Hidden under sheets and blankets for twenty years by an owner who hosted couchsurfing strangers, Flash, a portfolio of eleven coloured screenprints by Andy Warhol, is headed to sale at Adams Amsterdam Auctions on 15 December.
The screenprints had been kept in the original, unopened Warhol Foundation cardboard and Perspex box since its purchase (hence the rare, immaculate condition). Upon receipt of the box in 2000, the present owner gingerly threw a glance at it before tucking it away. When the box’s contents were unpacked by an expert from Adams twenty years later, it was the first time after purchase that eyes had been laid upon it.
In 1968, five years after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Andy Warhol published Flash, a work documenting the four days between the attack on the President and his funeral. The cover of the portfolio features the front page of the New York World Telegram with the headline 'President Shot Dead'. The other images used are based on campaign posters, the rifle ad of the weapon that the killer used, as well as press photos of Lee Harvey Oswald, a photo of the building from where he shot, and the heartbreaking image of Jackie Kennedy, smiling just before her husband's death.
All eleven screenprints have separate folders with covers printed with telex messages that, together, contain the chronicle of four of the most eventful days in American history. Each screenprint is signed 'Andy Warhol' in blue ballpoint pen on the reverse.
Despite the subject, there is an overwhelming power in the lot’s emotionless presentation. Warhol, who was obsessed with the insensitivity of popular culture, noted that a heartfelt response to this tragic event seemed almost impossible. In his words, “What bothered me was the way the television and radio were programming everybody to feel sad... It seemed like no matter how hard you tried, you couldn't get away from the thing.”
Flash is not only one of Warhol’s most pervasive works but also one of his most personal explorations. Earlier in 1968, he was in the hospital himself, recovering from two gunshot wounds. He had been the target of a personal shooting on 3 June 1968 at his sixth-floor office at 33 Union Square West.
Alongside these historic prints, other items in Adams Amsterdam Auctions’ 15-December ‘Modern & Contemporary Art’ sale include works by Harland Miller, Bram Bogart, Walasse Ting, to name a few.