A variant of Andy Warhol’s iconic depictions of soup cans, Campbell’s Soup Box is a multi-layered extension of one of the legendary artist’s most iconic motifs. In 1962 Warhol debuted 32 paintings of Campbell’s soup cans at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles. The works were displayed on a shelf, like groceries in a store, and were intended as a comment on rising consumerism in Post-War America. The soup cans marked a turning point in Warhol’s practice, finally giving him the exposure he always longed for. Within months of his show at Ferus Gallery, he began experimenting with silkscreening, which would become the most important breakthrough of his career and allowed his process of art making to mimic the industrial production of the consumer products he was depicting. Both the medium and the image would remain an influential component of his practice for decades.

ANDY WARHOL PHOTOGRAPHED IN FRONT OF HIS MOST FAMOUS WORK BY DUANE MICHALS, 1962

 

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Introduction

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As an artist that relied heavily on repetition and seriality, Warhol revisited to the subject of Campbell’s soup cans again and again throughout his career. He painted several variants of the can, some featuring repeated depictions of the same can, cans with peeling labels, and more. Building on Warhol’s preoccupation with materialism, the broken-down box takes the artist’s critique and analysis of consumer culture to the next level. By focusing on the packaging of everyday household goods, Warhol emphasized the display and promotion of products and the role marketing and branding plays in attracting buyers. He also puts forward the Duchampian theory that commercial product designs can be elevated to fine art and classified as artworks in their own right. The work also peels back some of the darker consequences of consumerism by highlighting the prevalence of leftover single use waste and other byproducts of the manufacturing and retail sectors.

By the mid 1980s, when Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box was created, the social and political climate had changed considerably since the early 1960s, when Warhol exhibited his first soup cans in Los Angeles. The work was completed in middle of Ronald Reagan’s presidency at the height of free market economics, and just two years before the 1987 cult film “Wall Street” glorified the financial sector’s unfettered capitalism with the now-infamous slogan “greed is good.” In this climate, Warhol’s response by painting a large-scale picture of broken down box of soup from a brand that, by this time, was regarded by most shoppers as a vestige of America’s past, seems fitting. Is the box a metaphor for the country as a whole? It’s hard to ignore the tongue-in-cheek irony of displaying an empty box that might be found on a New York City curb, that just like itself, is ready to be picked up and recycled.

“I used to have the same lunch every day [of Campbell’s soup], for twenty years, I guess, the same thing over and over again. Someone said my life has dominated me; I liked that idea. I used to want to live at the Waldorf Towers and have soup and a sandwich, like that scene in the restaurant in Naked Lunch….”

Throughout his extensive and famed career, Andy Warhol perpetually devised creative ways to give new meaning to his favorite and frequently revisited motifs. By the mid 1980s, his Campbell’s Soup paintings had become as universally recognized as the product itself. With Campbell’s Soup, 1985, Warhol once again returned to the iconic brand he had made his own more than twenty years earlier and created a series of monumental canvases, which visually flattened the cardboard soup box, emphasizing the absolute flatness he had sought and continually refined throughout his career. The resulting paintings are late masterpieces which rank amongst the most complex, symbolic and technically assured of his career.

Warhol had first used Campbell’s Soup as a subject for his art in early 1962 and continued to revisit the theme in different forms throughout his career. The first paintings though seemingly in the flat, machinated style of modern printing techniques were actually realized entirely by hand, stamps and stencils. The series of thirty-two Campbell’s Soup flavors was first shown at the sensational and well received 1962 Ferus Gallery exhibition. Years later, the revisitation of the iconic Campbell’s Soup motif provides a reverential nod to his own early success and established status. The return to this theme can be interpreted as an allegorical self-portrait in which Warhol combines the disparate concerns of consumerism, appropriation, superficiality and identity that drove his career.

Andy Warhol was a constant innovator throughout his career. Nevertheless he always liked to revisit some of his favorite motif in order to reinvestigate them with a new meaning. By the mid 1980s his Campbell’s Soup Paintings had become universally recognized and famous as the product itself -icons of the everyday in their own right had led Ivan Karp to announce that, “Tomato Soup will never be the same again.” This is something that Warhol himself acknowledges in the series of monumental ‘retrospective’ Campbell’s canvases he made in 1985; works took the iconic brand he had made his own more than twenty years earlier and flattened it across a large canvas.  In order to achieve this effect of absolute flatness, something he had sought and continually refines in his paintings from the start, rather than using three dimensional tinned cans of Campbell’s soup, this time he looked to the brand’s brightly colored, mass-produces cardboard boxes. Flattening their forms to fit the large, two-dimensional format of the canvas, it saw Warhol fusing the serial flatness of works like 100 Campbell’s Soup Cans with the sculptural forms of his earliest Campbell’s soup Boxes. The regulating paintings are late masterpieces which rank amongst the most complex, symbolic and technically assured of his career.

 

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2025 Auction Results

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#1. Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986

Seoul Auction: 28 October 2025
Estimated: KRW 150,000,000 – 300,000,000
KRW 342,200,000 / USD 238,855

Seoul Auction

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986
acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.5 x 50.5 cm)
Signed and dated on the overlap

#2. Campbell’s Onion Soup, 1986

Artcurial Paris: 9 December 2025
Estimated: EUR 130,000 – 180,000
EUR 158,880 / USD 184,915

Campbell’s onion soup – 1986

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Onion Soup, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed and dated on the reverse on the overlap

#3. Campbell’s Soup Box (Noodle Soup), 1986

Seoul Auction: 28 October 2025
Estimated: KRW 120,000,000 – 250,000,000
KRW 206,500,000 / USD 144,135

Seoul Auction

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box (Noodle Soup), 1986
acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
13 7/8 x 14 1/8 inches (35.7 x 35.2 cm)
Signed on the overlap

 

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2024 Auction Results

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#1. Campbell’s Soup, 1986

Phillips London: 27 June 2024
Estimated: GBP 450,000 – 650,000
GBP 850,900 / USD 1,078,941

https://www.phillips.com/detail/andy-warhol/UK010424/17

 

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2023 Auction Results

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#1. Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 9 March 2023
Estimated: USD 150,000 – 200,000
USD 165,100

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Contemporary Curated | 2023 | Sotheby’s

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches  (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed Andy Warhol and dated ’86 (on the overlap)

#2. Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 28 September 2023
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 127,000

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice | Contemporary Curated | 2023 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
24×22 inches (61 x 55.9 cm)
Stamped twice with the artist’s signature, dated 1986 twice
Numbered A1090.7 twice and signed by Frederick Hughes twice on the overlap

#3. Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 3 October 2023
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 127,000

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle | Contemporary Discoveries | 2023 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6 cm)
Variously signed and dated 86 (on the turning edge and overlap)

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2022 Auction Results

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#1. Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1985

Sotheby’s New-York: 17 November 2022
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 1,683,500

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Contemporary Day Auction | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1985
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Stamped twice by The Estate of Andy Warhol
Stamped twice by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
Numbered twice PA90.069 on the overlap
Numbered PA90.069 on the stretcher

#2. Campbell’s Soup, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 12 May 2022
Estimated: USD 400,000 – 600,000
USD 1,008,000

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987) (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)

#3. Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 13 May 2022
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 163,800

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987), Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Christie’s (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6 cm)
Signed, stamped with the Estate of Andy Warhol, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. and the Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board, Inc. stamps
Numbered and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86 VF PA90.070 A143.0310’ (on the overlap)
Numbered again ‘PA 90.070’ (on the stretcher)

#4. Campbell’s Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 30 September 2022
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 120,000
USD 126,000

Campbell’s Noodle Soup Box | Contemporary Curated | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Stamped with the Estate of Any Warhol and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
Numbered PA90.044 (on the verso)

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2021 Auction Results

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#1. Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Noodle), 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 19 November 2021
Estimated: USD 150,000 – 200,000
USD 277,200

Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Noodle) | Contemporary Day Auction | 2021 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Noodle), 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed Andy Warhol and dated 86 (on the overlap)
Stamped by The Andy Warhol Authentication Board and numbered A100.021 on the overlap

#2. Campbell’s Onion Mushroom Soup Box, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 30 September 2021
Estimated: USD 120,000 – 180,000
USD 182,700

Campbell’s Onion Mushroom Soup Box | Contemporary Curated | 2021 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Onion Mushroom Soup Box, 1986
Silkscreen on canvas
20 1/8 x 20 1/8 inches (51.1 x 51.1 cm)
Signed and dated 86 on the overlap

#3. Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986

Phillips London: 16 April 2021
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 126,000 / USD 174,201

Andy Warhol – 20th Century & Contempo… Lot 234 April 2021 | Phillips

#4. Campbell’s Soup Box: Noodle Soup, 1986

Phillips London: 16 April 2021
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 126,000 / USD 174,201

Andy Warhol – 20th Century & Contempo… Lot 233 April 2021 | Phillips

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2020 Auction Results

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#1. Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986

Sotheby’s London: 12 February 2020
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 137,500 / USD 178,530

(#174) ANDY WARHOL | Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed and dated 86 on the overlap

#2. Campbell’s Onion Soup Box, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 15 May 2020
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 100,000

Andy Warhol (1928-1987), Campbell’s Onion Soup Box | Christie’s (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Onion Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer and silkscreen ink on canvas
13 1/2 x 13 1/2 inches (34.3 x 34.3 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)
Stamped with the Andy Warhol Authentication Board stamp
Numbered ‘A108.0711’ (on the overlap)

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2019 Auction Results

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#1. Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Christie’s Shanghai: 21 September 2019
Estimated: CNY 1,300,000 – 1,800,000
CNY 1,680,000 / USD 236,900

ANDY WARHOL (USA, 1928-1987), Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Christie’s

ANDY WARHOL (USA, 1928-1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)
Stamped with Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board stamp and numbered ‘A104.056’ (on the overlap)

#2. Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Phillips London: 3 October 2019
Estimated: GBP 120,000 – 180,000
GBP 137,500 / USD 169,585

Andy Warhol – 20th Century & Contem… Lot 150 October 2019 | Phillips

 

 

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Campbell’s Soup Boxes (72×60)

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Campbell’s Soup, 1986

Phillips London: 27 June 2024
Estimated: GBP 450,000 – 650,000
GBP 850,900 / USD 1,078,941

https://www.phillips.com/detail/andy-warhol/UK010424/17

Universally recognized as one of the most significant, iconic images of the twentieth century, Campbell’s Soup exemplifies the industry, ingenuity, and exceptional achievement of Andy Warhol: a contribution to artmaking that continues to hold the public imagination today. Executed in 1986,Campbell’s Soup revisits the image that launched Warhol’s career, demonstrating the virtuosity, wit, and irreverence that continued to characterize the Pop artist’s visual language before his premature death a year later. The construction of serial imagery emerged soon after Warhol moved to New York at the age of twenty-one, laying the foundations for his revolutionary 1962 exhibition. Relocating to the city in 1949 after he had graduated from the Carnegie Technical Institute (now Carnegie Mellon University), Warhol initially secured a role working as a commercial illustrator. Working for clients in the fashion, television, liquor and pharmaceutical industries, Warhol became well versed in the importance of selecting direct, tantalizing iconography for advertising, replicating images through ‘blotted line’ and establishing the mechanisms that would become so fundamental to his later practice. As Warhol began to serialize his work, he projected and traced a photograph by Edward Wallowitch to create the first of his near identical compositions featuring a Campbell soup can. Capturing the imagination of dealer Irving Blum, after visiting Warhol’s studio in 1962 Blum resolved to mount a solo exhibition for the artist at his Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles that same summer. Installing thirty-two separate panels of all the varieties of Campbell soup then available, Warhol had radically altered the trajectory of contemporary art and unwittingly launched his meteoric rise to fame, well-established by the execution of the present Campbell’s Soup.

“I used to drink it. I used to have the same lunch everyday for twenty years, I guess, the same thing over and over again.”

In this manner, works from this series take on subtly autobiographic dimensions, the artist radically complicating the boundaries between art, commerce, and the everyday through his appropriation of the popular consumable’s branding. Installing each of the canvases on white mouldings that circulated the perimeter of Blum’s gallery, cleverly imitating the display of consumer objects in a supermarket, Warhol reconsidered the original function and meaning of the ‘banal’. Revisiting these ideas in Campbell’s Soup, Warhol followed in the tradition of avant-garde artists such as Marcel Duchamp, whose Readymades challenged the critical apparatus and content of ‘high art’. Building on these provocative principles, Warhol elevated the inconspicuous and everyday elements of popular culture as a source of inspiration and as worthy subjects of postwar American art.

“If you take a Campbell’s soup can and repeat it fifty times you are not interested in the retinal image. What interests you is the concept that wants to put fifty Campbell’s soup cans on a canvas.”
Marcel Duchamp

Following his inaugural gallery solo show dedicated to Pop paintings, Warhol developed his earlier interest in minimizing the presence of the artist’s hand in the work, deploying a method that was itself used in the production of food packaging: his signature photographic silkscreen technique. Fittingly, the series to which the present work belongs was commenced after the artist was approached by Campbell’s directly, inviting him to commemorate their new ‘soup-in-a-box’ line.  In contrast to the unembellished simplicity of his original canvases, in Campbell’s Soup Warhol combined the flatness of his earlier compositions with the sculptural forms of his earliest Campbell Soup Boxes. Created over twenty years later and utilizing more playful, vibrant color combinations, the canvas embodies Warhol’s careful use of color, layering, and form to create texture and illusory depth. Flashes of yellow, green, and blue outlining the text and central image juxtapose with the more distinctive Campbell’s red and white. At the height of his technical and commercial success, in Campbell’s Soup Warhol consciously underlined the increasing commoditization of art and the significance of popular culture in art history: a career that begins and ends with Campbell’s.

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1985

Sotheby’s New-York: 17 November 2022
Estimated: USD 500,000 – 700,000
USD 1,683,500

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Contemporary Day Auction | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1985
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Stamped twice by The Estate of Andy Warhol
Stamped twice by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.
Numbered twice PA90.069 on the overlap
Numbered PA90.069 on the stretcher

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box depicts a broken-down box of chicken noodle soup on a black background, painted in Warhol’s signature silkscreen style with accents added in acrylic. Warhol embellished the composition to intensify the colors, rendering the box in white and vibrant crimson red, with blue text and grey detailing, while heavily saturating the yellows noodles to make them leap off the canvas. The soup box is blown up to oversized proportions, at more than six feet tall, to drive home his messaging and to allow viewers to closely examine the artwork’s intricacies and details.

Campbell’s Soup, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 12 May 2022
Estimated: USD 400,000 – 600,000
USD 1,008,000

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987) (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)

“I love it. I just paint things I always thought were beautiful, things you use every day and never think about. I’m working on soups and I’ve been doing some paintings of money. I just do it because I like it.” 

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1985

Sotheby’s New-York: 19 May 2017
Estimated: USD 400,000 – 600,000
USD 384,500

(#197) Andy Warhol

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1985
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
72×60 inches (182.9 x 152.4 cm)

Campbell’s Soup, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 13 May 2010
Estimated: USD 800,000 – 1,200,000
USD 1,426,500

(#204) Andy Warhol (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup, 1986
Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
70×60 inches (177.8 x 152.4 cm)
Stamp-signed by the artist and inscribed and dated 1986 by Frederick Hughes on the overlap
Stamped by the Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board, Inc.
Numbered A114.032 on the overlap

Campbell’s Soup, 1985

Sotheby’s New-York: 15 November 2007
Estimated: USD 1,200,000 – 1,800,000
USD 1,945,000

(#211) Andy Warhol (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup, 1985
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
72 5/8 x 60 1/4 inches (183×152 cm)

 

 

 

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Campbell’s Soup Boxes (24×22)

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Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 28 September 2023
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 127,000

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice | Contemporary Curated | 2023 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
24×22 inches (61 x 55.9 cm)
Stamped twice with the artist’s signature, dated 1986 twice
Numbered A1090.7 twice and signed by Frederick Hughes twice on the overlap

Campbell’s Soup Box (Onion Mushroom), 1986

Heritage Auctions: 24 May 2018
USD 118,250

Andy Warhol (1928-1987). Campbell’s Soup Box (Onion Mushroom), | Lot #77051 | Heritage Auctions

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box (Onion Mushroom), 1986
Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
24 x 20 1/2 inches (61.0 x 52.1 cm)
Stamped twice with the artist’s signature
Dated, and inscribed on the reverse: Certified / A1090.6 / © 1986 Andy Warhol

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 19 May 2017
Estimated: USD 150,000 – 200,000
USD 187,500

(#207) Andy Warhol

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
24×22 inches (61 x 55.9 cm)

Campbell’s Soup Box (Onion Mushroom), 1986

Heritage Auctions: 11 November 2007
USD 187,500

Andy Warhol (1928-1987). Campbell’s Soup Box (Onion Mushroom), | Lot #66130 | Heritage Auctions

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box (Onion Mushroom), 1986
Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
24 x 20 1/2 inches (61 x 52.1 cm)
Stamped twice with signature
Dated and inscribed in ink on the overlap: Andy Warhol Certified © 1986 A1090.6

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 12 May 2016
Estimated: USD 150,000 – 200,000
USD 175,000

(#195) Andy Warhol

 

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
24×22 inches (61 x 55.9 cm)

 

 

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Campbell’s Soup Boxes (20×20)

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Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986

Seoul Auction: 28 October 2025
Estimated: KRW 150,000,000 – 300,000,000
KRW 342,200,000 / USD 238,855

Seoul Auction

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986
acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.5 x 50.5 cm)
Signed and dated on the overlap

Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986

Seoul Auction: 28 October 2025
Estimated: KRW 150,000,000 – 300,000,000
KRW 342,200,000 / USD 238,855

Seoul Auction

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986
acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.5 x 50.5 cm)
Signed and dated on the overlap

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 9 March 2023
Estimated: USD 150,000 – 200,000
USD 165,100

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Contemporary Curated | 2023 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed Andy Warhol and dated ’86 (on the overlap)
Stamped by The Andy Warhol Authentication Board and numbered A104.056 on the overlap

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box depicts its namesake product against a white background, painted in Warhol’s silkscreen style with acrylic accents. Warhol embellishes the composition to intensify the colors, rendering the box in white, yellow, and vibrant red, while adding pink and yellow outlines to make his shapes leap off the canvas. The soup box is blown up to oversized proportions to emphasize his messaging and allow viewers to closely examine the artwork’s intricacies. Warhol masterfully speaks to rampant consumer culture, facilitated by mass-production methods utilized by companies such as Campbell’s. By focusing on the packaging of everyday household goods, the artist emphasizes the marketing of products and the role that branding plays in attracting buyers. The subject itself is modest and approachable: pre-made soup was a staple in many late 20th century American households, yet Warhol takes this symbol and renders it infinitely significant and charged with meaning.

Campbell’s Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 30 September 2022
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 120,000
USD 126,000

Campbell’s Noodle Soup Box | Contemporary Curated | 2022 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Stamped with the Estate of Any Warhol and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts
Numbered PA90.044 (on the verso)

Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Noodle), 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 19 November 2021
Estimated: USD 150,000 – 200,000
USD 277,200

Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Noodle) | Contemporary Day Auction | 2021 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Noodle), 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed Andy Warhol and dated 86 (on the overlap)
Stamped by The Andy Warhol Authentication Board and numbered A100.021 on the overlap

Campbell’s Onion Mushroom Soup Box, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 30 September 2021
Estimated: USD 120,000 – 180,000
USD 182,700

Campbell’s Onion Mushroom Soup Box | Contemporary Curated | 2021 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Onion Mushroom Soup Box, 1986
Silkscreen on canvas
20 1/8 x 20 1/8 inches (51.1 x 51.1 cm)
Signed and dated 86 on the overlap

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986

Phillips London: 16 April 2021
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 126,000 / USD 174,201

Andy Warhol – 20th Century & Contempo… Lot 234 April 2021 | Phillips

Campbell’s Soup Box: Noodle Soup, 1986

Phillips London: 16 April 2021
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 126,000 / USD 174,201

Andy Warhol – 20th Century & Contempo… Lot 233 April 2021 | Phillips

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986

Sotheby’s London: 12 February 2020
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 137,500 / USD 178,530

(#174) ANDY WARHOL | Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed and dated 86 on the overlap

“Many an afternoon at lunchtime Mom would open a can of Campbell’s for me, because that’s all we could afford, I love it to this day.”

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Christie’s Shanghai: 21 September 2019
Estimated: CNY 1,300,000 – 1,800,000
CNY 1,680,000 / USD 236,900

ANDY WARHOL (USA, 1928-1987), Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Christie’s

ANDY WARHOL (USA, 1928-1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)
Stamped with Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board stamp and numbered ‘A104.056’ (on the overlap)

A variation of Andy Warhol’s iconic paintings of cans of tomato soup, Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box shows an everyday, readily available object as a work of high art. Depicting a rectangular box rather than the usual tin cans, the painting introduces an element of surprise, thus drawing attention to both its product type and variety name. The visible change in packaging reflects the cultural fascination with marketing and branding in the 1960s. The symbolic red and white combination as well as the use of font and lettering easily remind the consumers of the Campbell’s brand. Variations in box design, moreover, help to distinguish one product from the other: chicken noodle looks and tastes differently from tomato soup.

Campbell’s Chicken Rice Soup Box, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 11 May 2016
Estimated: USD 200,000 – 300,000
USD 269,000

Andy Warhol (1928-1987) (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Rice Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer and silkscreen ink on canvas
20×20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)

“I love soup, and I love it when other people love soup, too… You know, when I was little, my mother always used to feed us this kind of soup. But now she’s gone, and sometimes when I have soup I remember her and I feel like she’s right here with me again.” 

 

 

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Campbell’s Soup Boxes (14×14)

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Campbell’s Soup Box (Noodle Soup), 1986

Seoul Auction: 28 October 2025
Estimated: KRW 120,000,000 – 250,000,000
KRW 206,500,000 / USD 144,135

Seoul Auction

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box (Noodle Soup), 1986
acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
13 7/8 x 14 1/8 inches (35.7 x 35.2 cm)
Signed on the overlap

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986

Sotheby’s New-York: 3 October 2023
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 127,000

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle | Contemporary Discoveries | 2023 | Sotheby’s (sothebys.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928 – 1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6 cm)
Variously signed and dated 86 (on the turning edge and overlap)

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 13 May 2022
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 163,800

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987), Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box | Christie’s (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6 cm)
Signed, stamped with the Estate of Andy Warhol, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. and the Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board, Inc. stamps
Numbered and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86 VF PA90.070 A143.0310’ (on the overlap)
Numbered again ‘PA 90.070’ (on the stretcher)

Campbell’s Onion Soup Box, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 15 May 2020
Estimated: USD 100,000 – 150,000
USD 100,000

Andy Warhol (1928-1987), Campbell’s Onion Soup Box | Christie’s (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Onion Soup Box, 1986
Synthetic polymer and silkscreen ink on canvas
13 1/2 x 13 1/2 inches (34.3 x 34.3 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)
Stamped with the Andy Warhol Authentication Board stamp
Numbered ‘A108.0711’ (on the overlap)

Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986

Phillips London: 3 October 2019
Estimated: GBP 120,000 – 180,000
GBP 137,500 / USD 169,585

Andy Warhol – 20th Century & Contem… Lot 150 October 2019 | Phillips

Campbell’s Soup Box: Onion Mushroom, 1986

Sotheby’s London: 11 February 2016
Estimated: GBP 120,000 – 180,000
GBP 118,750 

(#198) Andy Warhol

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box: Onion Mushroom, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6cm)
Signed and dated 86 on the overlap

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986

Sotheby’s London: 11 February 2016
Estimated: GBP 120,000 – 180,000
GBP 149,000 

(#197) Andy Warhol

ANDY WARHOL
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Noodle, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6 cm)
Signed and dated 86 on the overlap

Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986

Christie’s London: 14 February 2014
Estimated: GBP 100,000 – 150,000
GBP 242,500

Andy Warhol (1928-1987) (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box (Chicken Rice), 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6 cm)
Signed and dated ‘Andy Warhol 86’
Stamped with the Andy Warhol Foundation stampa
Numbered ‘A 104.1110’ (on the overlap)

Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986

Christie’s New-York: 7 March 2013
Estimated: USD 120,000 – 180,000
USD 254,500

Andy Warhol (1928-1987) (christies.com)

ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987)
Campbell’s Soup Box: Chicken Rice, 1986
Acrylic and silkscreen inks on canvas
14×14 inches (35.6 x 35.6 cm)
Signed ‘Andy Warhol 86’ (on the overlap)