10 Facts About Andy Warhol's Trucks

Published in 1985 in conjunction with the Federal Association of German Long-Distance Goods Transport to commemorate the 20th World Congress of International Road Transportation Union, the portfolio consists of four prints.

The International Road Transportation Union, that this series is so closely associated with, still exists today. It works on soltions for mass trasnportation in the EU that are focused on the enviroment and economy.

Warhol co-published Trucks with Hermann Wünsche, a German art dealer who served as an early advocate for Warhol’s work in Germany.

With long distance journeys across mountain ranges, deserts and forests, the long distance truck driver became somewhat of a romantic figure in 20th century America, the lonesome drives becoming associated with the arduous journeys of cowboys on horseback during the conquest of the West.

Here Warhol has taken the symbol of the truck and raised it to the level of both kitsch and ‘high art’, as he did with many household objects – such as his Campbell's Soup Cans and Brillo Boxes – in his practice of taking the everyday and asking you to look again at objects that usually go unnoticed.

In the Truck series, the medium, as with many of Warhol’s works, fits the message; screen printing was traditionally the process of choice for commercial printers and here Warhol demonstrates his canny ability to reclaim it for his own celebration of the world of commerce.

Warhol enjoyed the irregularity of the screen printing method, describing it as “quick and chancy … you get the same image, slightly different each time” as well as the accessibility of creating multiples rather than unique artworks which are only owned and appreciated by a small art world elite. Instead, with works such as Truck, he was able to bring his work to a wide audience, appealing to the collective nostalgia for being ‘on the road’.

The complete Truck portfolio consists of four screen prints on Lenox Museum Board, with five numbered in Roman numerals and 73 unumbered individual TPs outside of the potfolios.

In April 2022, a Truck print sold for a total of US$239,400 (£186,522) at Christie's in New York.

A complete set of four Truck prints sold at Sotheby's New York in October 2022 for US$176,400 (£152,421).