“In his early career as a commercial illustrator in the 1950s, Warhol created dozens of drawings of beauty products for publications like Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar-including perfume bottles by many different brands,” explains Murphy. ![]() His journey into fragrance continued when he moved to New York after graduation in 1949, where he created perfume-themed windows at upscale department store Bonwit Teller, then began illustrating for major beauty giants. “I can completely understand how Warhol’s love of objects, including his collection of perfume bottles, may have been tied to that upbringing.”Īs far as fine fragrance is concerned, Murphy posits that Warhol’s first real exposure to perfume was during his art-school days at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, where he took a summer job doing window displays at a local department store named Joseph Horne’s, which had an extensive perfume department. “Catholics grow up with all these items that hold meaning and symbolism,” she says. As a Catholic herself, Murphy goes on to underline that Catholicism has a lot of paraphernalia associated with religious devotion, such as rosary beads, prayer cards, and statues of saints. “The mass was enhanced with candlelight, vocal chants, and rich incenses made from plant resins and spices, so this would have been a truly special aroma that Warhol experienced regularly in his youth,” she explains. ![]() Growing up in Pittsburgh, Warhol attended weekly Mass with his family at a Byzantine Catholic church, which follows the rites of Eastern Catholicism and thus involves all the senses, says Murphy. Taking it back to the beginning of Warhol’s life, the “Revelation” scent tour considers that Warhol’s love of fragrance, and by extension his appreciation of perfume bottles as objets d’art, stems from his Catholic faith.
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