The Andy Warhol Museum 

117 Sandusky Street

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 

Andy Warhol, born Andrew Warhola on August 6, 1928 was the youngest of three sons born to Andrej Warhola and Julia Zavacky Warhola.  His parents immigrated to the United States from the European region that is now Slovakia, settling into the working-class neighborhood of Uptown in Pittsburgh.  Warhol graduated from Carnegie Mellon University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Pictorial Design in 1949 and soon after moved to New York City to pursue a career as a commercial artist.

Throughout the 1950s, he became one of the most successful illustrators of his time and won numberous awards for his work.  His clients included Tiffany & Co., The New York Times, Bonwit Teller and others.  Much of his commercial work was based on photographs and other source images, a process he would use for the rest of his life.  While he continued to work as a commercial artist throughout his career, in the early '60s Warhol transitioned into the fine art world gaining notoriety in the Pop Art movement. 

Early Pop paintings were based on comics and ads, with his series of Campbells' Soup Cans in 1962 creating a buzz in the art world that launched Warhol as a celebrity.  Other early subjects drew upon Warhol's life-long fascination with Hollywood.  In 1962, he began a large series of celebrity portraits which included Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley and Elizabeth Taylor. 

Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe portfolio is a series of ten 36" x 36" silkscreen prints created in 1967, five years after the actress' passing.  Each print depicts the same image of Monroe in different, often bright colors.  The portfolio is considered a classic piece of Warhol's work and a challenge to traditional fine art standards. By elevating pop culture icons to fine art, Warhol blurred the lines between the two and revitalized portraiture* in the mid-20th century. 

*Portraiture is the artistic representation of a person or group, aiming to capture physical likeness, personality and mood through painting, photography or sculpture.  Dating back to ancient times, this art form serves to document identity, status and psychology evolving from formal, commissioned paintings to diverse photographic, digital and abstract styles. 

Warhol chose the source image for this painting of actress Elizabeth Taylor (1932-2011) from a publicity photograph of her 1960 film Butterfield 8.  He created this portrait when Taylor was at the height of her stardom.  

Triple Elvis is a 1963 painting by Andy Warhol.  The work depicts three repeated images of singer and actor, Elvis Presley derived from a publicity still for the 1960 Western film, Flaming Star.

Warhol died in New York City on February 22, 1987.  After Warhol's passing The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. was founded to promote the "advancement of visual arts".  The Andy Warhol Museum was announced in 1989 and opened in Pittsburgh in 1994. 

The Andy Warhol Museum Mission and Values

.. to engage and inspire through Warhol's life, art and legacy ..

The life story of Andy Warhol, in all its complexity, is inspirational and guides our work.  Our collection is the heart of our institution and we will succeed through sharing, preserving and interpreting the collection in the most accessible way possible.  The museum is a place to express and explore multiple perspectives, push boundaries and challenge conventions.  The Warhol believes in learning by doing and being a place of experimentation.  The Warhol is committed to advancing diversity, equity and inclusion in every aspect of our work. 

"If you want to know all about Andy Warhol, just look at the surface of my paintings and me, and there I am.  There's nothing behind it."

Andy Warhol 

Circa 1966

Self-Portrait