Andy Warhol: Campbell's Soup Cans and Other Works, 1953–1967

MoMA

April 25–October 18, 2015

Andy Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans is the signature work in the artist’s career and a landmark in MoMA’s collection. The 1962 series of 32 paintings is the centerpiece in this focused collection exhibition of Warhol's work during the crucial years between 1953 and 1967. The Soup Cans mark a breakthrough for Warhol, when he began to apply his seminal strategies of serial repetition and reproduction to key subjects derived from American commodity culture. Warhol also developed his signature use of the flat, uniform aesthetic of photo-screen printing just after he completed the Soup Cans. For the first time at MoMA, the 32 Soup Cans are shown in a line (rather than a grid), echoing the way they were first exhibited at the Ferus Gallery, Los Angeles, in 1962. The exhibition also includes drawings and illustrated books Warhol made in the 1950s, when he started his career as a commercial artist, and other paintings and prints from the 1960s, when he became a beacon of the Pop art movement.