Lot 230
  • 230

Andy Warhol

Estimate
900,000 - 1,200,000 USD
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Description

  • Andy Warhol
  • Marilyn (Reversal Series)
  • acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
  • 18 1/4 by 14 in. 46.4 by 35.6 cm.
  • Executed in 1979-1986, this work is stamped by the Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board, Inc. and numbered A118.965 on the overlap.

Provenance

Akira Ikeda Gallery, Nagoya
Private Collection, Tokyo
Acquired by the present owner from the above in 2012

Condition

This work is in very good condition overall. The surface is bright, fresh and clean. There is extremely light evidence of handling to the edges. Under ultraviolet light inspection, there is no evidence of restoration. Framed. *Please note the auction begins at 9:30 am on November 14th.*
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.

Catalogue Note

Signaling a new period of productivity in the artist’s work, the Reversals, alongside the contemporaneous Retrospectives introduced a new conceptual vigor to Warhol’s artistic practice. Taking his cue from the tradition of artists who have adapted, varied and transformed the art of their predecessors, Warhol, in an act of self-referential, post-modern brilliance, expropriated material from his own now famous repertoire of images, transforming and updating his classic Pop iconography of the 60s.

With his silkscreen process now honed to perfection, Marilyn (Reversal Series) from 1979-1986 is one of the best examples from this powerfully post-modern body of work, which pivots on the Duchampian notion of the readymade. Warhol had previous appropriated images from the canon of art history, in his 1963 serial painting depicting Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, provocatively re-titled Thirty are Better than One. Warhol's interest in Leonardo's masterpiece, however, was less about its art historical significance and more to do with its celebrity status. Exceptionally released from the safekeeping of the Louvre for a brief visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art that year, the media frenzy surrounding the visit of this normally immovable painting drew hoards of people curious to experience its alluring enigma. Little more than fifteen years later, Warhol's own paintings and celebrity status were so aggrandized that his instantly recognizable image of Marilyn Monroe befitted the same treatment as the Mona Lisa.

As David Bourdon explained: "Warhol's Reversals recapitulate his portraits of famous faces...but with the tonal values reversed.  As if the spectator were looking at photographic negatives, highlighted faces have gone dark while former shadows now rush forward in electric hues. The reversed Marilyns, especially, have a lurid otherworldly glow, as if illuminated by internal footlights." (David Bourdon in Warhol, New York, 1989, p. 378) The present work presents a myriad of prismatic, cool hues. Her visage is a gradation of violet, aqua, cyan and butter yellow with a lush, painterly texture. The intimate scale of the single Marilyn image, glowing through the outline of her eyes, lips and hair has the air of a sacred icon – an object for worship.

In Marilyn Monroe, whom he painted shortly after her premature death in 1962 at the height of her celebrity, Warhol found a memento mori which could unite the obsessions driving his career: glamour, beauty and death. As a star of the silver screen and the definitive international sex symbol of her era, Marilyn epitomized the fame and glamour of celebrity that Warhol craved. The vibrant colors in Marilyn (Reversal Series) recall the vibrant and shocking palette of Warhol's earlier Marilyns, in which he had deliberately chosen lurid, conflicting hues to transcend the humanity of the recently deceased star. Through negative printing, however, Warhol achieves a ghostly dematerialization of his subject, with the shadowy faces now reduced to their recognition value, their memory value alone. Although still recognizable and legible thanks to its common currency, Warhol's manipulations neutralize the power of the original image to convey meaning so that in Marilyn (Reversal Series) the emphasis is less on the celebrity of the sitter and more on that of the artist himself, less a depiction of the starlet and more a reflection on Warhol's own artistic past.

Having reanalyzed his own pictorial inventions in the Reversals series, Warhol devoted much of his 1980s creative practice to exploring the creative practices of his predecessors. In a broad range of compositions, Warhol directly lifted imagery from artists as varied as Boticelli, Munch and de Chirico, subjecting each to his leveling silkscreen technique, both alienating and transforming the image into a quintessential Warhol. The present work stands at the pinnacle of Warhol's appropriation-based paintings and not only questions the notions of authorship, authenticity and originality in art but also probes the legitimacy of Warhol's own artistic code.