One of Andy Warhol's signature silver wigs sold at auction yesterday for $10,800 (£5,900). Andy, who loved his wigs and hoarded money, would be pleased. The great pop icon of the 60s and 70s, who coined the phrase "In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes", suffered from severe insecurity and wore the wigs to cover a baldspot, but they became a fashion statement.
Warhol became famous for turning mundane commercial products such as Campbell Soup cans into works of art in his painting and for his portraits of the famous such as Marilyn Monroe . He was shot and wounded in June 1968 by radical Valerie Solanis at his New York City office/hangout The Factory, an event that has inspired a couple of movies including the upcoming "Factory Girl" starring Guy Pierce as Andy and Sienna Miller as Edie Sedgwick.
The auctioned silver hairpiece - complete with three stripes of toupee tape on the inside - was worn by the artist around 1980. Other Warhol lots included a 1977 polaroid of Muhammad Ali taken by the artist and signed by the boxing legend which sold for $19,200 (£10,500).
