Andy Warhol has become a household name. With famous works like his screen-printing of the Campbell’s Soup Cans, Warhol is one of the most famous artists during the Pop era of art and his style of art has transgressed through the decades of art.  Artists are constantly taking cues from his work.

Tucson Art Museum is now showing the “”Andy Warhol Portfolio: Life and Legends”” exhibition until July 3, 2010. The Warhol show is a part of a three-artist exhibit, which includes Ed Mell and David Tineo, but the Warhol exhibit stands above the rest.

The premiere of the exhibit on Feb. 26 was hosted by the Tucson Art Museum, which offered the press, museum members and the investors at the museum a chance to see the exhibit before the opening the following day. It was surreal to be in a museum with such famous works.

An element Warhol stresses in his work is repetition. Take, for example, the “”Flowers”” series, which is featured at the Tucson Museum of Art. Warhol repeats the same image over and over again, which changes a simple piece of art into a giant work that makes the viewer think. The work of Warhol makes me analyze pop culture more. With Marilyn Monroe’s photographs, he manipulated the image to highlight pop culture that is still relevant today.

A great work that is featured in the Warhol portfolio, in the same style of the Marilyn Monroe’s paintings, is a series on Muhammad Ali. The series features the famous boxer’s face from different angles and with a varying color palette. What is interesting about these works is that they feature the boxer in a completely different light. Usually, you see Ali in pictures from his boxing days, but Warhol threw out the stereotypical picture of a boxer by adding bright colors.

The show was incredibly interesting. It’s not every day that Tucson hosts an exhibit featuring the work of Warhol. As he is one of my favorite Pop artists, it was an incredible experience to see his work in person. Warhol has managed to remain relevant to this day with work he has done years ago. The way he throws images in your face through the use of color, composition and size makes the exhibit extremely appealing. It is one thing to see a work of art on the Internet or in a book, but seeing it in real life is an entirely different experience.