Andy Warhol’s print Muratti Ambassador Cigarettes was created for a 1985 advertising campaign by Les Fabriques de Tabac Reunies based in Switzerland. There was a contest in which the public participated, where the winning prizes included a painting and ten prints.
Muratti Ambassador Cigarettes as Part of Andy Warhol’s Larger Body of Work
Warhol’s beginnings as a product marketer heavily influenced his artistic career, in which he glamorized and transformed everyday objects, like soup cans and cleaning supplies, into works of art. Warhol was especially in his element when he was commissioned to do pieces like Muratti Ambassador Cigarettes. This image illustrates Warhol’s penchant for color and bold lines. The logos are represented multiple times, which is a technique that illustrators use to further penetrate the viewer’s psyche. In this way, Warhol not only created an ad that attracted potential customers, but he also changed the way in which people considered something as “art”. He further implemented this technique in much of his art, such as his widely famous portfolio of Campbell’s Soup Cans. While Warhol was commissioned to do this for a specific ad campaign, limiting his creative flexibility, he still managed to create something that was recognizably “Warhol.”
Photo credit: Original Muratti Ambassador Ads, 1967, 128 x 90 cm ( 50,59 x 35,57 inch).
