Campbell’s Soup Can (Tomato) 4A by Andy Warhol includes highly iconic imagery that is widely recognizable in the Pop Art movement. Once again, Warhol takes the ever-present American pantry staple and transforms it into high art—this time on a shopping bag. Warhol, originally a commercial graphic artist, found the imagery of the Campbell’s soup label a powerful visual tool. The soup cans could represent the role of mass consumerism in postwar American society. This particular work is a special addition to Warhol’s Campbell’s suite, as it is printed onto a shopping bag, adding another layer of irony to the work in its use.
Campbell’s Soup Can (Tomato) 4A as Part of Andy Warhol’s Larger Body of Work
Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Can (Tomato) 4A and the rest of the artist’s Campbell’s-inspired creations became legitimate subjects of modern still life during postwar American society. In the 1960s, Warhol had just started to experiment with screenprinting, a medium commonly used in the mass production of consumer goods, and one that would change the art world forever. Some of the most famous and recognizable images in art history come from Warhol’s experiments with Campbell’s Soup imagery. This is mostly because of his screenprinting process and the decision to depict such banal subject matter, which helped redefine and complicate the concept of high art. This print was created in 1966 for an exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, Massachusetts.
Photo Credit: Andy Warhol tracing Campbell’s Soup silkscreen, The Factory, New York City, circa 1965 © Estate of Nat Finkelstein © 2021 The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / Licensed by DACS, London
