The series was published in two editions: a standard edition of 40 copies and a real edition of 30 copies made with “diamond dust”, meaning that the copies were sprinkled with fine particles of crushed glass that sparkled in the light. like diamonds, Christie’s reported.
The value of the first, a blue screen print of Queen Elizabeth II (Royal Edition), is estimated at more than $250,000, while the second red screen print, of the same monarch, is estimated at over $250,000. $300,000.
In making this piece, the artist drew on a celebrated image of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, the official photograph taken by royal photographer Peter Grugeon (1918-1980), published for the Silver Jubilee celebrations in 1977.
When the artist decided that he wanted to make a painting of the woman on the throne of England, his European dealer, George Mulderhe wrote to the private secretary of the monarch, Sir William Helseltine, requesting permission to use that portrait of the queen in a set of four serigraphs. The year was 1982. The Palace’s response was cautious but not dismissive: “The Queen certainly would not wish to put any obstacles in Mr. Warhol’s way,” the royal secretary wrote, adding that she did not intend to offer “any comment on this idea.” “. Thus the series was born “Reigning Queens”.
Warhol (1928-1987) never imagined that thirty years later, in 2012, the Royal Collection of the United Kingdom would buy four copies of the Royal Edition, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Queen’s coronation. They are the only portraits of her in the collection for which the Queen did not pose.
Now, two other prints from that series are not only the highlights of the exhibition called The Art of Literature, which can be visited in London this month, but are also considered the main lot of the “London Now” auction, dedicated to contemporary and post-war art, which will take place in the same British capital.
But Warhol is neither the first nor the only artist who has thematized in his works the princess who, at the age of 25, at dawn on February 6, 1952, became queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
The Queen, who is the first British monarch to celebrate a Platinum Jubilee after 70 years of reign, he has been the subject of more than 150 official portraits, as well as innumerable unofficial representations that were also testimony to the changes in artistic practice -and in society itself- since the mid-20th century, the media recalled. local.
This list includes the famous photograph of Cecil Beatonon the day of his coronation in Westminster Abbey, the painting of Pietro Annigonifrom 1954, or the lithographs of Gerhard Richterin black and white, made in 1966.
Perhaps one of the most famous is the album cover of the Sex Pistols, “God Save the Queen”from 1977, irreverently made by the British artist Jamie Reidwhile in the case of the painter Lucian Freudthe queen agreed to pose for him in 2001. Meanwhile, the renowned American photographer Annie Leibovitz He made four portraits of Elizabeth II in 2007.
Probably the most widespread work was the one made by the artist Arnold Machincommissioned to design the royal portrait that appeared on United Kingdom coins between 1968 and 1984. In addition, this late artist, who was a master of sculpture at the Royal Academy schools, designed the effigy portrait of the queen that appears on British postage stamps since 1967, an image that has been replicated on at least 225 billion stamps.
Source: Ambito
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