Andy Warhol crossed a lot of celebrity paths during his lifetime and usually had his Polaroid Big Shot Camera in hand to snap photos of the glitterati. Now they’ve become art as much as his iconic pop-art portraits and silkscreens.
The photos have been curated into “Andy Warhol: Photographer: Photographs From The Hedges Collection” and will displayed at the Danziger Gallery in New York City from March 1 until April 21.
Check out Warhol’s photos; click to enlarge.
“Warhol was first and foremost an artist who relied on the camera as a personal recording device. If his paintings largely repel the human presence, his photographs solicit and revere them,” the gallery said in a statement.
“These stand-alone images represent Warhol at his most tangible. He is there, on the other side of the camera, inches from his sitter, plying and encouraging and finding his own judicious angle.”
The photos provide a window into the artist’s life and the many prominent names who shaped culture, style, fashion and sports in the 1970s and 1980s. Warhol often used the photos as guides for some of his most famous works of celebrities like Marilyn Monroe. They now command millions of dollars at auction.
Among the luminaries captured on his Big Shot are Liza Minelli and John Lennon and Yoko Ono, actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, boxer Muhammad Ali and performers like Debbie Harry, Dolly Parton and Diana Ross.
Warhol’s friendships also extended into the upper reaches of fashion. His shots include late designer Gianni Versace and Diane von Furstenberg.
Perhaps the most iconic of all are photos of the artist himself. He poses in his trademark silver wig, wearing sunglasses, a curly wig with full make-up.
Warhol founded Interview magazine in 1969 to provide a “window on pop” and many of his art works were used to illustrate its pages.
“If several of these Polaroids were ultimately used as the basis of screenprint portraits or Interview magazine covers, it is these final painterly renditions that are ultimately reproducible, endlessly repeatable, and easily disseminated,’ the gallery states. “The single Polaroid with no negative from which to reprint alone exists as the un-reproducible piece in the process.”
The Polaroids will be displayed with black-and-white diary-style photographs that detail the artist’s personal trips to his second home in Montauk, and encounters with celebrities like Elizabeth Taylor and Sylvester Stallone.
The display runs from March 1 until April 21. For more information, check out the DanzigerGallery And, check out the photos above.
For more information, visit Danzigerprojects.com