Monroe's Life and Warhol's Prints

            The works of Andy Warhol and Marilyn Monroe are known widely throughout the country. Andy Warhol began his artistic career after he attended Carnegie Institute of Technology, now Carnegie Mellon University, where he studied commercial art. He moved to New York, drawing shoe advertisements and album covers. Warhol became a leading member of the pop art movement during the 1960’s. His one man art exhibition in the Ferus Gallery of Los Angeles marked the debut of pop art on the west coast. He produced a wide range of art that included paintings, photographs, films, and prints. Warhol founded “The Factory,” a studio where he gathered a variety of artists, ranging from writers and musicians, to work and hang out. Some of his work was completed there but it also was home to underground parties. Valerie Solanas, a feminist and a part of “The Factory” group, attempted to murder Warhol on June 3, 1968. Warhol barely survived but lived on to February 22, 1987 when he died in his sleep of a cardiac arrhythmia.  

            Marilyn Monroe was America’s leading lady in films during the 1950’s. Appearing, and starring for the most part, in around thirty films, Monroe became famous and a public sex symbol. Some of her most notable roles are Lorelei Lee in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” Rose Loomis in “Niagara,” Sugar Kane Kowalczyk in “Some Like it Hot” and Pola Debevoise in How to Marry a Millionaire.” Monroe’s personal life has been plastered throughout the media ever since she made it big. Her marriages to police officer James Dougherty, baseball player Joe DiMaggio, and author Arthur Miller were scrutinized, along with her reported affairs with President John F. Kennedy and his brother Senator Robert Kennedy. Although she was known for her dumb blonde personality, Monroe had a deeper side. She wrote personal notes and poems that showed her intense emotions. One specific poem called “Life” portrays the side of Monroe that was hidden from the public.

            One of Warhol’s most popular techniques of creating prints was silk screening, where he could easily mass-produce his art and make variations of the same print with different colors. The silk screen print of Marilyn Monroe is one of Warhol’s most memorable prints, along with Campbell’s soup can, Elvis, and Coca Cola bottle. There are many variations of the Marilyn Monroe screen print located at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh; the most popular one is a set of nine different versions in a three by three box. It’s the same picture of Monroe, from a publicity shoot for the film “Niagara,” but with different color adjustments, for example, one has her hair yellow and her lips black and red, while the one next to it has her hair white and her lips blue and yellow. The colors of the backgrounds change with the colors of Monroe as well. Warhol chose to do a screen print of Monroe because she intrigued him. He had the ability to depict her as incredibly beautiful in some of the prints or show her darker and more mysterious side.

            Monroe’s poem “Life” is relatively unknown to the public, along with all her poetry. Life, included in the recently published book of Monroe’s work “Fragments: Poems, Intimate Notes, Letters,” describes Monroe’s feeling about how there are different directions in life, up and down. She says “Life, I am of both your directions,” meaning she has had her ups and downs, but this poem specifically talks about the downs. The repetition of the line “hanging downward the most” suggests that Monroe has had rough times in her life. Monroe exudes a somber tone through “Life.” The metaphor “strong as a cobweb in the wind” demonstrates weakness and loss of hope. “Life” shows a strikingly deep side of Marilyn Monroe.

            Andy Warhol decided to do screen prints for a certain purpose. Warhol chose to do a screen print, as opposed to any other kind of art technique, of Marilyn Monroe because he gained the ability to mass-produce images and became emotionally detached from his artwork. “The silk screen technique was ideally suited to Warhol, for the repeated image was reduced to an insipid and dehumanized cultural icon that reflected both the supposed emptiness of American material culture and the artist’s emotional noninvolvement with the practice of his art.“ Repeating the image of Monroe created a cultural icon that portrayed America’s material focus in society while he didn’t have to put much effort into the pieces. His noninvolvement with this artwork allowed him to focus his talents on other artistic ventures and bring himself to fame.

            Marilyn Monroe chose to write a poem for a specific reason as well. She didn’t have any other outlets to explain her deeper feelings. Constricted to being seen as dumb, her poem “Life” shows that she has a brain and can use it for more ways than just memorizing lines. Unlike Warhol, Monroe used her poetry to become more emotionally involved and become more comfortable with art, she had serious stage fright. Her poetry also portrays a different side of Monroe unseen by her film audiences, which is like how Warhol is able to show different tones and emotions by using different colors and shades on Monroe’s print. Monroe was able to describe her emotions through a different outlet other than acting, where she was only able to become emotional through different characters lives instead of her own. Her personality that was rarely seen is portrayed through this poem, like how Warhol’s true feelings toward cultural icons is shown through his screen prints.

            The screen print of Marilyn Monroe by Andy Warhol and the poem “Life” by Marilyn Monroe properly show that people may seem deep when they are shallow and the opposite seem shallow when they are deep. Monroe explains her feelings towards her life and life itself thoughtfully while Warhol mass-produces an image of an American sex symbol with ease and emotional detachment. Both artists succeeded in their fields and are recognized for their many different talents. Although being different Warhol and Monroe have similar qualities and their art complement each other.

Annotated Bibliography

“Andy Warhol.” Encyclopedia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 05 Nov. 2010. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/635864/Andy-Warhol I found this source from the library database. It gives most of the background information I found on Andy Warhol. Where he was born, brought up, attended college, lived and worked is in this article. This article tells a lot about the pop art movement.

“Marilyn Monroe.” Encyclopedia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 04 Nov 2010. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/390235/Marilyn-Monroe I also found this article from the library database. This gives background information for Marilyn Monroe. There is tons of information about her films but nothing about her poetry or deeper side so I had to look elsewhere for that.

McQuade, Donald, and McQuade, Christine. Seeing & Writing 4. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2010. Print. Seeing and Writing 4 is the text book required for my English class. It told me what to compare and contrast for these two works of work.

Monroe, Marilyn. Life. Fragments: Poems, Intimate Notes, Letters. MacMillan, 2010. I found this website by doing a basic search on Google. It’s an article about a newly published book of Monroe’s poems, notes, and letters that haven’t been published before. It shows her deeper, intellectual side.

Warhol, Andy. Marilyn Monroe. 1967. Screen Print. Andy Warhol Museum. I found this website by doing a basic search on Google, too. It’s about Warhol’s screen prints and why he likes to do them, the emotional detachment aspect. It also told of the museum dedicated to him and other works that he has done.