Currently on view in Hong Kong Andy Warhol’s Mao will come up for sale on the 11th of November. The work which is one of the most important of the series remaining in private hands is estimated to fetch in the region of $40 million.
Created in 1972 the large 82 x 57 inch silk-screen is the earliest iteration of the cycle that marked Warhol’s dramatic return to painting.
Following the historic visit to China by Richard Nixon in 1971 Chairman Mao was among the most prominent figures in the world at that time. By recreating the endlessly produced official portrait, the artist continued the absorption with celebrity that had seen him work with likenesses of figures such as Marilyn Monroe and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.
With its monumental scale, remarkable clarity in the execution of the silk screening with bright red lips, unblemished facial outline and the bold, sharp shirt collar, the current example is considered at the pinnacle of Warhol’s Mao paintings.
