Vesuvius 1985

Editor: So this is Andy Warhol’s "Vesuvius," a screenprint from 1985. It's so... loud. Not in a bad way, but that bright orange plume just grabs your attention. What strikes you about this piece? Curator: Loud is perfect! I think Warhol latched onto the primal drama of Vesuvius – the sheer power of nature. That screaming orange against the brooding mountain, the lurid green... It’s like Pompeii reimagined through a Pop Art filter, don’t you think? It makes me wonder, was he thinking about sudden fame and fleeting destruction? It certainly feels like something of a dramatic statement from him. Editor: Definitely. There's a kind of immediacy to it, despite the subject being something that happened centuries ago. Did he ever visit Vesuvius, or Pompeii for that matter? Curator: He did actually. He traveled to Naples, commissioned to do this very series by a gallery owner there, and he saw Vesuvius for himself. Funny, isn't it, that a volcano became this ultimate Warholian subject? Something natural, iconic, yet utterly reproducible. And that explosion? That's the most Andy moment of all. A celebration and a warning at once. Editor: It really does put the ‘Pop’ in Pop Art! I hadn't considered the reproducibility aspect, but it makes perfect sense for Warhol. I guess I walked into that. Curator: Happens to us all, I mean, wasn’t he, himself, endlessly reproducible in the media? But yes, Vesuvius here also reminds us how explosive, and quickly gone, ‘pop’ fame can be. So I think what Warhol shows us in Vesuvius is less nature, more the enduring nature of an image, both the volcano, and his. Editor: That’s a great way to look at it. I'm definitely seeing more than just bright colors now.