Life Savers (F. & S. II.353)
Signed Print

Rendered in warm, highly saturated colours, three rows of ring-shaped
candies occupy the upper part of the print against a pastel pink
background. The distinctive package of candies is featured below words
advising the viewer, ‘please do not lick this page!’. Recreating the
company’s advertising slogan in the bottom part of the print and placing
the playful message at the centre, Warhol’s Life Savers celebrates the alluring nature of commercial products.

Life Savers is the final print of Warhol’s Ads series commissioned by
Ronald Feldman Gallery in New York. As in the case of the nine other screen
prints the Ads series consists of, Life Savers was signed in pencil by the
artist. Emerging in 1985, Ads were preceded by the Dollar Sign series
(1981) that used the common monetary sign to touch upon the traps of
commodification, wealth, and luxury.

In his final thematic portfolio, Warhol explores these issues further,
recreating popular products that range from the Volkswagen car to the
Chanel No. 5 perfume bottle and appropriating the likeness of public
figures such as James Dean and Ronald Regan. In choosing these people
and objects as its subject matter, the Ads series plays with the notions of
high and low culture, problematizing the world of commodity and
commercial production.