Muhammad Ali (F. & S. II.179)
Muhammad Ali (F. & S. II.179)
Signed Print
Andy Warhol
£60,000-£90,000Value Indicator
$120,000-$190,000 Value Indicator
$110,000-$170,000 Value Indicator
¥590,000-¥880,000 Value Indicator
€70,000-€100,000 Value Indicator
$640,000-$960,000 Value Indicator
¥11,940,000-¥17,910,000 Value Indicator
$80,000-$120,000 Value Indicator
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102 x 76cm, Edition of 150, Screenprint
Medium: Screenprint
Edition size: 150
Year: 1978
Size: H 102cm x W 76cm
Signed: Yes
Format: Signed Print
Last Auction: October 2023
Value Trend:
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Meaning & Analysis
Andy Warhol’s 1978 image Muhammad Ali (F. & S. II.179) depicts the internationally famous boxer, orator, and activist Muhammad Ali in profile. Warhol uses his characteristic medium of screen printed photographs with the addition of overdrawing and colour blocking. Here, the artist had covered the top of the boxer’s head in the coral pink of the background, then drawn in the outline of his hair.
This print comes from the larger series Muhammad Ali produced by Warhol and commissioned by Richard Weisman. Warhol depicted Ali among other athletes including Jack Nicklaus and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Muhammad Ali, perhaps the most continuously recognizable of the athletes, was a three-time world champion heavyweight boxer at the time these images were taken. Warhol took the photos himself on a polaroid camera. Although Warhol was at first uninterested in sports, he came to recognize the celebrity of athletes, stating “I really got to love the athletes because they are the really big stars.” This growing interest in athletes evokes the shifting nature of celebrity overtime. These images clearly descend from his images of icons like Marilyn Monroe and Ingrid Bergman nearly two decades earlier, but represent a shift in popular culture.
Andy Warhol was a leading figure of the Pop Art movement and is often considered the father of Pop Art. Born in 1928, Warhol allowed cultural references of the 20th century to drive his work. From the depiction of glamorous public figures, such as Marilyn Monroe, to the everyday Campbell’s Soup Can, the artist challenged what was considered art by blurring the boundaries between high art and mass consumerism. Warhol's preferred screen printing technique further reiterated his obsession with mass culture, enabling art to be seen as somewhat of a commodity through the reproduced images in multiple colour ways.
