Andy Warhol - New Now London Wednesday, December 6, 2023 | Phillips
  • “The best thing about a picture is that it never changes, even when the people in it do.”
    —Andy Warhol

    The series of screen-painted portraits, that came to dominate Warhol’s enterprise throughout the 1980s, are here exemplified in unmistakable clarity. Warhol’s adoption of image-reproduction as a means to reframe timeless themes such as fame, authority, and consumption are well commented upon. Indeed, his portraits of iconic 20th century figures present as short-hand for Warhol’s shrewd commentary on popular culture and mass-production.

     

    In the present example, however, the sitter is neither famous nor infamous and is nevertheless rendered with characteristic elegance. Warhol’s choice to portray a sitter that is an acquaintance of his in the first instance, departs from the overstated glamour of certain other portaits. Instead, Warhol returns to the guiding principal of a ready-made aesthetic that is built around the production, modification, and mass-circulation of photographic images. The result is an image that is certainly timeless, not for its depiction of fame or power, but instead for its ability to encapsulate and validate the centrality of portraiture in contemporary art. 

     

     

    • Provenance

      Rudolf Budja Galerie, Salzburg
      Private Collection, Southern Germany (acquired from the above)
      Ketterer Kunst, Munich, 17 July 2020, lot 221
      Acquired at the above sale by the present owner

    • Exhibited

      New York, Dia:Beacon, Dia's Andy: Through the Lens of Patronage, 15 May 2005 - 10 April 2006, n.p. (listed)
      Sardinia, Porto Cervo, Rudolf Budja Galerie & CPH | Pevero Hotel, Andy Warhol - Masterpiece, 3 - 12 July 2011

    • Artist Biography

      Andy Warhol

      American • 1928 - 1987

      Andy Warhol was the leading exponent of the Pop Art movement in the U.S. in the 1960s. Following an early career as a commercial illustrator, Warhol achieved fame with his revolutionary series of silkscreened prints and paintings of familiar objects, such as Campbell's soup tins, and celebrities, such as Marilyn Monroe. Obsessed with popular culture, celebrity and advertising, Warhol created his slick, seemingly mass-produced images of everyday subject matter from his famed Factory studio in New York City. His use of mechanical methods of reproduction, notably the commercial technique of silk screening, wholly revolutionized art-making.

      Working as an artist, but also director and producer, Warhol produced a number of avant-garde films in addition to managing the experimental rock band The Velvet Underground and founding Interview magazine. A central figure in the New York art scene until his untimely death in 1987, Warhol was notably also a mentor to such artists as Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat.

       

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25

Portrait of a Lady (Natalie Sparber)

stamped by the Estate of Andy Warhol and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc., New York and numbered 'VP PO 50273' on the overlap; numbered 'PO 50.273 10-980-2903' on the stretcher
synthetic polymer and screenprint ink on linen
101.6 x 101.4 cm (40 x 39 7/8 in.)
Executed in 1984.

Full Cataloguing

Estimate
£150,000 - 200,000 

Sold for £190,500

Contact Specialist

Charlotte Gibbs
Associate Specialist, Head of New Now
+44 20 7901 7993
CGibbs@phillips.com
 

New Now

London Auction 6 December 2023