Calvin Klein, Inc., announced a multi-year partnership with The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
Calvin Klein, Inc.’s financial commitment will support the foundation’s endowment from which it distributes grants sustaining the creation, presentation and documentation of contemporary visual art. In turn, Calvin Klein will be granted unprecedented access to the late artist’s works, including many that have not yet been published. The global partnership is effective through 2020 and will extend to licensing projects across various business lines and future activations within the Calvin Klein brand portfolio.
“I’ve come to realize that Warhol’s genius goes much deeper than cheerful Campbell’s Soup paintings,” said Raf Simons, Chief Creative Officer, Calvin Klein, Inc. “He captured all sides of the American experience, including sometimes its darker sides. Warhol’s art tells more truths about this country than you can find almost anywhere else.”
The first iteration of the partnership was unveiled in September 2017, with Simons’ Spring 2018 CALVIN KLEIN 205W39NYC runway show. The collection, which is available in stores in January 2018, incorporates a selection of Warhol artworks as placement screen prints. The body of work is intimately connected to the collection’s inspirations of cinema, the dream factory of Hollywood and its depictions of both an American nightmare and the all-powerful American dream. The piece’s feature portraits of Warhol intimate and art collector Sandra Brant (1971) and movie star Dennis Hopper (1971), as well as Knives (1981–82), Electric Chair (1964–65), and Ambulance Disaster (1963–64) from Warhol’s Death and Disaster series. The collection also features pieces produced under license and in collaboration with Hopper Goods, a brand inspired by the life and spirit of actor, photographer, and iconoclast Dennis Hopper.
