Elizabeth II was the official photograph taken by the Royal photographer Peter Grugeon (1918-1980), released for the Silver Jubilee celebrations in 1977…reports Asian Lite News
Two Andy Warhol screen prints of Queen Elizabeth II in ‘The Art of Literature: Auction Highlights Exhibition’, are on display in London till June 14 at Christie’s.
Created in 1985, Warhol’s Reigning Queens series brought together four ruling monarchs, Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, Queen Margarethe II of Denmark, Queen Ntombi Twala of Swaziland and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands. The series was issued in two editions, a standard edition of forty, and a Royal Edition of thirty with diamond dust. (Illustrated on page 1 right, blue screen print), Queen Elizabeth II, from: Reigning Queens (Royal Edition), 1985, (estimate 200,000-300,000) and (illustrated on page 1 left, red screen print), Queen Elizabeth II, from: Reigning Queens (Royal Edition), 1985, (estimate 250,000-350,000) both from the ‘diamond dust’ Royal Edition.
The source image for Warhol’s celebrated portrait of H.M. Queen Elizabeth II was the official photograph taken by the Royal photographer Peter Grugeon (1918-1980), released for the Silver Jubilee celebrations in 1977.
The two works are on display in conjunction with Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations, which commemorate her coronation in June 1953. After 70 years of service, Her Majesty The Queen will become the first British monarch to celebrate a Platinum Jubilee, as well as the world’s third longest reigning monarch and the longest-reigning female monarch in history.
Following the recent record-breaking sale on 9 May 2022 at Christie’s New York, where the Shot Sage Blue Marilyn by Andy Warhol sold for $195 million from The Collection of Thomas and Doris Ammann Evening Sale, establishing it as the most expensive 20th-century artwork to sell at auction, Andy Warhol is very much in the news.