Andy Warhol Flowers Portfolio (F & S II.64 - 73) For Sale

Flowers is a portfolio of ten screenprints produced by the artist in 1970. Exemplifying some of the most vivid and aesthetically pleasing work of the artist’s career, the portfolio appropriates images of hibiscus blossoms that were photographed by Patricia Cualfield for Life magazine. Though the artist had painted flowers before in 1964 this is the first series of ten screenprints devoted to them, beautifully realised in a spectrum of joyous hues including teal, pink, orange, purple and yellow.  

At the time of their production, flowers were a departure from Warhol’s artistic repertoire. Preoccupied with current affairs and the cult of fame and celebrity, Warhol’s subjects were often symbols of tragedy as Marilyn Monroe and John F Kennedy’s assassination. In following on from these, Flowers is a euphoric stand-out. However, they are nonetheless symbolic, connoting beauty, nature and impermanence. A Warholian paradox is that the images themselves are a world away from that of natural: his screenprinting process meant that the flowers are duplicated, manipulated and mechanised. In a style typical of Pop Art, the flowers lose their dimension by way of flat colour. One of the most simple and yet evocative decorative symbols is now undeniably contemporary.