Andy Warhol

Goethe 1982

1982

© 2021 The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / Licensed by DACS, London

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Not on display

Artist: Andy Warhol 1928–1987
Medium: Screenprint on paper
Dimensions: Support: 702 × 508 mm
frame: 770 × 582 × 38 mm
Collection: ARTIST ROOMS Tate and National Galleries of Scotland
Acquisition: ARTIST ROOMS Acquired jointly with the National Galleries of Scotland through The d'Offay Donation with assistance from the National Heritage Memorial Fund and the Art Fund 2008
Reference: AR00440

Online caption

The 1980s saw Warhol return to the work of painters such as Sandro Botticelli as a source of inspiration. He first experimented with this in relation to Mona Lisa’s visit to New York in 1963, producing a variety of works based on Leonardo’s mysterious woman. This screenprint is based on a painting by the German artist Johann Tischbein. It depicts Goethe, a key figure in German literature as a traveller in a landscape of ruins. Warhol has cropped the original composition so as to create a head and shoulders portrait of the writer. Goethe had contemplated painting as an early career choice and published a book on the theory of colour. As the first person to study the psychological affects of colour, it is interesting to think what he would make of Warhol’s representation of him as a Pop icon.