“'Bevery quiet,'warned John, the guide, as he switched off the ignition of the Land Rover. He pointed to a wooded knoll about 300 yards away. 'Rhino,'he whispered. There, just below the crest, was the dark, massive form of a black rhinoceros.”
—New York Times reporting from the Masai Mara Game Reserve, Kenya, 29 June 1982 … And so began the New York Times article that inspired Andy Warhol to create hisBlack Rhinoceros of 1983. Anchored by the cut-throat vertical axis of its dominating horn, Warhol’s composition depicts the majestic creature in all its glory. Frontally facing with large endearing ears, hooked-lip, and fuzzy snout, the rhino’s enchanting gaze is both striking and submissive. Warhol was immediately taken by the article, which reported on the devastating impact of poaching in Kenya, the result of which left only ten percent of wild rhinoceros populations remaining. Previously abundant on the African plains, the early 1970s saw an extortionate increase in hunting the animal for its precious ivory horn. Back in New York, awareness of endangered animals was growing, as was a weightier environmental consciousness; thus began the creation of Andy Warhol’s Endangered Species series.
Commissioned by gallerists and environmental philanthropists Ronald and Frayda Feldman, Warhol turned his iconic Pop sensibility toward the natural world, deriving his visual material from an unusual source: the Endangered Species Act of 1973. The vibrant imagery of these exotic animals – from majestic Siberian tigers to lime-green Pine Barrens tree frogs – belies the melancholic reality of their dwindling numbers. Employing the same silk-screenprocess he used for his iconic Pop images that consider the commodification of fame, Warhol inserts the animals into the public eye and affords them the same status as his Marilyns – with one fundamental distinction. While his Pop idols were lauded for their unattainable celebrity, withthe Endangered Species series Warhol hoped to harness attention in order to draw light on the ecological crisis, a cause rooted in reality, as opposed to the aloof admiration of famous socialites. Describing the series, the National Museum of Wildlife Art wrote, “Warhol draws attention to the rarity of these animals and gives each the ‘star’ treatment”, utilising his easily digestible pop style that immediately engages viewers and in turn, creates a space for activism.
“I think having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want to own.”
—Andy Warhol Warhol’s Black Rhinoceros was directly appropriated from a photograph by the award-winning Kenyan photojournalist Mohammed Amin, who, amongst raising awareness of Africa’s endangered species, helped inspire the 1985 Live Aid charity concert through his heart-wrenching documentation of the Ethiopian famine. Amin also documented the conservator and animal activist Michael Werikhe who shot to fame on Christmas Day of 1982 when he decided to embark on a 500 kilometre walk through East Africa to raise awareness for the Black Rhinoceros. Along his sponsored walks he would spend time educating people around the world about the near extinction of the rhinos, eventually raising over a million dollars for wildlife protection.
After its initial creation, Warhol donated 100 copies of the entire Endangered Species portfolio to wildlife conservation organisations with the intention that they be auctioned to raise money and awareness for the ongoing ecological concerns and global impact of human destruction. Often caught in the crosshairs between profit and nature, Warhol’s Endangered Species series is as much a call for action as it is an artistic endeavor: activism through visual culture serving as an acute reminder of what we as mankind stand to lose.
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Provenance
The Taylor Gallery, Belfast
Acquired from the above by the present owner in 2006Literature
see Frayda Feldman and Jörg Schellmann 301
Artist Biography
Andy WarholAmerican • 1928 - 1987
View More WorksAndy Warhol was the leading exponent of the Pop Art movement in the U.S. in the 1960s. Following an early career as a commercial illustrator, Warhol achieved fame with his revolutionary series of silkscreened prints and paintings of familiar objects, such as Campbell's soup tins, and celebrities, such as Marilyn Monroe. Obsessed with popular culture, celebrity and advertising, Warhol created his slick, seemingly mass-produced images of everyday subject matter from his famed Factory studio in New York City. His use of mechanical methods of reproduction, notably the commercial technique of silk screening, wholly revolutionized art-making.
Working as an artist, but also director and producer, Warhol produced a number of avant-garde films in addition to managing the experimental rock band The Velvet Underground and founding Interview magazine. A central figure in the New York art scene until his untimely death in 1987, Warhol was notably also a mentor to such artists as Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat.
