Andy Warhol. Hammer and Sickle

From 19 May - 15 Jun 2004, the first ever opportunity to view a major representation of Warhol's 'Hammer and Sickle' series of 1976-1977 was exhibited at Haunch of Venison London.

Andy Warhol is one of the most influential artists of the twentieth-century. World famous as a Pop artist, Warhol was part of a group of artists who introduced the iconic images and mass-production techniques of contemporary society into fine art

Warhol represented mass-produced iconic images from contemporary society of people, products and objects that have a strong symbolic link to the fundamental themes of life including food, sex, death and power. These images include Campbell's Soup, Marilyn Monroe, skulls, dollar bills and the hammer and sickle.

At the time of their making during the Cold War the Hammer and Sickle was the best known symbol of the enemy, the USSR. By using this feared symbol of communism as the subject-matter of an object for sale in a capitalist economy, Warhol's work was seen as an ironic commentary. However, by recreating this subject-matter from objects photographed in a range of new compositions, Warhol's series can be seen to turn this symbol into a postmodern still-life.

Warhol helped introduce the mass-production techniques of photography into the fine art practices of painting and drawing. In 1962 he invented a method of photographic silkscreen printing, and from 1972 he made a series of large scale finished drawings from projected templates of photographic images.

With the exception of a hiatus from 1963 to 1972, Warhol drew prolifically throughout his life - it is the one medium that can be seen to extend from his earliest days as an art student in the 1940s to the last weeks before his death. His career was founded on the production of commercial art, primarily drawings, in the 1950s and early 1960s.

Andy Warhol
Hammer and Sickle