Issue No. 99: Andy Warhol Would Have Turned 83 Yesterday.

You glean new information everyday.

Warhol instructed Billy Name [ne Linich], to write back asking if Campbell's would be interested in purchasing any of the soup can pieces. This was the letter sent in reply:

From warholstars.org:

JULY 9 - AUGUST 4, 1962: ANDY WARHOL HAS HIS FIRST SOLO POP EXHIBITION.

The exhibition at Irving Blum's Ferus Gallery on La Cienega Blvd. in West Hollywood featured Warhol's series of 32 different canvases of Campbell's soup cans. A nearby supermarket piled up real Campbell's soup cans in their window, advertising them as "the real thing for only 29 cents a can."

Six of the Warhol paintings were sold for $100 each. The buyers included Don Factor, Betty Astor, Ed Jans and Bob Brown. Blum ended up getting the buyers to relinquish their ownership so that he could get keep the set together, and bought the entire series for $1,000.00 from Warhol, paying him $100.00 a month. (PS219) A year after Warhol died, Irving Blum was offered $10 million for the paintings. They are currently on permanent loan to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (BC27)

Interesting.....

Issue No. 97: Lucien Freud Died Wednesday 20 July, 2011. Aged 88.

• Please follow the following links to read some of the obituaries.
• “Lucian Freud, Adept Portraiture Artist, Dies at 88,” New York Times
• “Lucian Freud dies aged 88,” The Guardian
• “Painter Lucian Freud dies at 88,” BBC News
• “Realist painter Lucian Freud dies at 88,” Associated Press
• “Lucian Freud, Portrait Artist, Dead at 88,” Atlantic Wire
• “Lucian Freud dies at 88,” The Telegraph