Details of Renaissance Paintings (Sandro Botticelli, Birth of Venus, 1482). 1984.
Silkscreen in colors.
Signed and numbered. From an edition of 70 copies. On firm wove paper. 63.5 x 94 cm (25 x 37 in). Sheet: 82 x 112 cm (32,3 x 44,1 in).
Sheet 3 of the portfolio comprising a total of 4 color silkscreens. Printed by Rupert Jasen Smith, New York. Published by Editions Schellman & Klüser, Munich/New York (with the stamp on the reverse). [SM].

• Warhol makes Botticelli's Renaissance icon, the "Birth of Venus" (Uffizi, Florence), a pop art icon.
• Warhol is a master of adaptation and alienation: closeup view, gaudy pop art colors and an execution in several color variants.
• Confronting Renaissance and present age, originality and mass production, aura and adaptation, Warhol challenges our traditional ideas of art and creates a fascinating new concept.
• Alongside masterpieces by Piero della Francesca, Paulo Uccello and Leonardo da Vinci, Warhol's exploration of Sandro Botticelli's “Birth of Venus” is the most famous work in the series “Details of Renaissance Paintings”.

PROVENANCE: Private collection Hesse (since ca. 1989).

LITERATURE: Frayda Feldman, Jörg Schellmann, Claudia Defendi, Andy Warhol Prints. A catalogue raisonné 1962-1987, New York 2003, no. II.319.
Forty are better than one. Edition Schellmann, 1969-2009, ed.by Jörg Schellmann, p. 345 (illu., presumably different copy).

"The other day a company wanted to buy my aura. These people didn't want a 'product' from me, they said: >>We want your aura.<<. I didn't find out what it really was they wanted. But they were prepared to pay a lot for it. So I thought to myself, if someone wants to pay that much money for something, I should make the effort to find out what that might be."

Andy Warhol, quoted from: Andy Warhol. Die Philosophie des Andy Warhol von A nach B und zurück, Munich 1991, p. 73.