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Factory Work: Warhol, Wyeth
and Basquiat
September 9 - November
19, 2006
Factory Work: Warhol,
Wyeth and Basquiat, on exhibition September 9 through
November 19, 2006 at the Brandywine River Museum, explores the fascinating
collaborations in the late 1970s and early 1980s between Pop artist Andy
Warhol (1928-1987) and realist Jamie Wyeth (b. 1946), and between Warhol
and New York graffiti artist Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988). The exhibition
provides clues to understanding these unique partnerships and offers examples
of how these very different artists influenced and inspired each other.
Wyeth and Basquiat were young, independent artists with
established reputations when Andy Warhol invited each of them to paint at
the "Factory," his New York City studio. Warhol mentored the younger
artists who, in turn, enabled him to connect with new audiences in an evolving
art world.
(above: Andy Warhol (1928-1987), Self Portrait with Skull
(1978), synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas, collection
of Phyllis Wyeth, © Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts / ARS,
NY.)
Wyeth, son of realist painter Andrew Wyeth and grandson
of illustrator N.C. Wyeth, had his first one-man exhibition at Knoedler
Gallery in 1976 at the age of 20. During his friendship with Warhol, the
two shopped for antiques and taxidermy specimens together, attended art
exhibition and gallery openings, discussed popular culture, and exchanged
ideas. Warhol repeatedly visited Wyeth's farm in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania.
Warhol's published diaries chronicle one of these visits.
Warhol and Wyeth painted each other's portraits. One journalist
referred to a 1976 exhibition of the portraits at the Coe Kerr Gallery in
New York City as "The Patriarch of Pop Paints the Prince of Realism."
In addition, they collaborated on a painting of a large pig for a Washington,
DC, charity event. Jamie Wyeth continues to create works saluting his adventures
with Warhol. Wyeth's The Wind (1999) is a modern interpretation of
a post-Pre-Raphaelite painting owned by Warhol. Factory Lunch (2004)
depicts Warhol at the Factory, and Fred Hughes (2005) captures Warhol
with his ever-present tape recorder and his business manager.
(above: Andy Warhol (1928-1987), Portrait of James Wyeth
(1976), synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas, collection
of James Wyeth, © Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts / ARS,
NY.)
Basquiat, the son of Puerto Rican and Haitian parents,
had fascinated the New York art world since 1977 with his aggressive graffiti
slogans. He had his first one-man show in Italy in 1981, also at the age
of 20. Basquiat was a fiercely ambitious teenager who sought out Warhol,
not so much to learn about painting, but to learn how to become a celebrity.
According to art historian Robert Rosenblum, Basquiat was "a dark-skinned
crazy kid from Brooklyn whobegan his meteoric career by raucously embracing
a counter-cultural life, living in public parks, selling painted T-shirts
on the street, spraying graffiti on city walls, succumbing to cocaine and
heroin, and using a garbage-can lid as his painter's palette." Warhol
and Basquiat, like Warhol and Wyeth, painted each other's portraits and
collaborated on a series of paintings that were exhibited in 1985. Basquiat
tried Warhol's silk-screen techniques, and Warhol created an "oxidation"
(copper metal powder, Liquitex acrylics, and urine) portrait of Basquiat.
Basquiat has been credited with inspiring Warhol to return to painting with
brush on canvas. Basquiat died of a drug overdose a year after Warhol's
unexpected death in 1987.
Factory Work: Warhol, Wyeth and Basquiat features works by Wyeth and Basquiat that solidified their individual
reputations. It exhibits works by Warhol related to his collaborations with
the younger artists. The exhibition includes paintings, drawings, photographs,
interviews, clippings and audiotapes related to the Warhol-Wyeth and Warhol-Basquiat
years. Additional information and demonstration material focuses on the
unusual techniques used by Warhol to create portraits during the 1970s and
1980s.
(above: Andy Warhol (1928-1987), Jean-Michel Basquiat
(c. 1982), acrylic, silkscreen ink, and urine on canvas, collection of the
Andy Warhol Museum, 1998.499, © Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual
Arts / ARS, NY.)
Factory Work: Warhol, Wyeth and Basquiat is organized by the Brandywine River Museum.
The accompanying exhibition catalogue, published by the
Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine, can be purchased at the Brandywine
River Museum or online at www.brandywinemuseumshop.org. The guest curator
for the exhibition, Dr. Joyce Hill Stoner, is an art historian, paintings
conservator and Director of the Preservation Studies Doctoral Program at
the University of Delaware. The exhibition will travel to the Marion Koogler
McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas, from January 16 to April 8, 2007,
and the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine, from May 6 to August 26,
2007.
On Sunday, October 15, at 2 p.m., Dr. Stoner will present
an illustrated lecture on the little-discussed side of Pop artist Andy Warhol
as mentor to realist painter Jamie Wyeth and graffiti artist Jean-Michel
Basquiat. The lecture, to be held at the Brandywine River Museum, complements
the exhibition Factory Work: Warhol, Wyeth and Basquiat, on view
at the museum from September 9 to November 19, 2006.
Following is an article prepared by Halsey Spruance,
Brandywine River Museum Director of Public Relations, for the museum's members
magazine with a narrative by guest curator Joyce Hill Stoner, Ph.D.
Factory Work: Warhol, Wyeth and Basquiat, on view September 9
through November 19, 2006 at the Brandywine River Museum, explores the fascinating
collaborations in the late 1970s and early 1980s between Pop artist Andy
Warhol (1928-1987) and realist Jamie Wyeth (b. 1946), and between Warhol
and New York graffiti artist Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988). The exhibition
provides clues to understanding these unique partnerships and offers examples
of how these very different artists influenced and inspired each other.
Organized by the Brandywine River Museum and supported by a generous
contribution from Charlie and Julie Cawley, the exhibition is organized
by guest curator Joyce Hill Stoner, Ph.D., an art historian, paintings conservator
and Director of the Preservation Studies Doctoral Program at the University
of Delaware. Recently, Dr. Stoner reflected on the evolution of the exhibition
and her nearly decade-long dedication to the subject:
- In 1998, I interviewed Jamie Wyeth about his collaborations with Andy
Warhol for an article in American Art magazine published the following
year by the Smithsonian American Art Museum. I was amazed at the extent
of their joint activities and interchanges and at the general omission
of this surprising friendship from the vast Warhol literature. On the first
page of his published diaries, Warhol chronicles one of his many visits
to Wyeth's 300-acre farm in the Brandywine Valley in 1976. Less than a
month before his death, in 1987, Warhol made the last of the 29 diary entries
about Wyeth. In at least 12 of the tapes in the archives of The Andy Warhol
Museum in Pittsburgh, Warhol and Wyeth are in conversation, usually at
the "Factory," Warhol's New York studio.
-
- In 1976, Warhol and Wyeth painted each other's portraits. They jointly
attended four openings for the portraits and accompanying sketches at the
Coe Kerr Gallery in New York (1976), the Brandywine River Museum (1976),
the Cheekwood Museum of Art in Nashville (1977) and the Hotel de Paris
in Monte Carlo (1980).
-
- The interactions with Wyeth were important to Warhol and are evidenced
in his work, particularly his cat and dog paintings of 1976, his pig photographs
and print of 1979, and his skull paintings and self-portraits with skulls
of 1976 and 1977. In turn, Wyeth adopted certain phases of Warhol's "pop-ism"
for his paintings in the late 1970s and early 1980s and has continued to
revisit Warhol themes in his paintings through 2006. Warhol biographers
have dismissed or downplayed the friendship, perhaps thinking this "odd
couple" could have little in common. Wyeth may have been considered
too traditional or too wholesome. However, in 1976 Warhol said to a reporter
regarding Jamie Wyeth, "I think he's peculiar...maybe even more peculiar
than I am."
-
- Brandywine River Museum Director Jim Duff and I decided that we must
revisit the Warhol-Wyeth collaboration and the impact Warhol and Wyeth
had on one another's work as a full-scale exhibition, and the staff at
the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine, agreed to co-host the show
and prepare the catalogue. Jamie Wyeth noted that we should look at Warhol
in the role of mentor and then surprised us by suggesting we add Jean-Michel
Basquiat to the mix, because Warhol had offered fatherly advice to this
young, exciting neo-expressionist graffiti artist in the 1980s. Basquiat
rented a studio from Warhol on Great Jones Street beginning in August 1983,
and collaborated with Warhol on joint paintings in 1983 and 1984. Basquiat
had already fascinated the New York art world with his aggressive graffiti
slogans beginning in 1977. His confrontational paintings of skulls and
racially charged words and images had been exhibited in Europe, Los Angeles
and the Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial by 1983. Both Wyeth and
Basquiat had had successful one-man shows by the age of 20. Warhol was
fascinated by these younger, noteworthy artists from vastly different worlds
and invited them to paint at the Factory during two different decades,
and they enabled him to stay connected to new audiences of an evolving
artworld.
-
- This unique exhibition includes paintings by all three artists with
connecting themes, photographs taken at the Factory, re-created oxidation
paintings, a tape of a conversation between Warhol and Wyeth, film clips
of Basquiat painting in the New York streets, and even taxidermy pets and
a train collected jointly by Warhol and Wyeth.
Factory Work: Warhol, Wyeth and Basquiat will travel to the McNay
Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas, from January 16 to April 8, 2007, and
the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine, from May 6 to August 26, 2007.
Gene E. Harris, the Brandywine River Museum's curator of collections, assisted
in the organization of the exhibition. The accompanying exhibition catalogue,
published jointly by the Brandywine River Museum and the Farnsworth Art
Museum, can be purchased in the Museum Shop or online at www.brandywinemuseumshop.org.
Following are wall labels for the artworks in the exhibition
as of August 21, 2006. They are subject to change until the exhibition opens
September 9.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Cow Single Edition Print, No. 5, 1971
- Screen print on wallpaper
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- In 1971, Warhol made single screen prints of his famously outrageous
cow wallpaper from the 1960s and used them as gifts to celebrities.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Rudolf Nureyev, 1975
- Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
- Collection of Aby J. Rosen
- Both Warhol and Wyeth depicted the Russian dancer Rudolf Nureyev in
the 1970s. Warhol was terrified of Nureyev's temper. The dancer tore up
many of the Polaroids that Warhol intended to use to create the portrait.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Cat, 1976
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Both Warhol and Wyeth had collected taxidermy pets before they met,
and Wyeth had already painted from them. After meeting Wyeth, Warhol did
"celebrity portraits" of cats and dogs, and the two artists had
K K Larkin (Auchincloss) hold a taxidermy cat when she sat for her portrait.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Dog, 1976
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Warhol was interested in Wyeth's portrayals of animals and joked about
the way Wyeth had portrayed Warhol's dachshund, Archie, in oil. For Dog,
Warhol made his own celebrity dachshund portrait using the same silkscreen
techniques he used for images of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, Elizabeth Taylor,
and Rudolf Nureyev.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Jamie Wyeth, 1976
- Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
- Collection of Jamie Wyeth
- When their joint portrait show opened in 1976, Warhol told reporters,
"Jamie is just as cute in New York as he is in Chadds Ford, and what
I hope to reveal in the portrait is Jamie's cuteness." Warhol portrayed
both Wyeth and Basquiat as ideal male prototypes.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Portrait of James Wyeth, 1976
- Pencil on paper
- Collection of Jamie Wyeth
- Warhol's pencil drawings of Jamie in various poses were done mechanically
from the Polaroid photographs he took with his famous "Big Shot"
camera.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Portrait of James Wyeth, 1976
- Pencil on paper
- Collection of Mrs. Douglas Auchincloss
- K K Larkin (Auchincloss), a friend of Warhol who soon became a friend
of Wyeth, owns a matched set of drawings of Warhol by Wyeth, Wyeth by Warhol,
and a portrait of herself by each of the two artists.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Jimmy Carter, 1976
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Warhol and Wyeth each created images of President Jimmy Carter. Warhol's
enhanced silk-screen was used for the 22 January 1977 cover of The New
York Times Magazine. The President told a gathering at the White House
in 1977:
- I think that [Warhol's] painting of me, based on that photograph,
was superb. It kind of grows on you . . . The first one was frowning and
scowling and worrying because I was broke, I had lost some primaries, I
didn't know where I was going to go next, and the fact that Jamie Wyeth
and Andy Warhol were willing to help me kind of turned the tide.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Portrait of K K Larkin, c. 1977
- Pencil on paper
- Collection of Mrs. Douglas Auchincloss
- After seeing the Warhol-Wyeth portrait show in New York, K K Larkin
(Auchincloss) asked Warhol to do a drawing of her just as he had drawn
Wyeth.
-
- Poster for Andy Warhol's BAD, 1977
- Artist: Jamie Wyeth
- Printed by Einweg, Germany, 1977
- Collection of the Brandywine River Museum
- Wyeth attended screenings with Warhol of Warhol's movie Bad,
and Wyeth's portrait of Warhol was used for advertisements and the movie
poster.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Self Portrait with Skull, 1977
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- Collection of Phyllis Wyeth
- In 1976 and 1977, Warhol produced a series of large silk-screened paintings
of skulls and small self-portraits with skulls. He gave Phyllis Wyeth one
version of Self Portrait with Skull. Warhol had owned a human skull
for several years but had not used it in his art until after discussions
with Wyeth about anatomy, dissection, and funerals. These discussions are
on tapes in the Warhol Museum's collection.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Skull, c. 1977
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- Collection of Jamie Wyeth
- Warhol gave Phyllis and Jamie Wyeth this second skull painting. Warhol
was known for his refusal to discuss death, but after conversations about
Wyeth attending open heart surgery and riding in hearses, Warhol painted
skulls during the next two years. These conversations and the younger artist's
openness in discussing death resonated with Warhol's thoughts on mortality
following his near death from a shooting in 1968.
-
- Andy Warhol posing with small piglet, c. 1978
- Gelatin silver print
- Rupert Jasen Smith, photographer
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- In one of their many taped conversations, Warhol quizzed Wyeth about
the behavior of pigs. Wyeth's pig, "Baby Jane," was a gift to
him from Warhol's superstar, Baby Jane Holzer.
-
- Envelope and photograph of Andy Warhol with Rosalyn and Jimmy Carter
at the White House, 1978
- Chromogenic color print with ink inscriptions
- Photographer unknown
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Warhol had jealously noted in his diary in December 1976, "So
Jamie is now the Carter court painter." By 1978, Warhol had also been
invited to the White House.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Fiesta Pig, Single Edition Print, Artist's Proof (2/10), 1979
- Screen print on Arches 88 silkscreen paper
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- In 1979, Warhol took Polaroid pictures of a live pig eating Cheerios
from Fiestaware. One of Warhol's tapes records his conversation with actress
Paulette Goddard and Wyeth about Wyeth's pet pigs and how difficult it
was to get them up and down stairs.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Jean-Michel Basquiat, c. 1982
- Acrylic, silkscreen ink, and urine on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Warhol's portrait of the twenty-two-year-old Basquiat shows his vital,
youthful head unexpectedly threatened by the chemical decomposition used
in the abstract "oxidation" paintings of 1977, in which (reinventing
Jackson Pollock's drip technique) the artist's chums would urinate on canvases
covered with copper paint, producing an effect, both grisly and beautiful,
of something rotting away before the viewer. As it turned out, this became
a grim metaphorical prophesy of Basquiat's death six years later from a
drug overdose. [From Robert Rosenblum's essay in the Factory Work
catalogue.]
-
- Andy Warhol
- Train, 1983
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Warhol and Wyeth each collected toys. They jointly purchased a train
set which was kept at Wyeth's farm for Warhol to play with when he visited.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Flash Sharivan Robot, 1983
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- This toy belonged to Warhol. He, Wyeth, and Basquiat all enjoyed toys
and games; all three maintained a whimsical Peter Pan approach to adulthood.
Wyeth still collects toy tanks and soldiers.
-
- Andy Warhol wearing white leather motorcycle jacket with painted
portrait of Jean-Michel Basquiat, by Stefano, c. 1983
- Gelatin silver print
- Patrick McMullan, photographer
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Basquiat was a rising art star when he met Warhol, and Warhol liked
to be connected to younger artists with new approaches.
-
- Andy Warhol
- Jean-Michel Basquiat, 1984
- Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- In his portrait of Basquiat, Michelangelo's David seems reborn in a
posing strap, a perfect specimen of the almost-naked male body, half hustler,
half Greek god, a painfully far cry from Warhol's own rather scrawny physique.
[From Robert Rosenblum's catalogue essay.]
-
- Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat
- Collaboration (Crabs), 1984-1985
- Acrylic, silkscreen ink, and oil stick on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- Collaboration (Crabs) presents the result of a "tagging
war" (graffiti art terminology). The commercial drawing of a crab
that Warhol traced onto the canvas was attacked with abandon by Basquiat,
who outlined and filled in the figure in a manner that would have rendered
the shellfish nearly invisible had he not labeled it with his signature
bold lettering. [From Margaret Rose Vendryes's catalogue essay.]
-
- Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat
- Collaboration (Dollar Sign, Don't Tread on Me), 1984-1985
- Acrylic, silkscreen ink, and oil stick on canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
- In Collaboration (Dollar Sign, Don't Tread on Me), the markings
are more balanced than in the composition of crabs, but it is still Basquiat's
message placed over Warhol's dated dollar sign that drives the painting.
[From Margaret Rose Vendryes's catalogue essay.]
-
- Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat
- Collaboration (Coma, Indian), n.d.
- Acrylic and oil stick on linen canvas
- The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Founding Collection, Contribution
The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
-
- Poster
- Tony Shafrazi/Bruno Bischofberger
- Present Warhol/Basquiat Paintings
- © Tony Schafrazi Gallery, New York, 1999
- Photograph by Michael Halsband
- Private Collection
- The visuals used to promote the 1999 Tony Shafrazi Gallery show inflated
the level of competition between the two artists. The idea that this unlikely
pair would be slugging it out in a ring was ridiculous, mostly because
on all counts, Basquiat would obviously win. However, Warhol was the art
world heavyweight. According to Paige Powell, Warhol's assistant who dated
Basquiat, Basquiat was upset by the critical reaction to the Tony Shafrazi
show of the collaborative paintings when "an art critic said that
Jean-Michel was too influenced by Andy."
-
- James Wyeth
- Portrait of Shorty, 1963
- Oil on canvas
- Collection of Andrew and Betsy Wyeth
- At the age of seventeen, Jamie Wyeth created with lapidary surface,
translucency, and the exactitude characteristic of sixteenth-century German
oil technique in painting this portrait of an aging recluse.
-
- James Wyeth
- Drawings from the New York Morgue, 1965
- Pencil on paper
- Collection of Jamie Wyeth
- Lincoln Kirstein, Jamie Wyeth's earlier mentor and a strong believer
in the importance of the traditional study of anatomy, arranged for the
artist to sketch in the New York City morgue. Warhol's fascination with
Wyeth's work sketching cadavers and open heart surgery is recorded in one
of their many taped conversations.
-
- James Wyeth
- Draft Age, 1965
- Oil on canvas
- Collection of the Brandywine River Museum
- Purchase made possible by Mr. and Mrs. Randy L. Christofferson, Mr.
and Mrs. George Strawbridge, Jr., Mary Alice Dorrance Malone Foundation,
Margaret Dorrance Strawbridge Foundation of PA I, Inc., The William Stamps
Farish Fund, Mr. and Mrs. James W. Stewart, III, and MBNA America, 1999
- At the age of nineteen, Wyeth painted this now iconic dissident, his
friend Jimmy Lynch. In 1965, United States military involvement in Viet
Nam was growing and was a major controversy throughout the country.
-
- James Wyeth
- Portrait of Lincoln Kirstein (Study #5), 1965
- Charcoal on paper
- Collection of Jamie Wyeth
- Lincoln Kirstein, ballet impresario and art critic, was a strong supporter
of Wyeth's work. Andy Warhol drew Kirstein's feet in his series of famous
feet.
-
- James Wyeth
- Portrait of John F. Kennedy, 1967
- Oil on canvas
- Collection of Jamie Wyeth
- Warhol and Wyeth both painted members of the Kennedy family. Their
techniques were entirely different, but both artists were dispassionate
observers recording their subjects as they saw them.
-
- James Wyeth
- Portrait of Pig, 1970
- Oil on canvas
- Collection of the Brandywine River Museum
- Gift of Mrs. Andrew Wyeth, 1984
- Portrait of Pig is one of Wyeth's early signature works. The
"Hog King of Nebraska" accurately diagnosed a snout malformation
on this pig ("Den-Den") when the painting was on exhibition at
the Joslyn Museum in Omaha. The keenly observed barnyard portrait can also
be interpreted as a social commentary on the "cops as pigs" concept
following the 1968 National Democratic Convention in Chicago. Warhol later
became fascinated with Wyeth's pigs and created his own screen print of
a pig.
-
- James Wyeth
- Portrait of Jean Kennedy Smith, 1972
- Oil on canvas
- Private Collection
- Warhol's diary of 20 December 1976 reports:
- It seemed Jean Kennedy Smith really has a crush on Jamie because
she asked me to go to the coat room with her, and when we got there she
pulled out an American quilt and asked me if it was real, and I said yes,
and then we went back and she gave it to Jamie. I reminded her that I saw
her in Bloomingdale's the other week when we both were in the shirt department,
and she said, "Oh yes, those shirts were Christmas presents for my
family." So it was regular old shirts for her family, but for Jamie
it was an American quilt.
-
- James Wyeth
- Angus, 1974
- Oil on canvas
- Collection of Fred and Lucette Larkin
- On his farm in Pennsylvania, Wyeth has carefully observed and recorded
animals for more than four decades. He has kept a live wolf and a pig in
his living room, studied sharks in a specially built tank, constructed
a studio in his barn, and raised an abandoned vulture.
-
- Andy Warhol and Jamie Wyeth in the Factory, 1976
- Susan Gray, photographer
- Collection of the Brandywine River Museum
- Warhol's studio manager, Vincent Fremont, noted that Wyeth was admitted
to the "inner circle" of the Factory, and while he was there
it was the only time the Factory "smelled of oil paint." Fremont
also noted that Wyeth gave him an inscribed sketch of Warhol "dedicated
to 9:05 Vincent" because Fremont always let him in at 9:05 in the
morning.
-
- James Wyeth
- Andy Warhol, Facing His Right (Study #15), 1976
- Charcoal on paper
- Collection of the Brandywine River Museum
- Gift of Miss Amanda K. Berls, 1980
- About Warhol's wigs Wyeth said:
- The wigs were the damnedest wigs. They would change. Every day would
be this kind of a different form or shape. Mainly the back was different.
It would fly out
- this way or thatbut the front stayed pretty much the same.
-
- James Wyeth
- Andy Warhol, Right Profile (Study #24), 1976
- Mixed media on board
- Collection of the Brandywine River Museum
- Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Marshall E. Baker, 2003
- Wyeth commented:
- I never saw him without one of his wigs. And actually, if you look
at some of my drawings, you can see dark hair growing out of the back of
the neck. But he
- dyed his eyebrows; his eyebrows were dark, and he dyed them platinum,
the color of his wig.
-
- James Wyeth
- Andy Warhol (Study #8), with Archie in Profile, 1976
- Combined mediums on cardboard
- Collection of Jamie Wyeth
- Wyeth had painted a few earlier sketches on corrugated cardboard, but
he used brown cardboard more frequently while working in the Factory. Warhol
liked the sense of cardboard's impermanence, although Wyeth used it because
of the way paint clung to the corrugation.
-
- Warhol's dachshund, Archie, was sometimes said to be "in a snit"
and wouldn't pose. On those days, Warhol would hold a round velvet pillow
in the dog's place when he posed.
-
- James Wyeth
- Portrait of Andy Warhol, 1976
- Oil on panel
- Collection of Cheekwood Botanical Gardens and Museum of Art, Nashville,
Tennessee
- In a recent interview, Wyeth noted:
- His whole thing of absorbing everything, of recording - turning
yourself into a
- sort of tape recorder - that appealed to me. I had that element
in my vocabulary
- at that point anyway, but he re-instated it in me. Our work
was diametrically
- opposite. But I loved the idea that he was a recorder. And I styled
myself after
- it - or at least, it appealed to me; it fit right into what I wanted
to do. And
- then I selfishly wanted to record him and paint every pimple that
he had on his face.
- And he let me.
-
- For this oil portrait, Wyeth focused his gaze on Warhol, catching him
as a "deer in the headlights," much as Warhol had simply aimed
his 16mm movie camera at his subjects and captured what was directly in
front of the lens.
-
- James Wyeth
- Andy Warhol Portrait Pose (Study #16), 1976
- Charcoal on paper
- Collection of Mrs. Douglas Auchincloss
- Warhol held Archie (or a velvet pillow) while posing for this sketch,
part of K K Larkin Auchincloss's matched set, and Wyeth and Warhol gave
her a taxidermy cat to hold when posing so that the portrait sketches would
be pendants.
-
- James Wyeth