An Unexpected Warhol

Dia Beacon mounts (most of) ‘Shadows’

In the winter, Dia Beacon closes at 4 p.m. because most of its contents are illuminated by natural light, which pours in from the pointy, serrated rooftop windows along with other gaping openings that punctuate three of the building’s outer walls. Once the sun dips, the interior goes dark.

The museum, which opened in 2003, is dedicated to large-scale contemporary works, some of them site-specific. One prized possession, “Shadows” by Andy Warhol, has traveled the globe. After a year-long hiatus in 2023, most of the concept is back on display with plans to let it hang for at least a few years, says Donna De Salvo, a Warhol expert and curator at the museum.

This time, 72 of Warhol’s 102 panels, which he considered to be one item, are displayed at Dia Beacon in roughly the same order as they appeared during the 1979 premiere. Back then, the de facto Dia gallery in Manhattan only had room for 83.

Few venues in the world are large enough to show the entire creation, although the Hirschorn Museum in Washington, D.C., pulled it off managed it in 2011 along a long, curved interior wall. 

According to the gallery notes, Warhol wanted the panels displayed “edge to edge and low to the ground, but not too low to be kicked.” At Dia Beacon, the harmonious hanging draws the eye around the room.

Dia bought the silkscreened canvasses coated with sponge-mopped acrylic paint right after the premiere ended. “Shadows” is the only artifact of the pop artist that Dia retained after donating more than 200 works to the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, his birthplace, which opened in 1995.

Warhol, who died in 1987 at age 58 after a botched gallbladder operation, dismissed “Shadows” as wallpaper. “Someone asked me if they were art and I said, ‘No,’ ” he wrote in New York magazine. “You see, the opening party had disco. I guess that makes them disco decor.”

Each panel measures 52 by 76 inches, or roughly 4-by-6 feet; the series suggests mass production because the images are repetitive, yet they convey distinctive color or texture. A few are rendered in smooth matte; others are covered in bumpy splotches.

The main design in the frame’s left edge, almost always rendered in black, looks like a ragged capital L or an exaggerated wolf’s head. A recurring jagged peak resembles a flame or floating lighthouse. Often offering contrast is a bright-colored negative space toward the top right, which is unusual because darkness often creates the voids in paintings. 

In the current configuration, six panels convey a nearly complete dark monochrome. Two lack any black and three others pair the lower-left blotch with a jammy purple that exudes a fingerpaint pattern vibe. In other places, it’s easy to see where Warhol dragged the mop.

After ditching depictions of Elvis, Mao and Marilyn, Warhol turned to abstracts. Based on “a photo of a shadow in my office,” he wrote in New York, these color studies use hues like aubergine, chartreuse, carmine red, cadmium yellow, cobalt blue, phthalo green and his signature silver.

“He’s one of the great colorists — I liken him to Matisse,” says De Salvo.

In her view, the pieces look like sound wave blips and “have a cinematic quality, almost like being inside an old zoetrope,” a pre-film animation machine. 

There is nothing quite like “Shadows” in contemporary art, De Salvo says. “It’s an immersive installation that rewards repeat visits,” she says.” It’s amazing to watch first-timers. Many are puzzled and ask, ‘This is Andy Warhol?’ ”

“Shadows,” by Andy Warhol, at Dia Beacon Dia Art Foundation

Dia Beacon, located at 3 Beekman St., is open Friday to Monday. Winter hours end today (Feb. 28); beginning March 1, the hours will be 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. See diaart.org. Admission is $20 ($18 seniors, $12 students and disabled visitors, $5 ages 5 to 11, free for ages 5 and younger). Beacon and Newburgh residents are admitted free, and Putnam and Dutchess residents are admitted free on the last Sunday of each month.