Andy Warhol John Wayne (1986) shows the famous actor John Wayne as a larger-than-life character, holding a gun and wearing a cowboy hat. He is made more impressive by the vivid red that dominates this work. His persona is also made more imposing by his inaccessibility – his eyes are obscured by the shade cast by the brim of his hat as he gazes to the right.

Warhol is more concerned with John Wayne’s celebrity than his true identity; the actor’s real name was Marion Robert Morrison, but much like in this work, the legend of John Wayne often took precedence in cultural perception of him.

Taking this image from a publicity photo for the film The Man Who Shot Liberty Wallace, Andy Warhol’s John Wayne fits perfectly in Cowboys and Indians, a series that explores the ways that the West was conceptualized and romanticized in mass media. It captures one of the major figures in this idealized vision of the West. It also captures the discrepancy between the Hollywood version and the true version of John Wayne, mirroring the discrepancy between the idealized and true versions of the American West.

Created in 1986, Andy Warhol’s John Wayne is a color screenprint on Lenox Museum Board and is hand signed in the lower right corner in pencil. It is a unique work of an edition of 250, published by Gaultney, Klineman Art Inc., New York and printed by Rupert Jason Smith, New York.

Andy Warhol Cowboys and Indians Series:

Andy Warhol’s Cowboys and Indians series of 1986 consists of ten prints each depicting their own respective subject—John Wayne, Annie Oakley, Kachina Dolls, Geronimo, Buffalo Nickel, Tonto, Theodore Roosevelt, General George Custer, Plains Indian Shield, and Northwest Coast Mask. Featuring images of famous American Western icons, Warhol’s series explores the relationship between Native Americans and Hollywood's portrayal of them in Western films. Warhol, being fascinated with celebrity culture, uses these famous figures to examine ways in which fame and popular culture intersect with history and myth.

The Cowboys and Indians series was also created during a time at which Warhol was exploring his own Native American heritage. His mother was of Ruthenian and Carpatho-Rusyn descent, but Warhol claimed that his father was of Slovakian and Native American ancestry.

Overall, the Cowboys and Indians series reflects Warhol's interest in American culture and history, as well as his fascination with celebrity and the intersection of art and commerce.

This screenprint is part of a portfolio of works Warhol created in 1986 titled Cowboys and Indians. Other works in the Cowboys and Indians Series include General Custer, Sitting Bull, Kachina Dolls, Geronimo, Annie Oakley, War Bonnet Indian, Buffalo Nickel, Action Picture, Northwest Coast Mask, Plains Indians Shield, Mother and Child, Indian Head Nickel, and Teddy Roosevelt.

Catalogue Raisonné & COA:

Andy Warhol John Wayne, from the Cowboys and Indians Series, 1986 is fully documented and referenced in the below catalogue raisonnés and texts (copies will be enclosed as added documentation with the invoices that will accompany the sale of the work).

1. Feldman, Frayda and Jörg Schellmann. Andy Warhol Prints: A Catalogue Raisonné 1962 – 1987, 4^th Ed. New York: Distributed Art Publishers, Inc., 2003.
2. A Certificate of Authenticity will accompany this artwork.

About the Framing:

Framed to museum-grade, conservation standards, Andy Warhol John Wayne, from the Cowboys and Indians Series, 1986 is presented in a complementary moulding and finished with silk-wrapped mats and optical grade Plexiglas.