Warhol Poop Can

Jaylen Strong

Andy Warhol and my “Campbell’s Poop Can”

The piece that I chose is none other than Andy Warhol’s “Campbell’s Soup Can”. I wanted to do Andy Warhol because I’ve been interested in learning about him since last semester. I decided to choose the soup can because it’s an easily recognizable work that a wide range of people from artist to construction worker have probably at least seen a Campbell’s soup can. The soup can is one of those images stored permanently in the human brain. So if you even ever saw one without the label one would at least say it’s a can.

When Andy Warhol decided to create the soup can, he wanted to raise the popular or everyday things to the status of art. He chose the soup can because it’s what he grew up eating for twenty years of his life. He didn’t always have money, and when he was a kid living with his parents in Pittsburgh, they would always Campbell’s. Seeing as how this was an important part of his life, this was the object that he decided to base his work off of. I also decided to do the soup can because it is Warhol’s most famous work, even though it was one of a series of 32 different 20x16 inch paintings. There was one canvas for each Campbell’s variety on the market.

The Andy Warhol solo show, which was his first one, at the Ferus Gallery put Warhol on the critical map. He didn’t sell to many pieces, but the ArtForum’s gallery was right upstairs which helped his exposure. Only six of his 32 paintings sold, which were priced at $100 each, but Irving Blum wanted to keep them as a complete set. Blum bought all 32 for $1000 which would be paid in ten monthly installments. The pieces would later go on to be sold to New York‘s Museum of Modern Art for $15 million dollars in 1996.

The Campbell’s Soup II (1969) is the one I decided to draw inspiration from. In Warhol’s painting, he decided to go with the original colors; red, white, and some light bronze accents, that are part of making Campbell’s soup still easily recognizable today. The can is then placed in the middle of a blank background. The 3D drawn can lives in a flat 2D world. The only attempts at shading in Warhol’s are at the top of the can, and the bottom. The piece as a whole looks computer generated. It’s painted in a way as if to say, “look, a can”, and forcing the viewer to ask themselves why this brand of soup. The medium that Andy Warhol used is oil on canvas.

For my take on this pop classic, I decided to use ink and sharpie on watercolor paper. Andy Warhol painted the Campbell’s soup can because of all the memories behind eating them. I decided to draw the Campbell’s soup can because of current issues around the globe. Specifically, the issue of truth against lies being spread by lobbyist, politicians, and other war criminals that have dumbed down a nation. With war looming in the horizon because of propaganda spread by the U.S. government, along with a failing economy, it’s time for the people to take charge and say we do not want war.

I decided to stripe the can of its original color and give it a plan black and white with some burnt orange accents. The top of the can reads, “Eww” openly displaying its hesitant taste. The bottom reads “Tomato Poop”, once again warning the consumer to think twice before consuming. Out of the bottom oozes what would be the consumer’s meal. As far as shading, I stippled the sides and did a little shading where Warhol did his cans’. I decided to make the background half black and half white to show a perspective as if the can were in the ground like a blade of grass. The white part being the sky, and the black part being the ground. The tomato paste coming out of the bottom of the can would be the roots of the seed coming out, but instead, it is colorless ooze. I used this to symbolize our brains being killed and dumped off into the darkness. The light, which is the white, would be knowledge and the air for the plant to grow, also symbolizing humans growing as a whole. The white would be everyone getting along with everyone for the benefit of all mankind. The labeling also reads what we are becoming. No more useful than mush.

The only things shown on TV are either pointless programs or the news, which as of late with proof coming out of all its lies, isn’t slightly useful. We have been sucked into using our time to distract ourselves from life, and working until death. There is a bigger purpose for mankind, and we’re certainly not living it. In Andy Warhol’s book, The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, he says:

People sometimes say that the way things happen in the movies is unreal, but actually it's the way things happen to you in life that's unreal. The movies make emotions look so strong and real, whereas when things really do happen to you, it's like watching television - you don't feel anything. Right when I was being shot and ever since, I knew that I was watching television. The channels switch, but it's all television.

My work is a contrast to Andy Warhol’s because he did his to make an object art. In my work I am trying to get an issue through to anyone that will listen; Whereas Warhol wanted to be famous from his works.

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"Campbell's Soup: Ode to Food." Warhol. Web. 7 Feb. 2015. <http://www.warhol.org/education/resourceslessons/Campbell’s-Soup--Ode-to-Food/>.

"Everything You Wanted to Know About Andy Warhol's Soup." Neatorama. 31 Aug. 2012. Web. 9 Feb. 2015. <http://www.neatorama.com/2012/08/31/Andy-Warhols-Soup>.