October 25, 2020–March 28, 2021
Andy Warhol thrived on outrageousness, and got used to critics trashing his work. But today, 33 years after his death, many see him—the king of pop art—as the most influential artist of the 20th century. His creative activities were boundless: painting, printmaking, film, television, commercial illustration, sculpture, photography, installation art, rock music promotion, publishing, writing, modeling, advertising. Warhol touched nearly every form of aesthetic expression.
Please register for MAG timed tickets prior to your visit – here.
The artist and his art contained a multitude of contradictions, and anyone seeking to come to terms with Warhol’s legacy finds a knotty and evergreen project. He depicted religious subjects and superstars, mundane consumer products and sexual acts. He was simultaneously a dispassionate social observer and a greedy exploiter of commercialism and celebrity. At one moment he touches on social justice, but then throws consumer products in our faces. In the 1960s, his films were routinely banned or busted for nudity, sex, and queer innuendo; but looking back years later, he claimed, “The old stuff is better to talk about than to see. It always sounds better than it really is.”
If it is difficult to wrap one’s head around Warhol, it is not only because of the depth and range of his output, but also because each generation has found new ways to make Warhol theirs. This fact is yet another paradox of his accomplishment, because from his earliest days to his last he viewed himself as a misfit and an outsider. And yet this fey, awkward man, obsessed about skin problems and baldness, was able to sell himself as a fashionable portraitist, whose clients ranged from Iran’s royal family to Gianni Versace. From today’s vantage point, he was a pioneer in making it OK to be different, which in Warhol’s case was a particularly strange and conflicted beauty.
Included in Season of Warhol:
Cow Wallpaper | Silver Clouds | Warhol TV
Virtual Lecture with Jonathan Flatley
Sunday, October 25, 2020 | 2-3 pm | FREE | Watch the recorded lecture
Join us on the opening day of a Season of Warhol for a virtual lecture by Jonathan Flatley as he speaks of the work of celebrated American artist, film director, producer, and publisher Andy Warhol. Jonathan Flatley is a professor of English at Wayne State University. He is the author of Affective Mapping: Melancholia and the Politics of Modernism (2008) and Like Andy Warhol (2017), and co-editor (with Jennifer Doyle and José Esteban Muñoz) of Pop Out: Queer Warhol (Duke University Press, 1996). He is currently working on a book about Black Leninism and revolutionary counter-moods. Sponsored by Dr. Hannah J. Solky.
Especially for Educators: Virtual Talk on Andy Warhol
Wednesday, October 28, 2020 | 4-5 pm | FREE
Calling all teachers! Join MAG Director Jonathan Binstock for an insider’s look at our new exhibition Andy Warhol Portfolios: A Life in Pop. This special free webinar is presented to celebrate the hard work of all the teachers and to provide an opportunity to explore the many facets of Warhol’s work on view at MAG October 25, 2020–March 28, 2021. Please note this a noncredit in-service.
Andy Warhol, Virtuoso of the Ordinary: A Conversation with Blake Gopnik and Catherine Zuromskis
Friday, November 13, 2020 | 6-7 pm | FREE
Join us for a virtual conversation with Blake Gopnik and Catherine Zuromskis as they discuss the sometimes surprising ordinariness of the iconic and influential pop artist, Andy Warhol. From the origins of his famous silkscreen paintings to his underappreciated late-career work of the 1970s and 80s, Warhol’s genius as an artist emerged in fascinating ways from his everyday life and experiences. Drawing on Gopnik’s definitive new biography of Warhol, this conversation will explore a different side of the artist and his art.
Live captioning will be available.
Never Bothered by Reruns: Andy Warhol and Television
Thursday, January 28, 2021 | 6 pm | FREE
Andy Warhol loved television. From his cover design of the March 1966 issue of TV Guide, his unseen soap operas from the seventies – Vivian’s Girls, Phoney, and Fight, to his television appearances on Saturday Night Live, The Love Boat, and his own Andy Warhol’s Fifteen Minutes in the eighties, Warhol’s relationship with the medium was varied and playful. Join us for a virtual talk with Greg Pierce, Associate Curator of Film and Video at the Andy Warhol Museum, as he illuminates Andy Warhol’s relationship with television and how it intersected with and informed his painting, filmmaking, and photography as well as his own celebrity.
Live captioning will be available.
Especially for Educators: Warhol Comes to the Classroom
Wednesday, February 24, 2021 | 4 pm | FREE
Join us and learn about the new programs and resources to bring the exhibit and MAG’s Permanent Collection to your classrooms, including: an 8-minute video overview of the exhibit, a live virtual tour of the exhibition, and meet UR Assistant Professor of Art Mizin Shin who will discuss her videos, detailing some of the screen printing techniques used by Andy Warhol. Pre-registration required.
A Virtual ASL Tour of Season of Warhol
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 | 6 pm | FREE | Watch the recorded tour
Explore the many facets of Andy Warhol’s work in MAG’s exhibition Season of Warhol! Join us for a live virtual tour led by MAG Docent Jackie Schertz in American Sign Language (ASL) and interpreted in spoken English. Registration required.
Season of Warhol Black Artists Engagement Project
Saturday, March 13, 2021 | 2–4 pm | FREE | Watch the recorded discussion
Join six Rochester-based Black artists in their 20s and 30s—Lavonne Barfield, Martin Hawk, Erica Jae, Cocoa Rae, Narada Riley, and Brittany Williams—as they share their responses through their visual art, written and spoken words to the provocation of MAG’s current suite of exhibitions, Season of Warhol. This virtual Long Table conversation, hosted by Rachel DeGuzman of 21st Century Arts Inc. and MAG Director Jonathan Binstock, is the culmination of an effort to animate the legacy of Andy Warhol in the context of the Black Lives Matter civil rights movement.
Read the Season of Warhol press release.
Season of Warhol is sponsored by the Gallina Family and the Sands Family Foundation, with additional support from the Rubens Family Foundation, Can-Am Consultants, Inc., the Gallery Council of the Memorial Art Gallery, Sanjay and Allyson Hiranandani, Sandra Hawks Lloyd, Nocon & Associates, a private wealth advisory practice of Ameriprise Financial Services, Inc., and Woods Oviatt Gilman, LLP. Funding is also provided by Janet S. Reed, Peter and Nan Brown, Marilynn Patterson Grant and David Grant, Chris and Mike Haefner, Henrietta Building Supplies, Inc., Trudie and Ron Kirshner, Peter and Kathy Landers, the McDonald Family, Deanne Molinari, Sharon and Bob Napier, Lewis Norry in memory of Sharon and Neil Norry, Marcia Stern, Lori Van Dusen, Sarah and Bob Hurlbut, Mark F. Schork, and Harter Secrest & Emery LLP.
The exhibition is also made possible by the Robert L. and Mary L. Sproull Fund, the Thomas and Marion Hawks Memorial Fund, the Margaret Davis Friedlich and Alan and Sylvia Davis Memorial Fund, the Nancy R. Turner Fund for Special Exhibitions, the Dr. and Mrs. James H. Lockhart, Jr. Fund, and the Kayser Fund.
