Annie Oakley by Andy Warhol

Annie Oakley by Andy Warhol

This multi-colored print features Annie Oakley, an American sharpshooter of the wild west. Her exceptional talent led to a starring role in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show (1885) and allowed her to become one of the first American female superstars. She won numerous medals for her marksmanship, performed for royalty, and remains a legendary figure of the American West. Warhol’s application of his trademark bold and vibrant colors, allows us to see this American hero of the past as a modern pop culture icon

Annie Oakley is part of Warhol’s Cowboys and Indians portfolio in which he interspersed recognizable portraits of well-known American “heroes”–John Wayne, Annie Oakley, Teddy Roosevelt, and General George Custer–with less familiar Native American images and motifs in his ironic commentary on Americans’ collective mythologizing of the historic West. Rather than portraying Native Americans within their historical landscape, or Cowboys in their veritable forms, Warhol chose to portray a popular, romanticized version of the American West. The West that he chose to represent is familiar to everyone and can be seen in novels, films, TV series. Warhol’s Cowboys and Indians Suite is an ahistorical representation that mirrors a popular interpretation of the American West.Annie Oakley is a fine example of Warhol’s aesthetic intent in its reduction of an entire heritage and way of life into a single “trademark” image.

Andy Warhol created the Cowboys and Indians series during the mid-1980s, arguably his most prolific period. During this time, Warhol was forming bonds with a number of younger artists in the New York art scene including Jean-Michel Basquiat, Julian Schnabel and David Salle. Warhol saw a re-emergence of critical and financial success during this period of his life.