Andrew Warhola is considered to be the “founder and a major figure of the pop art movement”. He was born in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania in 1928. He graduated from the Carnegie Institute of Technology, where he majored in pictorial design. He worked as an illustrator in many magazines including Vogue, Harpers Bazaar and the New Yorker, but, his big break was in 1949, when he illustrated for Glamour Magazine. Andy Warhol was born with the name Andrew Warhola, he dropped the “a” when his credit for his drawing read, “Drawings by Andy Warhol”. Warhol was obsessed by ambition to become famous and wealthy, and he knew the only was to achieve this was with hard work. In the 1950s, he moved to a place on East 75th Street, his mother moved with him. Warhol had successful career as a commercial artist, he won several commendations from the Art Director's Club and the American Institute of Graphic Arts. In 1952, the artist had his first individual show at the Hugo Gallery, exhibiting ‘Fifteen Drawings based on the Writing of Truman Capote’. His work was exhibited in several other venues during the 1950s, including his first group show at The Museum of Modern Art in 1956.Soon He had all of New York copying his work The 1960’s was when Warhol began to make his first prints. They started off mostly based on comic strips like, Dick Tracy, Superman, and Popeye. In 1962 Warhol made prints of dollar bills and Campbell soup cans. He also did many prints on famous people, including, Marilyn Monroe, John Wayne and Anney Oakley. He was well known for making prints with slight colour change. Warhol’s favorite printmaking technique was ‘silkscreen’. In this same year, 1962, he founded The Factory, it was an art studio where he employed in a rather chaotic way “art workers” to mass produce mainly prints and posters, but also some other things like shoes designed by the artist. Other from art, the Factory also served as a filmmaking studio. He made a series of 16mm films
Bibliography: http://www.warholfoundation.org/ Biography by Martin Cribbs, Licensing Director. http://www.warhols.com/bio.html Jennifer Johnson 418 West 15th street New York, N.Y. 10011 Warhol, Andy; Ted Yanak and Pam Cornelison The Great American History Fact-Finder 12-01-1993