Left: Trump Tower via WikiCommons. Right: Andy Warhol’s “New York Skyscrapers,” courtesy of Phillips.
An Andy Warhol painting of Trump Tower commissioned by Donald Trump—but never paid for—is heading to auction. Requested in 1981 by the then up-and-coming real estate developer to hang in the lobby of his new Fifth Avenue skyscraper, the artwork is one of eight portraits from Warhol’s “New York Skyscrapers” series depicting Trump’s first namesake development. The auction, first reported by Artnet, takes place on November 19 at 5 p.m.
Initially valued between $500,000 and $700,000, the painting could fetch a far higher price following Trump’s election win, according to Gothamist.
The portrait series was conceived after a meeting between Warhol and Trump, arranged by Marc Balet, the art director of Interview magazine, according to Phillips. In a diary entry from April 24, 1981, Warhol described the encounter:
“Had to meet Donald Trump at the office (cab $5.50). Marc Balet had set up this meeting… He’s designing a catalogue for all the stores in the atrium at the Trump Tower and he told Donald Trump that I should do a portrait of the building that would hang over the entrance to the residential part. So they came down to talk about that… Nothing was settled, but I’m going to do some paintings, anyway, and show them to them.”
Warhol continued: “It was so strange, these people are so rich. They talked about buying a building yesterday for $500 million or something. They raved about the Balducci’s lunch, but they just picked at it… [Trump]’s a butch guy.”
Weeks later, Warhol photographed the architectural model of Trump Tower, still under construction. Using these images, he depicted the 58-story skyscraper’s “ostentatious luxury” in shades of black, silver, and gold, then added a layer of “diamond dust”—ground glass—over the wet paint immediately after printing.
The artist’s approach to “New York Skyscrapers” took on his signature style while still being innovative in its techniques. Using his signature silkscreen technique, Warhol layered images and adjusted their opacity to create a “dynamic interplay of form and texture,” according to Phillips.
Opulent hues of gold and silver reflect against deep black strokes, offset by bright, shimmering trails of ground glass—a medium Warhol used in other pieces during the early 1980s that added a sense of modernity and affluence.
However, when Donald and his wife Ivana visited Warhol’s studio, the artist said they seemed confused by the lack of color coordination.
“The Trumps came down. […] I showed them the paintings of the Trump Tower that I’d done. I don’t know why I did so many, I did eight. In black and grey and silver which I thought would be so chic for the lobby. But it was a mistake to do so many, I think it confused them,” Warhol wrote in his diary on August 5, 1981.
“Mr. Trump was very upset that it wasn’t color-coordinated. They have Angelo Donghia doing the decorating so they’re going to come down with swatches of material so I can do the paintings to match the pinks and oranges. I think Trump’s sort of cheap, though, I get that feeling.”
Balet told Gothamist the paintings were not up to “Trump standards” and he never paid for them. Warhol then consigned the works to a dealer in Switzerland, who later sold them to private collectors. Two of the portraits are currently on view at the Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh.
Warhol carried resentment towards the Trumps for their disapproval of his commission. During a 1983 encounter at Roy Cohn’s birthday party, he wrote that Ivana seemed “embarrassed.”
“She came over and when she saw me she was embarrassed and she said, ‘Oh, whatever happened to those pictures?’ and I had this speech in my mind of telling her off, and I was undecided whether to let her have it or not, and she was trying to get away and she did,” Warhol noted, according to Gothamist.
In 1984, Warhol was selected as a judge for cheerleader tryouts for the New Jersey Generals, a football team that Trump purchased.
“I was supposed to be there at 12:00 but I took my time and went to church and finally moseyed over there around 2:00. This is because I still hate the Trumps because they never bought the paintings I did of the Trump Tower,” Warhol wrote.
In May 1984, he echoed these feelings: “I just hate the Trumps because they never bought my Trump Tower portraits. And I also hate them because the cabs on the upper level of their ugly Hyatt Hotel just back up traffic so badly around Grand Central now and it takes me so long to get home.”
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