Andy Warhol's " Big Buck " at The Forbes Galleries

Tuesday, 13 June 2006 10:18

New York City - In his book, The Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B and Back Again), Warhol wrote that “Business art is the step that comes after Art.  I started as a commercial artist, and I want to finish as a business artist.  Being good in business is the most fascinating kind of art.” 

From his early success in the commercial art world of the 1950s through the end of his life, Warhol continually re-configured the boundaries that separate the worlds of business and art.  Drawing from the permanent collection of The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, this exhibition examines Warhol’s evolving relationship with the corporate world and looks at how the images and strategies of business were incorporated and exploited in his work.  The show includes examples of his commercial work from the 1950s, his well-known Pop works from the 1960s, commissioned portraits of corporate titans from the 1970s and ’80s, as well as the Ads series of the 1980s. 

One of his most brilliant comments on the blurred lines between art and business are his Dollar Sign paintings of the early 1980's.  On view will be a Dollar Sign painting, the quintessential symbol of capitalism, inscribed by Warhol to Malcolm Forbes and presented to him on the occasion of the opening of the magazine’s galleries in 1985.  The exhibition will be supplemented with related ephemera from the museum’s archives which supports the theme of Warhol’s works as “business art.”

Forbes, the leading business magazine, welcomes the opportunity to display these icons of popular culture, art and business at the Forbes Galleries in conjunction with the The Andy Warhol Museum. For further information on The Andy Warhol Museum, please visit http://www.warhol.org/.