Andy Warhol's Elephant in the (Basquiat) Room

Thursday afternoon I was able to make time for the Andy Warhol Museum while in Pittsburgh. The Pirates were playing at Heinz Stadium as I passed through the heart of the city. Finding a parking spot was easily achieved and I was soon inside, purchasing a ticket at the reception area. Tickets are half price for seniors, which turned out to be an unexpected perk, more than covering the cost of parking.

As noted in yesterday's post, the layout of the seven-story museum is chronological. You begin at the top and work your way down. Each level unfolds a more developed aspect of Andy Warhol's career explorations, from ad agency commercial illustration/design to Pop Art and screen printing, fascination with celebrities, film making and even journalism. And yes, there is a room dedicated to the Andy Warhol Screen Test in which museum-goers can also do a screen test.

This blog post is devoted to the Elephant here pictured, which stands on a small pedestal in the Warhol-Basquiat Gallery. It's been famously observed that the two artists did a lot of collaboration and the results were often dramatic. It would have been interesting to be a fly on the wall as these two created the works here.

When I entered the space, I initially scanned, then panned, the elephant. My eyes were drawn to the Warhol-Basquiat collaborations, bold and brassy, dramatic and uninhibited.

After circling the perimeter of the room, engaging each of the pieces (most of them mixed media) I returned to the elephant, and upon noticing the falling man pattern that spilled over the paper mache creature, I seemed to take more pleasure in the piece. It wasn't just a zebra-striped endangered creature.

As for the subject matter, Warhol had in 1983 produced a series of prints featuring 10 endangered species for Ron and Freyda Feldman. In other words, the sculpture was not unrelated to a theme he'd already shown interest in.

"Elephant" (Side view)

Here are a couple of the Warhol/Basquiat pieces that were hanging in this room.

Collaboration (Chairs/African)

Collaboration (Year of the Rat, Rodent (TM))

Meantime, art goes on all around you. Engage it.

Related Links
Basquiat and Warhol: Exploitative or even-handed relationship?
Was Robert Hughes Right About Basquiat?
Warhol's Elephant 293