Andy Warhol and his pop art helped define the 1960s and 1970s in America. Born the son of poor Austro-Hungarian immigrants in Pittsburgh, he was fortunate enough to attend the Carnegie Institute and study art. After graduation, he moved to New York, where he became a successful commercial artist sketching women’s accessories for ads before soaring to popularity with his silkscreen paintings of Campbell soup cans and celebrities like Marilyn Monroe.

Obsessed with fame, Warhol coveted the company of the social elite and became one himself. After opening the Factory, an art studio where he surrounded himself with a clique of admirers, Warhol turned to filmmaking and shot hundreds of underground films. This eventually led him to get into contact with Valerie Solanas, a woman who desperately wanted him to produce her play. When Warhol declined, Solanas shot the artist, and although he survived, he was left with a fear of hospitals that would ultimately take his life 19 years later.

Andy Warhol’s unusual art was in demand everywhere, and by the time of his death, the immigrant’s son was worth $100 million.

History