Campbell Soup Cans is a renowned artwork by the well—known artist Andy Warhol. This artwork gained immense fame in the early 60’s that has not been alleviated till date. It marks the high point of the artist’s career and is recognized around the world as one of his signature artworks This was a key transitional work produced by the artist as after this piece, he shifted from making hand-painted works to silk-screening. This work is particularly rendered exquisitely and precisely as the observational painting of the soup can is highly realistic and static, with the correct areas of highlight and shadow which creates a drastic contrast to the freehand, loose works he did earlier like Before and After in 1961 with the paint allowed to drip in the work.‘ Even though Warhol hand-painted each of the soup cans meticulously, the conscious choice of using a stamp to create the faded, yellow, repetitive design at the bottom of the cans presages the shift in his artistic focus to screen printing.
By pitching the idea of comfort food through the use of soup cans as his subject in this artwork and initially displaying them in the exhibition as stacked cans in a grocery store shelf, the artist successfully makes something as ordinary as soup cans the focus of the artwork The warm, tomato red color on the soup cans balances well with the cool, olive green and white color which ”2 highlights the idea of warmth on a cold day, making you directly reminisce “home cooking . Viewing the thirty-two cohesive and almost indistinguishable soup cans as one piece of art, hypnotizes the viewer and the viewer‘s eye catches the word “soup” printed in hold at first This word connotes warmth and therefore the artist has intelligently used typography as well to further emphasize the concept of comfort food.
The actual soup cans, which were produced sixty-five years before this art piece came into existence, had a typeface that was rather unique. Johnathon Thorn, Campbell’s corporate archivist mentioned that it was etched into the cans and was “very similar to Joseph Campbell’s own signature”3 . He also stated, “it was intended to look like cursive handwriting of the day that one would find on handwritten recipes, equating to ‘Homemade””. This revelation stresses the concept of comfort food that Andy Warhol displays implicitly to a large audience The viewer is compelled to reflect upon the concept of the piece rather than the form. The audience does not focus on the brush stroke and other technical details of the piece as much as they do on the subject of the cans being painted and labeled as “art” in the 60’s in the United States where their cultural life is dominated mainly by consumerism. This particular artwork marks the era of increasing consumerism, especially in the United States, which was led by the increasing popularity of advertisements on television.
The artwork is almost like an advertisement due to the repetition of the image thirty-two times, which is successfully drilled into the viewer’s mind. Through his style of creating works in a series, Andy Warhol blurred the distinction between fine art and mass productions. The 19605 were marked by the climax of radicalism where New York in particular became the epicenter of avant-garde artists. Warhol realized the visual effectiveness of serial imagery and chose to use subjects that were mass-produced and recognized worldwide to imitate the homogenous nature of advertisements“. One of the main art movements that was rising in the United States at the same time as consumerism was Pop Art, It came into recognition when the ‘popular culture’ was merged with ‘fine art’ to create one unique genre. It dealt with the idea of mechanical reproduction and DH “downplayed the idea of originality.
As mass consumerism was growing during this time period, the artwork resonated well with the affluent culture of the 60s. Through his artworks, Warhol intended to move away from the individual expression, which was what the abstract expressionists were seeking of communicating through their work. This was one of the signature works of the Pop Art movement that was emerging during the 60’s because it drifted away from the personal to something universally recognized. By creating paintings of mass culture objects and media stars, the entire concept of there being no hierarchy of culture and of art borrowing from any type of source was what the initiators of the significant movement wanted to convey. The artist received great criticism for the same as there was a drastic transition from ‘traditional art’ to a more modern take on what is considered “art” and this movement in particular was not easily accepted by a majority of the society.
It is highly ironic how the society itself was chosen as an inspiration to create such an artwork and they were the ones frowning upon the piece. The rise of expenditure and consumption in the United States during the 1960s was the content of his series of thirty-two painted canvases and it almost seemed to mock the idea of the risen affluence and materialism that came with it. It is commendable how Warhol used visuals to depict the current state of society and brought about a major change in the mindsets of people in regard to the definition of art He forced the viewers and artists to look beyond one’s personal pain and anxiety in the field of an and focus on the universal truth of the state of United States at that point. Through this celebrated artwork, Andy Warhol successfully communicates the correlation of consumerism to the concept of comfort food and the Pop Art movement and interprets the significant transition in the state of the society that is affected by the mass production of goods. This artwork is lauded worldwide today because of the powerful idea the artist successfully conveys. This piece acts as a mirror to the society and reflects the blatant truth of a highly materialistic world that came into existence in the 20‘“ Century.
