Andy Warhol's Polaroids: Big Shot
Before some artists make a final version of an artwork, they make preparatory sketches. Instead, Warhol used the Polaroids shot with the Big Shot camera as his preparatory photographs for paintings. Introduced to the market by the Polaroid company in 1971, the Big Shot camera was relatively inexpensive at $19.95 apiece. It was relatively easy to use, marketed to the everyday person with few buttons or complicated settings. Despite its simplicity and a heavy marketing campaign by Polaroid, the camera did not sell well to the general public. However, it became Warhol’s favorite camera. He made a deal with Polaroid that they would supply him parts and new cameras every so often. He used the camera for a long time after it was discontinued by the company.
The name of the camera, Big Shot, not only references the name of the camera but also the type of people who were photographed using it, “big shots,” including Dolly Parton, Neil Sedaka, Diane von Furstenberg and his own art dealer Irving Blum, who showed Warhol’s "Campbell’s Soup Can" series for the first time.
When he used the Big Shot camera to make preparatory photographs for larger portraits, Andy Warhol would paint his sitters with white paint to “flatten out” their appearance. He did this in order for the portraits to appear more in Warhol’s caricature-like pop style, and eliminate some of their facial features like wrinkles and freckles. Although we don’t know exactly who Estelle Feldman is, she was presumably a socialite who could afford to commission a portrait from Warhol.
Irving Blum (b. 1930) was the first person to show Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans on the West Coast of the US. After his service in the US Air Force, he worked as a furniture salesman for the Knoll company in New York for three years where he had his first exposure to art, artists, and galleries. His exposure to art in New York made him excited about the art world and its potential. Blum moved to California in 1957. He introduced himself to Walter Hopps who owned an art gallery with the artist Ed Kienholz called the Ferus Gallery, Blum purchased Kienholtz’s share of the gallery for $500.
When Blum came to New York to find work for his new gallery he expected to see Roy Lichtenstein's comic strips but instead stumbled upon the Campbell's Soup Cans and offered Warhol a solo show at his gallery on the spot.
On July 9, 1962, Blum took a chance on Warhol and showed the Soup Cans at his gallery. Initial reactions to the work were negative as the public could not understand Warhol’s choice of painting such a mundane and everyday subject, however public perception of the work turned around as this show announced the introduction of pop art as a movement. Blum ended up selling seven of the cans for $100 a piece, but then decided that the paintings of soup cans were meant to be a series and should not be sold individually. All of the buyers returned their works to Blum who kept the soup cans in a series in his gallery for many years. After Warhol’s death, Blum sold the series to the Museum of Modern Art in New York where it remains until the present day.
The title, "Long Hook Nose" could relate to Andy Warhol’s anxieties about self-presentation. Warhol was very insecure about his appearance and societal taboos about what gay people should look like and after he was shot on June 3, 1968, he became insecure about the appearance of his gunshot wounds. Due to these internal thoughts, Warhol would regularly receive Botox injections as well as wear wigs and makeup.
Warhol was particularly interested in the phenomenon of rhinoplasty. He did an entire series on the subject titled Before and After which epitomized one of his famous quotes: “pop is just taking the outside and putting it on the inside or taking the inside and putting it on the outside” as the work is a manifestation of plastic surgery.
When Warhol was eight years old, he contracted Sydenham chorea, also known as St. Vitus Dance, a rare disorder of the nervous system. He also suffered from a pale, blotchy complexion that influenced the way he saw himself as a child. At age 29 Warhol had rhinoplasty, but it was not the type where one’s nose is reshaped, instead, he had the skin of his nose shaved off in order to grow new skin. The procedure ultimately failed and Warhol remained insecure about the state of his nose for his entire life.
Not only does Unidentified Man (Long Hook Nose) possibly point to Warhol’s opinion on his own nose, but also on the state of ideal beauty that after WW2. After WW2, many Jews in the United States elected to have rhinoplasty to look more “American” and attempt to rid themselves of Jewish physical stereotypes, one the ‘hook nose’ or having a large nose. Many art dealers and business people around Warhol were Jews. This image was possibly him identifying with Jewish insecurities or thinking about the way Warhol felt similarly to these people, a misfit in society due to physical appearance.
Regina Schrecker (b. 1948) is an Italian model, designer, stylist and philanthropist. In 1971, she was crowned Miss Universe. This image of Schrecker is a preparatory image for a painted portrait that Warhol created of Schrecker in 1983, which ended up being two silkscreened canvases. Schrecker met Warhol when she would pass through New York for modeling jobs. She was fascinated by his extraordinary world and his work ethic, including his ability to turn popular objects into art that inspired an entire artistic movement. Warhol admired Schrecker’s catwalk and her personal style. The two had mutual admiration for each other and became fast friends who stayed in touch for many years.
This image demonstrates Warhol's interest in making art out of recognizable popular or “pop” objects, most famously the Coca-Cola bottle or the Campbell's soup can. In 1985 Warhol became the first artist commissioned to make a “portrait” of the Absolut vodka bottle. In 1986 the advertising campaign went public and was titled “Absolut Warhol”. His painting of the bottle lead to one of the most successful advertising campaigns of the 20th century.