?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
D'APRES ANDY WARHOL (1930-1987) ABSOLUMENT. 1994. 68 1/2x46 1/4 inches. Condition A: wrinkles and abrasions in image; minor tears at edges. Paper. In 1983 Michel Roux, the CEO of Carillon, the company that imported Absolut vodka to the United States, commissioned Andy Warhol to do a painting. "Over dinner one night, Warhol tells Michel that he's enthralled by the artfulness of the Absolut bottle . . . Warhol proposes painting his own interpretation of the Absolut Bottle . . . when Warhol was finished, Roux was as surprised as everyone else to see the 'black' Absolut bottle, but he loved it and thought it would make a great Absolut ad" (Absolut p. 65). The image was a smashing success and became the start of the, now-famous "Absolut Art" series. When it first appeared, the ad campaign was considered too "New Yorkish" (ibid.) and did not appear in France (this in spite of the fact that Warhol was already known in Paris for his 1983 ad for Perrier). In 1994, Paris' Laville Bastille gallery held an exhibition of the works of twenty contemporary artists. They received permission from Absolut to use the Warhol image on their posters, which were displayed on the advertising kiosks around Paris which were reserved for advertising cultural events. Given the small numbers of these public hoardings, there was probably a very small print run of the image. Absolut p. 64.
