The one and only Andy Warhol has landed in Tokyo. We’re talking the Andy Warhol – Serial Portraits exhibition which has just opened at Espace Louis Vuitton, the gallery space of the Louis Vuitton flagship store on Omotesando dori. Perched on the seventh floor, the show presents masterpieces and lesser-known works by the artist, and is part of the hors-les-murs or ‘beyond the walls’ programme, which is based on the philosophy of bringing previously unseen works from the vast Fondation Louis Vuitton collection in Paris to audiences across the planet. Warhol was a multifaceted artist and one of the greatest masters of pop art. From the start of his career in 1949 as an advertising illustrator until his death in 1987, he was active in New York City and left behind an immense legacy of prolific work.

While best known for his mass-produced, colourful silkscreen works, the artist also worked as a film director, music producer, show designer, television host, and celebrity magazine editor. Throughout these diverse activities, Warhol enjoyed manipulating his own image and creating multiple alternate personalities. This is evident in the silkscreen self-portraits and staged photographs he created throughout his life. For Warhol, portraying people was a central theme in his artistic practice, from his time as a student at the Carnegie Institute of Technology, now called Carnegie Mellon University, in Pittsburgh, until his death. He tirelessly sketched, photographed, filmed, and silkscreened the people around him, with his favourite subjects being movie stars, the upper class, and prominent figures in the art world. The countless portraits he accumulated over the years eventually became collective portraits that reflected the era itself.

From a young age, Warhol collected newspaper clippings about celebrities, and he recognised early on that effectively ‘staging’ himself was important to attracting significant media attention. He created an enigmatic persona by donning wigs and sunglasses, and actively promoting this image helped sell his work. Warhol was a master of disguise and self-presentation, taking on a wide variety of characters in his photographs and self-portraits, often in various poses. Polaroids of him dressed as a drag queen, as well as the numerous self-portraits he produced throughout his life, demonstrate his ability to manipulate appearances and raise questions about the manipulation of identity and image. So, what’s on display at the show? This exhibition explores the evolution of Warhol’s media persona and the technical and stylistic development of his artistic practice. Opening with a series of ballpoint pen drawings of a young man from the 1950s, these rarely exhibited drawings offer a glimpse into the expressive and distinctive style of his early advertising illustrations.

This is a valuable work that allows us to explore Warhol’s unique artistic talents. While this exceptional drawing ability occasionally appears in his later works, it is not evident in his silkscreen works. This exhibition traces his consistent path of exploration, from the personal sketches for Unidentified Male to the photographs he took with a passport camera wearing a wild wig affectionately known as the “flight wig” the year before his death, to his 1980s Ten Portraits of Jews of the Twentieth Century, which could be considered the culmination of his continued exploration of incorporating industrial techniques into his work. Looking out at the world from behind the mask of sunglasses, Warhol continued to demonstrate his extraordinary adaptability and innovative imagination, using silkscreen and various camera techniques as his medium (on through Feb 15). © superfuture