Arts Council Celebrates
the Art of Business and the Business of the Arts
"Being good in business is the most fascinating kind of art."
~ Andy Warhol
The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, 1975
In celebration of the art of business and the business of the arts, the Sarasota County Arts Council is proud to present Jack Dowd’s Andy 15 Times — an audacious demonstration of modern American sculpture.
The awe-inspiring exhibit, comprised of 15 100-pound, 68-inch Andy Warhol replicas, is currently on display at the Sarasota/Bradenton International Airport.
The exhibit is featured as part of the Arts Council’s ongoing celebration of Sarasota’s commitment to the business of the arts, which will tie in with the 2008 80th birthday of perhaps America’s greatest icon for the marriage of business and art, Andy Warhol.
“Andy Warhol embodied ‘the art businessman’,” explains Martine Meredith Collier, executive director of the Sarasota County Arts Council. “He was a marketing genius who redefined American contemporary art, art production, and the concept of art as celebrity.”
“What better metaphor for a celebration of Sarasota’s success at the business of the arts than the man who helped define art as a prime marketable commodity?”
“Sarasota County is blessed to be a community where our arts organizations are not only highly efficient businesses in their own right, but our local industry understands and supports the role that the arts play in Sarasota’s economic and cultural prosperity,” Collier continues. “Having an exhibit of this caliber at SRQ will serve as reminder to everyone coming through the airport that they have, indeed, come to visit Florida’s Cultural Coast.”
Known for illuminating the human condition through larger-than-life sculpture, Jack Dowd has often been quoted as stating: “My work is for the enjoyment of lovers of humor and to the annoyance of all others.”
According to Dowd, “Andy 15 Times seeks to capture Andy Warhol's elusive character as an artist who carefully cultivated his public persona as a superstar while exploring America's obsession with celebrity.” A cultural visionary, Warhol left a legacy of what the present has proved to become. His prediction: "In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes," has proved prophetic of today's culture of reality TV, media starlet feeding frenzies, and online social networking sites.
Andy 10, 15, or 20 times was designed to be exhibited in a group setting in keeping with the Warhol tradition of multiples. For as Warhol himself said: "I like things to be exactly the same over and over again. If I'm going to sit and watch the same thing I saw the night before, I don't want it to be essentially the same - I want it to be exactly the same."
"Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art."
~ Andy Warhol
The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, 1975
About the Artist
Jack Dowd’s infatuation with the arts began early. In addition to the exuberant experience of exploring the new ideas of the avant-garde art produced in his hometown New York City, Dowd attributes the influence of the great American films of the 40s and 50s with igniting his imagination and firing his quest for adventure.
In his early career, Dowd pursued employment that enabled him to travel – choosing both exotic and not-so-exotic places for his work. Meeting and working with many diverse people helped him develop an insight into the human psyche that today enables him to endow his sculpted figures with humor, sensitivity, pathos, satire, and even hubris.
Today, Jack lives and works closely with his family in a Sarasota studio and home designed in the `70s by Tollyn Twitchell of the Florida School of Architecture. The natural ambience of his home and the faith and devotion of his family provide the harmony and order so necessary to his creative success. “Each day I reach deep within myself to continue my journey to create art that, as in the movies, is larger that life.”
