In a time when pop culture reigns supreme, Andy Warhol still counts among its royalty.
The art world's answer to Marshall McLuhan, he grasped the converging power of mass media and mass marketing in the 1960s and '70s and cannily prefigured today's instant communication and social networking.
Drawing inspiration from advertising, celebrity culture and anything underground or outre, Warhol made low art the new high art and set the stage for much of what was to come in the following decades.
That the famed pop artist's work remains as contemporary and relevant as ever, nearly a quarter-century after his death, goes far in explaining the local buzz around a newly opened exhibition at the University of Denver's Myhren
Warhol's manipulated, pop-influenced style can be seen in "Mao 3," part of a 1972 suite of screen-prints depicting Mao Tse-tung. ( Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts/ Artists Rights Society, New York )
Although hardly a full-fledged retrospective and lacking much in the way of major works by the artist, it is nonetheless an ambitious offering, complete with an accompanying 68-page, magazine-style catalog.
The show, co-curated by Myhren director Dan Jacobs and Rupert Jenkins, contains more than 100 objects — photographs, original prints, graphics and assorted other works by Warhol, as well as images and memorabilia related to him.
Its springboard was a 2008 gift of 158 Warhol photographs — Polaroids and silver prints — from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts in a bid to boost the display and study of this area of his artistry.
Beginning in 2007, the foundation distributed more than 28,000 of the artist's photos (still just a fraction of the estimated 100,000-150,000 images that exist) to 183 university galleries and museums across the United States, including three in Colorado.
The undertaking was a brilliant win-win for everyone. It kept these works from languishing unseen in storage, and it gave institutions, which could otherwise afford to acquire little if anything by this artist, a substantive body of his work.
Among the DU images are Polaroid snapshots, which Warhol used as the basis for his portraits, and images that served as a kind of photographic diary of his expansive, celebrity-driven social milieu.
The Myhren Gallery could have simply exhibited a portion of the donation, and that probably would have been interesting enough. But to their credit, Jacobs and Jenkins greatly expanded the show's scope, borrowing supplementary objects from nearly 20 private and public collections.
Several of these loans, such as "Golden Mushroom," a 1969 silk-screen from the Campbell's Soup II series, and the "Campbell's Souper Dress" (1967-68), both quintessential examples of Warhol's famous appropriations of the iconic soup can, provide a telling introduction to his work.
Also highly representative is a 1972 set of eight silk-screened portraits of Mao Tse-tung, (another of Warhol's favorite subjects), created in the artist's trademark manipulated, pop-influenced style with eye- catching, saturated colors.
A fascinating subset in the show is a group of more than a dozen of Warhol's less widely known album covers, including a contact- sheet-like look for "This Is John Wallowitch" (1964) and the Rolling Stones' "Sticky Fingers (1971), with an actual zipper built into the design.
In a catalog essay on the covers, Darrin Alfred, AIGA associate curator of graphic design, wrote that these undertakings were the artist's "most constant vehicle of production" from 1949 until his death in 1987.
As suggested by the title, part of the exhibition is devoted to documenting Warhol's trips to Colorado, including a visit to Fort Collins in 1981 for an an exhibition of his work at Colorado State University.
In images such as "Warhol Signing at CSU Fort Collins," depicting eager autograph-seekers, photographer John Bonath, then on the school's faculty, captured the sensation that the artist's appearance obviously sparked.
There are several memorable portraits taken during his time in the state, including the whimsically titled "Andy Warhol, Mountain Man, Colorado" (1982), by Denver photographer Mark Sink, who met the artist at CSU and became part of his circle in New York City.
Also notable is "Portrait of Andy Warhol at the Denver Art Museum" (1977) by Lloyd Rule, then the museum's staff photographer. The unusual four-way image shows the artist seated in the corner of a Larry Bell glass sculpture, contemplating his reflections.
Warhol was an artistic bellwether of his time, and his pop-tinged vision still sharply resonates today.
Kyle MacMillan: 303-954-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com
"WARHOL IN COLORADO."
Art. Myhren Gallery, University of Denver, Shwayder Art Building, 2121 E. Asbury Ave. Photographs, original prints and other works by Andy Warhol are on view along with photographs of Warhol and memorabilia related to him and his visits to Colorado. In all more than 100 objects are included from DU's holdings and nearly 20 other public and private collections. Noon to 6 p.m. daily. Free. 303- 871-3716 or
du.edu/art/myhrengallery.html.
"WARHOL + 1."
Film series. Denver FilmCenter/Colfax, 2510 E. Colfax Ave. The Denver Film Society is presenting a series of four films exploring key figures in Andy Warhol's life: artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, socialite Edie Sedgwick, filmmaker Danny Williams and actress Candy Darling. 7 p.m. Tuesdays in Febuary. 303-595-3456 or
denverfilm.org.
