Andy Warhol
Self-Portrait

Self-Portrait

© The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Self-Portrait
Self-Portrait
ArtistAmerican, 1928–1987
CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Self-Portrait
Date1986
PlaceUnited States
MediumAcrylic on canvas
Dimensions80 × 80 in. (203.2 × 203.2 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by the Charles Engelhard Foundation in honor of Linda L. Cathcart, Director of the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston from 1979 to 1987
Object number88.34
Not on view

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Object Type
Description

In the 1960s a new artistic style overtook New York. Known as Pop Art and defined by its cool impersonality, this style embraced American popular culture, utilizing comics, tabloid photographs, and movie stills as artistic inspiration. Perhaps the best-known Pop artist was Andy Warhol, who conceived a new idea of the artist as celebrity.


Across his career, Warhol worked in the traditional genre of portraiture. His portraits of celebrities such as Jackie Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, and Elvis Presley were taken from publicity stills and newspaper photographs. He used these portraits not only to question the originality of the artistic image but also to explore themes of death, celebrity, and postwar culture.


In this ghost-like self-portrait, produced a few months before his death, Warhol stares out at the viewer with an impenetrable glare. The artist’s disembodied head floats against an inky black background, his image silkscreened in a pale violet. Slack-jawed and wearing a platinum fright wig, Warhol likens his face to a skull or death mask.


ProvenanceThe artist; [Texas Gallery, Houston]; purchased by MFAH, 1988.
Exhibition History"Direction and Diversity: Twentieth Century Art in the Museum Collection,” Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, May 21–September 3, 1988.

"Pop Art: The Object Transformed," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, July 28–December 29, 1991.

"Contemporary Art and Photography: Spotlight on the Collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, September 30, 2001–February 3, 2002.

"Andy Warhol: Self-Portraits," Sprengel Museum, Hanover, Germany, October 30, 2004–January 16, 2005; Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, February 12–May 2, 2005.

“Contemporary Art: Selections from the Museum’s Collection,” Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, July 3–September 21, 2014.

"Selections from the Museum's Collection: Post-War Painting and Sculpture," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, May 5–September 5, 2016.

"Warhol By the Book," Blanton Museum of Art, The University of Texas at Austin, October 16, 2016-January 29, 2017.

"Three Times Out," Dublin City Council, Ireland, October 4, 2023–January 28, 2024. (OL.1573)

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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