The Bite Magazine - Spring/Summer 2020 - Issue 27

bite exhibition lief that emerged from his biography and how he reim- agined what art could be in an age of immense social, political and technological change. Warhol was born Andrew Warhola in Pittsburgh to Carpatho-Rusyn parents who emigrated from a small village in the former Czechoslovak Republic. His family was devout followers of the Byzantine Ruthenian Catho- lic Church. The impact of the strong religious conviction of his mother, Julia, with whom he lived for most of his life, is considered as a significant context to his work. His sexuality is also an important theme in the exhibi- tion shown through his evocative early line drawings of men from the 1950s. After graduating and moving to New York to become a commercial illustrator, Warhol’s drawings in the 1940s and 1950s were light-hearted and often fantastical. In many of them, he used a ‘blotted-line’ technique, a basic form of printmaking that resulted in works such as Cano in 1948 and The Summer Dancers in 1955. He also had one of his drawings bought by Tina Fredericks, the art editor of Glamour fashion magazine who then commis- sioned him to provide a series of shoe illustrations. This led to more commissions and soon he was in high demand as an illustrator for prestigious clients includ- ing Conde Nast, the New York Times, Vogue, and Harper’s Bazaar. Becoming fascinated with New York’s glamor- ous celebrities, he began creating a series of portraits focused on stars like Elizabeth Taylor, Elvis Presley, and Jackie Kennedy using photographic silkscreen printing. This meant he could directly reproduce images already in the public eye, such as publicity shots or tabloid pho- tographs. He went on to create Head with Flowers in 1958 and Ice Cream Dessert in 1959 and would hold ‘colouring parties’ in which he invited his friends to add coloured inks to his drawings. He employed this collaborative, de- tached attitude at his studio, The Factory, in the 1960s, where studio assistants would help create his work for Andy Warhol (1928 – 1987) Debbie Harry 1980 - Private Collection of Phyllis and Jerome Lyle Rappaport 1961