Requirements of a Modern Painter: Warhol

According to David Batchelor’s article, Modernity & Tradition: Warhol & Andre, Andy Warhol meets Charles Baudelaire’s criteria for being a modern painter. In Kimiko Powers (1981), a piece by Warhol, he used modern iconography, a modern means of expressing the modern experience, and a relationship of his work to the tradition of art history. These were Baudelaire’s three main requirements of a modern painter.

Warhol utilized a modern visual vocabulary by using modern iconography. The main goal of Pop Art was to use a common visual vocabulary to communicate with the average viewer, which is why Warhol replicated images of known American icons. “…his starting point is not perhaps Monroe the person at all so much as her public image, an image which by definition is infinitely reproducible. Warhol is depicting not so much a person as a product” (Batchelor, 132). Like Monroe, the image of Kimiko Powers was a specific image, an icon that was recognizable and accessible to the public. Kimiko and John Powers were “well known in international art circles for their insightful, highly personal and astonishingly comprehensive collection of Contemporary Art. In their many years of collecting, the Powers amassed what is considered to be the most impressive collection of Pop Art in private hands…” (Gagosian Gallery). The pop art movement was a reaction to Abstract Expressionism to make art more accessible to everyone rather then a select elite group of people. Warhol wanted to communicate to the viewer using popular images, symbols and designs often found in advertisements or mass production.

Warhol used a modern means of articulating visually, through the silk screen technique, also used for mass production. The four main colors used in his compositions were the same as those used in printed media. Through CKMY (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black) Warhol was actively using the subtractive process to reproduce color, which was an advertising technique he employed to create his images. The color was placed almost carelessly on the figure, which gave Kimiko Powers the feeling of a messy mass produced print, rather than an individual and unique image. “The apparently careless quantification of images does far more to amplify than negate the mass produced and impersonal mood of the image, as does the use of sharp, hard, colour which treats all areas as equal flat islands, irrespective of whether it coincides with face, lip, eyelids, dress or background” (Batchelor, 132). Another reason for the impersonal and mass produced aesthetic of Warhol’s work could stem from the fact that assistants reproduced his work, rather than the artist himself. There was no recognizable hand of Warhol, since his means of producing his art was through “the factory” where his idea was created by others. Through this radically new idea Warhol and other Pop artists in the movement tried to re-define the meaning of art and its place in history. In doing so they also had to convince their audience that their art was legitimate and that they used not only modern ideas, but borrowed techniques from previous art movements.

The image of Kimiko Powers shows a connection to the history of art, specifically portraiture. “In more general terms it has also been suggested that Warhol’s work displays connections with artistic tradition rather than break with it, in that most of his chosen subjects correspond to the categories or genres of traditional art” (Batchelor, 134). Kimiko Powers related to the tradition of portraiture, while his other images reflect still lives, and perhaps even historical painting. “In the universe of the image, there is no need to differentiate between humans and tin cans, heroes and villains, celebrities and carnage. They are all equivalent” (Batchelor, 132). His art also connects to the tradition of print making, since Warhol is asserting the fading ink and the Japanese tradition of prints. The heavy black contour lines and flat expanses of color also have the feeling of Japanese prints which had been influencing western art since the Symbolist movement in the late 1800’s.

In David Batchelor’s article, Modernity & Tradition: Warhol & Andre, he discuses Charles Baudelaire’s three main requirements of a modern painter. Andy Warhol would have been identified as a modern painter since he achieves all three requirements in his works, including Kimiko Powers. This piece shows how Warhol used modern iconography, a modern means of expressing the modern experience, and a relationship of his work to the tradition of art history in his art.

Bibliography

Batchelor, David. “Modernity & Tradition: Warhol & Andre.” Investigating Modern Art by Liz Masterson. Yale University Press, 1996. 128 – 142.

The Official Website of the Gagosian Gallery. 30 Jun. 2001. 16 Dec. 2005. Pop Art: The John and Kimiko Powers Collection.

Russell, Heather. “Pop Art 1950’s – 70’s.” AR 212 History of Western Art III. Colorado State University, CO. 6 Dec. 2005.

Warhol, Andy. "Kimiko Powers." 1981. Online image. Magidson Fine Art – Aspen. 2000. 16 Dec. 2005.