Andy Warhol is probably one of the biggest commercial artists in the world.

Enclosed is a link to a Warhol canvas of our beloved Prince.

Anyone with a cool $50,000 to spare.

What a cool dude he looked back in the early eighties anyway.

Prince rocks.

p.s sale this Friday 12th May in New York.


http://phillipsdepury.liv...44808.html

It's nice....



but I muuch prefer this one!



Also, read Andy Warhol's diary entry after seeing Prince perform at Madison Square Garden in 1986 here:

Yes, I like the colored version, very patriotic, red, white and blue Prince, nice!

Let's start the bidding!

How much do kidneys go for these days?

Hmmm. Not Andy's best work (in my professional opinion)...I don't think any museum will buy them, probably more likely to sell to a private collector. Maybe Prince himself will buy them? I couldn't find the date they were done (obviously b/t 84 and 87 but I'm curious nonetheless) or the print number (e.g. what number print is it out of how many)? I'd really like to know the number of prints that were pulled.

I read somewhere that this was called "Mr P Lovesexy" by Warhol himself.

Anyone know if this is true?

i put my bid in...



























...two tamales...

i've seen the 2nd one before...the 1st one's a lot cooler to me.

BananaCologne said:

I'm not hating on Andy but that is some simple art work. I'm not impressed with that in any way.

Graycap23 said:

the work itself may look simple, but the process used (silkscreening) isn't.

Cliffy74 said:

I doubt it. Lovesexy didn't come out until 1988, right? Andy Warhol died in 1987 and I'm guessing this was done b/t 84 and 86.
[Edited 5/11/06 12:57pm]

ALready spent my money on the Vegas show.....maybe donate some blood

jone70 said:

yeah, i'm thinking that it'll go the collectors' route too. hell, anybody who knows their screenprinting skills could churn out stuff like this and have it for much cheaper than the $50k asking price they've got here.

I'd be interested to know how Andy Warhol did this print..did he project Prince's image onto the canvas and trace it with paint....or whatever....

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

IT'S ANDY WARHOL PEOPLE. His whole game was simplifying the art process to an near assembly line process to almost mock the art world and throw in the pop culture iconic elements as symbols of our culture. $50,000 is the going rate right now for his more simplistic silkscreens - actually it may go for more by auction's end.

Yea, you can churn out this stuff and it would be worth a dollar. Andy has already done it, so you lost your chance 30 years ago.

I'm surprised Anxiety hasn't posted. I've seen this before and I still think it's cool. I dig Warhol and his concepts. The Factory was waaay ahead of their time and influenced Bowie to a degree.

PurpleRein said:

pretty much uses a photo and traces it then creates the screen from that.

feelUup said:

Yes, I know Warhol's game...I have a Masters in Contemporary Art History so I'm more than familiar with Warhol's m.o.; and those prints are still weak compared to his other work.No major museum is going to buy that for their collection...maybe a gallery though. And if you've never taken a printmaking class I doubt you could "churn out this stuff." Just because it looks simple doesn't mean it is. (see also: J. Pollack, M. Duchamp, S. LeWitt, B. Naumann, J. Koons...the list goes on.)

feeUup said:

It's not quite that simple. You have to use certain chemicals and light exposure to get the image (usually taken from newpaper or magazine in Warhol's case) to 'burn' onto a silk screen. Wherever parts of the image are not burned onto the screen is where the ink will ooze through the screen onto the fabric, paper, etc. The more colors one uses, the more complicated it is because you have to have a separate screen for each color and then line them up exactly the same or the image will not have clean edges. I took printmaking in undergrad and we learned all different types (silkscreen, litho, etching...), I can't remember all the details so any current printmakers feel free to add/correct.

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

I think that's what it's called...

I agree with you guys: Silkscreen is not an easy process, but it's not THAT difficult either. I've taught it to middle school kids with success. Even when you're using more than one color--this looks like 3 plus the white, getting the registration correct takes some time and precision, but it's not the most difficult thing either. I've never been THAT impressed with Warhol's work, but I still like the idea that he did a silkscreen of Prince!

jone70 said:

According to The Andy Warhol Foundation it was created in 1984 - same as the other prints.

jone70 said:

ooooohhhh, rocket science....
pfff...

lookinggoodbaby said:

50,000 sand dollars?

I don't know why anyone would pay for this, since it looks like a 10 year old made it. No talent or creativity went into making this. It doesn't take talent to make a direct stencil out of a picture. A little practice with your tracing skills, and you're set! Yes, the screen printing might be a little confusing at first, but once you learn the system it's not that hard to produce these kind of results. You can make this on a beginners screen printing kit from your art store.

I'll do it for $100 if anyone wants one

P.S. Shepard Fairley's print (click on link) of Prince blows this away. Even though he used the played out "Che" profile, and it only kind of looks like him.

http://www.obeygiant.com/...y=soldout2
[Edited 5/12/06 0:17am]

MrPurple said:

BananaCologne said:

first time i saw it was a year before '84
unless this one is a bit different?

MrPurple said:

If it takes no talent or creativity to make it, you should offer to produce it for free.

I was just reading an entry in Warhol's diary where he saw Prince on the Parade tour, I believe it was... gushes on forever about how amazing he was, and how nice.

He might have had a little crush on him.

tour edit... 1986 had to have been Parade
[Edited 5/12/06 1:20am]

blackguitaristz said:

Oh, all the way, man... Warhol glorified & glamorized the drag queen before anyone else in the pop spectrum.

And when you consider the Factory's close ties to Max's Kansas City... of course that's where punk started, and its later influence on 80s pop is non-negligeable. (The New Romantic Billys & Blitz scenes resemble Max's KC more than anything else I can find...)

Warhol was in the thick of all this. And of course he was friends w/ all the 80s biggies... Boy George, Madonna, the Durans and of course, our man Prince.

Here's the diary entry:

p. 749, Saturday, August 2, 1986 - Wilfredo had gotten tickets for Prince, and so cabbed over to Madison Square Garden ($3). We passed Debbie Harry and Stephen Sprouse who were there, and we sat down just as Prince jumped out naked, or almost, and it's the greatest concert I've ever seen there, just so much energy and excitement. I saw Ron Delsener and he invited us to the party for Prince at the Palladium. Prince left in a limo the second the show was over.

We went into the Mike Todd Room and it was just almost empty, tables set up, reserved, and there, in a white coat and pink bellbottoms, like a Puerto Rican at a prom, all by himself, was Prince. He was just great, that image of him being weird and always with the bodyguards and everything was just dispelled, and he came over to each and every person and shook their hand and said he was so happy they came, and he danced with each and every girl – all these weird girls in sixties dresses. Literally with every girl, and he wasn't even a good dancer. And he remembered names, like he said, « So glad you came, Wilfredo. » What manners! And Wilfredo was in heaven. We asked Prince if he would be our December cover and he said we'd have to talk to his manager and we said that we'd asked the manager and the manager said to ask him, and so they said they'd work it out. We were just shaking, it was so exciting. And Billy Idol was there and you know, seeing these two glamour boys, it's like the boys are the new Hollywood glamour girls, like Harlow and Marilyn. So wierd.