Andy was born in Pittsburgh in 1928 as the son of Slovak immigrants. His birth name was Andrew Warhola. Andy’s father was a construction worker who died in an accident when Andy was only 13.
Andy’s love and talent for art started off quite early in his life. After high school he studied commercial art at the Carnegie Institute of technology in Pittsburgh. Andy graduated in 1949 before moving to New York where he worked as an illustrator for magazines like Vogue and Harpar’s Bazaar and also for commercial advertising. He soon became the most thought of and successful commercial illustrator.
Andy Warhol had his first one-man show exhibition in 1952 at the Hugo Gallery in New York. In 1956 he had an important group exhibition at the renowned Museum of Modern Art.
It wasn’t until the sixties Warhol started painting the famous Campbell Soup cans and Coke bottles. Soon enough he soon became a famous figure in the New York art scene. Andy Warhol started doing silkscreen prints of famous personalities like Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor from 1962.
Andy Warhol’s art removed the difference between fine art and commercial art. Warhol once expressed his philosophy in one affecting sentence:
“When you think about it, department stores are kind of like museums.”
In 1962 Warhol started The Factory, his art studio.
The pop artist not only depicted mass products but he also wanted to mass produce his own works of pop art. Consequently he founded The