Andy Warhol Before and After [3], 1961

Artwork Info

Artwork title
Before and After [3]
Artist name
Andy Warhol
Date created
1961
Classification
painting
Medium
casein on linen
Dimensions
54 1/8 × 70 1/4 in. (137.4 × 178.6 cm)
Credit
The Doris and Donald Fisher Collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
Copyright
© The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Permanent URL
https://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/FC.675
Artwork status
On view on Floor 4 as part of Ways of Seeing: Fourteen Artists

Audio Stories

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SFX: A beauty parlor, in the early 1960’s. Huge hood dryers hum, and the am/fm radio plays something bubble-gummy. 

 

JULIA:  

Marjorie, did you see this ad in the paper? With the “Before and After?” 

 

MARJORIE (loudly):  

One moment, Julia — my dryer’s still running.  

 

SFX: She switches off the hairdryer. 

 

MARJORIE:  

What, now — ? Oh, yes, I saw it in the Enquirer! Such a difference, don’t you think? 

 

JULIA:  

Well, she certainly looks happier on the right. 

 

MARJORIE:  

Such a transformation! She scarcely looks like the same woman!  

 

JULIA:  

Now, that you mention it, Marjorie — it’s not just the nose. The eyes, the lips, they all look– smoother, happier, more pleasing somehow. Maybe she’s not even the same woman! 

 

MARJORIE:  

I remember when surgery was for medical reasons. Now it’s every little nip and tuck you can think of!  

 

JULIA:  

Marjorie, it’s 1961! Think of all the amazing things they’re doing with plastics! Someday maybe we’ll all look like this. 

 

MARJORIE:  

Fundamentally, it’s a question of image and identity, Julia. Isn’t that essentially what Nietzsche postulates — that humans can never really know themselves? 

 

JULIA:  

Oh, please, Marjorie. That’s such a feminist read! I mean, is there even an essential nature? Maybe beauty–surface–is all we need to bother with! 

 

MARJORIE:  

You’re so deep, Julia. 

 

JULIA (Bothered by this):  

Am I? 

 

MARJORIE (Giving in a little):  

I’ve never been crazy about my nose. Tear that ad out for me, would ya? 

 

JULIA:  

I can’t. My nails are wet. 

 

MARJORIE:  

…Eh. 

 

SFX: The dryer clicks back on. Music and salon atmosphere fades. 

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NARRATOR:

Andy Warhol’s Before and After from 1961 is four and half feet high by almost six feet wide. It shows a female face in profile twice, side-by-side, both looking to the left. By using black casein paint for the background, and white linen for the faces, Warhol creates a reverse silhouette. On the left, the woman has a large, downward-pointing beaked nose, bags under her eyes, and a mole on her cheek. On the right, the bags and the mole are gone, and the nose has been transformed into a smaller, slightly upturned, perky slope. Her lips curve a bit more in the “after” image, indicating a satisfied smile. The image is an enlarged illustration from a magazine advertisement for cosmetic surgery. 

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