The purpose of art is to inspire, as well as to be thought-provoking, but sometimes an artist opts to be just provocative instead. Andy Warhol ranks among the most eminent figures of the 20th-century art. Extravagant on the verge of audacity, he defied traditional perception of the matter and promoted a brand new approach called Pop Art. Warhol presented his Campbell’s Soup Cans in 1962, outraging the critics that were surprised by the work’s simplicity. The purpose of this paper is to examine Andy Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans as a controversial work of art of the 20th century.
The work in question consists of thirty-two canvases, each having a painting of Campbell’s Soup can over it. Warhol chose the number deliberately to cover each variety of the soup available at the time. According to the artist, he painted the cans because he “used to have the same lunch every day, for twenty years” (Flatley, 2017, p. 96). Flatley (2017) notes that Warhol’s idea of liking something consisted in repetition, i.e., doing the same pleasant thing one time after another in a machine-like fashion. This work attracted much attention, and while some critics were against it, it showed the public that everything could be art. According to Flatley (2017), “Warhol’s everyday consumption of Campbell’s soup appears to be a perfect mirror of its mass production” (p. 96). In other words, the artist picked a subject that was relevant to most of his audience to show that art is not necessarily something sophisticated or abstract. Warhol saw beauty in modern and mundane aspects of life, which inevitably had a positive response on behalf of the audience, to whom the topic is close and relevant.
The work in question was never censored, as it did not directly offend anyone. Nevertheless, it was faced with condescendence on behalf of some critics. As Gene Swanson mentioned during his interview with Warhol, “Barbara Rose made an interesting point in that thing about Pop Art is not a style” (Sichel, 2018, p. 63). The critic’s opinion derives from the fact that there is no specific manner in which Pop Art works are created, unlike traditional styles, such as Abstract Expressionism that dominated at the time. Warhol responded that, to some extent, Rose was right but later mentioned that there was no way to “say that an Abstract Expressionist is better than, you know, a Pop artist” (Sichel, 2018, p. 74). His idea was that there did not exist a superior style, and one could find beauty in any mundane object, such as a can of soup.
In general, art censorship is rarely justified in today’s society. In the past, censorship was an effective tool that allowed monarchs and churches to enact control over the population with the objective of protecting their power. As values have shifted toward the present day, freedom of speech and expression is now considered of paramount importance. Every piece of art promotes creative thinking and deserves to find its audience without external control. It is every individual’s personal decision to accept or reject the idea of a particular work.
All in all, Andy Warhol managed to revolutionize the public’s perception of art. Campbell’s Soup Cans served to promote the idea that art is not limited to abstract forms and is available to everyone. Following Warhol’s experiments, Pop Art received due recognition on the global scale, thus contributing to art popularization. Therefore, this work deserves to be listed among the most significant pieces of the 20th century because of its undeniable impact on the industry.
References
Flatley, J. (2017). Like Andy Warhol. The University of Chicago Press.
Sichel, J. (2018). ‘Do you think Pop Art’s queer?’ Gene Swenson and Andy Warhol. Oxford Art Journal, 41(1), 59–83.