As both artist and personality Andy Warhol played a major role in the Pop Art movement of the 1960s which claimed images from the mass-media as subjects for high art. Warhol pioneered the use of commercial silkscreen processes to produce paintings and serial prints of ubiquitous commercial products such as the Campbell’s Soup cans and Coca-Cola bottles. He applied these same techniques to numerous read-made images from the popular culture including news photographs and picture-magazine portraits of celebrities. When asked to explain his work, Warhol warned his critics not to probe for hidden meaning because he cared only for surfaces.

Warhol denounced all claims to seriousness. Like the corporation, which advertises that it “enjoys having people call us chicken,” Warhol adored being labeled superficial. If the artist made any commentary upon the American way of life it arose from his brilliant intimation of consumerism gone berserk. Warhol ignored the soup to portray its packaging; he focused not upon the personality of Marilyn Monroe but upon her promotion; he examined violence not as a social problem but as a media event. Warhol could blithely dress the electric chair in boutique colors because at the extreme end of mindless consumerism the quality of a product, strength of character and exercise of thought do not matter. All that glitters is all there is.