25 Cats Name Sam and one Blue Pussy by Andy Warhol
Kitty Cones After Andy
In the 1950s and before a glamorous life of a celebrity as a world-renown POP Artist, Andy Warhol a freelance children’s book illustrator at the time lived with his mother Julia in an uptown Manhattan apartment with 25 cats.
In his spare time, he created portraits of his feline roommates in a series of lithographs.
Then in 1954, he compiled a collection of them, along with his mother’s calligraphy, in an extremely rare limited edition book, “25 Cats Name Sam and One Blue Pussy.“ According to Christie, original copies of the book can sell between $40,000 – $50,000. In 1987 Panache Press reprinted the book which can be obtained in the secondary market for much less.
Improper grammar aside (“name” instead of “named”), the book doesn’t feature 25 cats, it includes 16 named Sam plus one Blue Pussy for a total of 17 kitty portraits. There were approximately 190 variations of colored lithographic prints prior to the book but still a total of 17 inked kitty portraits.
I always loved this early illustrative work by Mr. Warhol. The runny ink drawings and bright watercolors distinctly depict an early era of his art and career. This work inspired me to pay tribute by creating my own “Kitty Cones After Andy” series of illustrations. I changed Sam to Pam and tried to capture the essence of the originals. I hope you like them. It was fun trying to retain the design sensibilities and proportions of my Kitty Cone characters while still capturing the technique and poses Mr. Warhol so beautifully executed.
Below are the side by side works for comparison to the originals.
You can view the “Kitty Cones After Andy” NFT collection on OpenSea.
Thanks for looking! Purrr…