Andy Warhol

Onion Made with Beef Stock
1968

This set of ten color screenprints is based on the Campbell’s soup can, one of Andy Warhol’s best-known icons. In 1962 Warhol produced a series of thirty-two silkscreen paintings depicting the cans—one canvas for each variety of soup available at the time. He continued to produce images of the soup cans for more than two decades, a process of repetition that reflects his characteristic interest in mimicking the conditions of mechanical reproduction. In the Campbell’s soup can series, as elsewhere in mass culture, an “original” reproduction resulted in many other reproductions. Likewise, the screenprint technique—which removed any trace of the artist’s hand from the creative process—dovetailed with Warhol’s mass-produced subject. The artist’s own encounters with the homogeneity of postwar consumerism perhaps explain his particular attraction to the Campbell’s soup can. As he remarked, in typically laconic terms: “I used to drink it. I used to have the same lunch every day, for twenty years, I guess, the same thing over and over again.”

Not on view

Date
1968

Classification
Prints

Medium
Screenprint

Dimensions
Sheet: 35 1/16 × 23 1/8in. (89.1 × 58.7 cm) Image: 31 7/8 × 18 7/8in. (81 × 47.9 cm)

Accession number
69.13.7

Edition
114/250 | A-Z APs

Publication
Printed by Salvatore Silkscreen Co., Inc.; published by Factory Additions

Credit line
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase, with funds from the Friends of the Whitney Museum of American Art

Rights and reproductions
© The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / Licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

API
artworks/5632

Part of a series:

Campbell's Soup I

10 works

Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed beef soup can with vegetables and barley.
Illustration of a Campbell's condensed black bean soup can.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed chicken noodle soup can.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed beef consommé soup can with red and white label.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's Condensed Cream of Mushroom Soup can.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed green pea soup can.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed onion soup can with a red and white label.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed Pepper Pot soup can.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed tomato soup can.
Illustration of a classic Campbell's condensed vegetable soup can with a red and white label.