Uncle Sam (F. & S. II.259)
Uncle Sam (F. & S. II.259)
Signed Print
Andy Warhol
£40,000-£60,000Value Indicator
$80,000-$120,000 Value Indicator
$70,000-$110,000 Value Indicator
¥390,000-¥590,000 Value Indicator
€45,000-€70,000 Value Indicator
$430,000-$640,000 Value Indicator
¥7,960,000-¥11,940,000 Value Indicator
$50,000-$80,000 Value Indicator
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97 x 97cm, Edition of 200, Screenprint
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Meaning & Analysis
Uncle Sam (F. & S. II.259) is a signed screen print on Lenox Museum board made by the renowned artist Andy Warhol in 1981. The print comes in a limited edition size of 200 and shows a portrait of Uncle Sam, a fictional figure who was created to represent the US government, most notably remembered for featuring in the posters recruiting young people to join the American army during World War I and World War II. Against a pale yellow backdrop, Uncle Sam is rendered in Warhol’s characteristic visual style with bright red and blue gestural lines delineating the icon’s facial features. The colours of the American flag dominate this composition which capture how Uncle Sam is often seen as a personified embodiment of the United States.
Uncle Sam (F. & S. II.259) is part of Warhol’s Myths collection which features ten screen prints, all of which depict icons and idols from American popular culture. While many of the subjects for Warhol’s portraits in this collection are characters from television shows and films, Uncle Sam is one of the few figures that was not created for entertainment purposes.
To create this portrait, Warhol asked one of his friends to dress up as Uncle Sam so he could take Polaroid photographs of the character in any pose he wanted which would then act as the source material for the screen prints. This contrasts with many of Warhol’s other screen prints which were based on preexisting imagery, such as those in the Ads collection.
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.