The American Supermarket

The American Supermarket was a 1964 group exhibition held at the Bianchini Gallery in New York City. Organized by artist Ben Birillo, the show featured works by Pop artists Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, and James Rosenquist, among others—all of whom were tasked with creating objects that could appear in a grocery store. The exhibition received extensive media coverage, including by a full-color feature in Life magazine.[1]

The American Supermarket is considered a pivotal moment in the history of Pop art. By transforming the gallery into a supermarket environment, the show foregrounded themes of mass production, branding, and commodity aesthetics that defined mid-20th-century American life.

Background

The American Supermarket opened on October 6, 1964, at the Bianchini Gallery, located at 16 East 78th Street on Manhattan's Upper East Side.[2][3] At a moment when Pop art was gaining institutional recognition, the exhibition extended the movement's engagement with consumer imagery into a fully immersive installation.[3]

The driving force behind the project was curator Ben Birillo, who partnered with gallery proprietor Paul Bianchini.[4][5] Over four months, Birillo developed the concept, invited prominent contemporary artists, and produced many of the works on display, drawing in part from an earlier collaboration planned with Robert Watts, who was prominently featured with flocked and chromed fruit and vegetables, vacuum-formed eggs, and plaster breads.[3] Working closely with Birillo was Dorothy Herzka, who met her future husband, Roy Lichtenstein, during preparations for the exhibition.[3] Rather than presenting framed works on white walls, the gallery adopted the layout and promotional tactics of a typical supermarket, complete with shelves, checkout counters, and price tags, using the setting to challenge conventional exhibition practices.[6]

Publicity mirrored commercial advertising strategies: garishly printed handouts resembled supermarket circulars, and a week-long "Grand Opening" distributed 1,000 promotional buttons bearing soup can, turkey, or apple motifs, while a hot-dog stand operated outside the gallery.[7][3] Upon entering, visitors were greeted by Bianchini and Birillo, who took orders on a grocery pad, encountering artworks displayed and sold as grocery items—effectively collapsing distinctions between high and low art.[4][2]

Participating artists

The exhibition featured prominent Pop artists, including:

Artworks

Works in The American Supermarket were presented as grocery merchandise, complete with price tags and point-of-sale displays. The exhibition featured food-themed sculptures, multiples, and painted objects that mimicked supermarket inventory while functioning as fine art.[2]

Visitors entered the exhibition through a turnstile designed by Richard Artschwager, reinforcing the illusion of a functioning retail environment.[9] Among the most widely noted items were chrome and wax food objects by Robert Watts, including chrome cantaloupes priced at $125, boxes of chrome eggs priced at $12, wax eggs at $2, and red, white, and blue eggs at three for $10. Wax tomatoes in gray, white, and blue were sold in groups of three for $15.[2] Watts also exhibited bread sculptures, with chrome loaves selling for $20 and colored loaves for $10.[10] Wax meats and delicatessen items by Mary Inman were displayed in freezer cases; a sirloin steak or hard salami was priced at $33, while a cold roast beef sandwich was marked at $27.[2]

Andy Warhol contributed his wooden box sculptures; replicas of Brillo Soap Pads, Mott's Apple Juice, Kellogg's Corn Flakes, Del Monte Peach Halves, Campbell's Tomato Juice, and Heinz Tomato Ketchup, which averaged at $280 apiece.[7] The Brillo Box was priced at $350.[1] His painting Campbell's Soup Can was priced at $1,500.[1] He also autographed the labels of genuine cans of Campbell's soup, sold as "specials" at three for $18 or one for $6.50, and produced serigraphed and signed paper shopping bags featuring a red Campbell's soup can image, priced at $12.[4][10] The shopping bag was one of the fastest-selling items in the exhibition.[2]

Other contributors expanded the supermarket conceit through painting and sculpture. Tom Wesselmann offered a molded plastic display card of a turkey, while Roy Lichtenstein presented a turkey painting rendered in red and yellow Ben-Day dots.[10] James Rosenquist exhibited a work titled Noxema, Be Beautiful Contest.[10] Billy Apple exhibited painted bronze fruit, including a watermelon priced at $500, as well as a painting titled A Apple, offered for $450.[1] Additional items included plaster pies and candy by Claes Oldenburg, and Ballentine beer cans by Jasper Johns.[10][11]

As a final gesture blending art display and promotional spectacle, visitors were given complimentary boxes of real Milady's Blintzes as souvenirs.[10]

Critical reception

The New York Times described the installation with dry humor, noting: "The prices were horrendous the supplies were scant and the place is closing within a month. In fact, even the food displays were fake." The article clarified that The American Supermarket was “a show of Pop art, staged by the Bianchini Gallery," which had refashioned its premises into "a real-life store, with counters, aisle signs and a turnstile."[2]

In The Observer, Joyce Egginton portrayed The American Supermarket as a sharp, expensive parody of everyday shopping, describing it as "a new kind of supermarket—smaller than most but, at first glance, just as conventional in layout and style."[7] She noted the public confusion it generated: "Many people who wander into the show believe this to be a real supermarket, but quickly leave emptyhanded and with baffled expressions." Yet, "a day after the supermarket show opened most of the lower price items had sold out."[7]

Elisabeth Stevens of ARTnews noted the show "offers all the essentials for a glorious Last Supper of Pop Art—a celebration of the struggle to combine fine art, commercial art, publicity stunts and everyday things and events into a swirling stew labeled 'Reality.' The gallery has become an 'environment,' the reaction of the viewers a Happening, and ten well-known artists have cooked up specialties which are plentiful and, for a change, relatively cheap."[10]

In his Life magazine review, art critic Calvin Tomkins framed The American Supermarket as part of a long artistic tradition of depicting food, updated for an age of mass production and consumer spectacle.[11] He argued that Pop artists used grocery imagery to blur the boundary between reality and representation, turning illusion itself into the subject.[11] Quoting Claes Oldenburg's embrace of vernacular culture, Tomkins cited the call for "art that is sweet and stupid as life itself," suggesting the exhibition was less a gimmick than a pointed reflection on modern American abundance.[11]

Chain Store Age reported that the American Supermarket exhibition surprised visitors with its elevated art prices. One supermarket executive remarked, "I think I'm in the wrong business. Anybody who can charge $6.50 for a beer can, $27.50 for wax sirloin steaks, and $12 for a shopping bag has a better deal than I do."[12]

Significance and legacy

The American Supermarket extended the strategies of Pop art by literalizing the relationship between art and commerce. The exhibition functioned both as satire and affirmation of consumer capitalism, reflecting broader cultural shifts in postwar America.[3]

The exhibition is frequently cited in scholarship on Pop art and 1960s American art.[13][14] It demonstrated how commercial display strategies could be repurposed as artistic media, influencing later generations of artists engaged with branding, appropriation, and institutional critique. By mimicking a retail environment, the show anticipated later installation art and institutional critique practices. It also contributed to the growing mainstream acceptance of Pop art in the mid-1960s, alongside exhibitions at venues such as the Stable Gallery and the Sidney Janis Gallery.[15]

The American Supermarket is regarded as a pivotal early example of immersive, environment-based exhibition design and remains a touchstone in discussions of art's relationship to mass production and consumer culture.[16] The exhibition was later reconstructed in the 2002 group show Shopping: A Century of Art and Consumer Culture at the Schirn Kunsthalle and Tate Liverpool, curated by Max Hollein and Christoph Grunenberg.[17][4]

Collections

Specifically created for the show were shopping bags, one by Andy Warhol had an image of a tomato Campbell's Soup Can, and another has an image of a turkey by Roy Lichtenstein. Examples of these bags are in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art and Saint Louis Art Museum.[18][19]

References

  1. ^ a b c d "You think this is a Supermarket? No Hold your hats... It's an Art Gallery". Life. 57 (21): 138–140. November 20, 1964.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g "Sale: Lettuce a la Metal and Turkey au Canvas; GALLERY MARKET HAWKS ART ON RYE; Store Display Is Set Up for Pop Food Creations". The New York Times. 1964-10-08. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-02-19.
  3. ^ a b c d e f Hollein, Max; Grunenberg, Christoph, eds. (2002). Shopping: A Century of Art and Consumer Culture. Ostfildern-Ruit : Hatje Cantz. pp. 171–173. ISBN 978-3-7757-1214-9.
  4. ^ a b c d Gayford, Martin (December 19, 2002). "Still life at the check-out". The Telegraph.
  5. ^ "Ben Birillo, the Curator Who Once Helped Launch the Pop Art Movement, Is Showing His Own Art in New York". Artnet News. 19 September 2018. Retrieved 19 May 2025.
  6. ^ Doak, Erin (21 November 2022). "The Pop Artists That Loved Food". Artsper Magazine. Retrieved 19 May 2025.
  7. ^ a b c d Egginton, Joyce (1964-10-11). "Mr Apple's apples cost £180". The Observer. p. 2. Retrieved 2026-02-20.
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j "The Grand Opening of the American Supermarket". Specific Object. Retrieved 19 May 2025.
  9. ^ Sheppard, Eugenia (1964-10-15). "Inside Fashion; He Sells Hand-Painted Steak Sculpted Salami". Hartford Courant. p. 27. Retrieved 2026-02-24.
  10. ^ a b c d e f g Stevens, Elisabeth (November 1964). "Reviews and previews". ARTnews. 63 (7): 60.
  11. ^ a b c d Thomas, Calvin (November 20, 1964). "Art or not, it's food for thought". Life. 57 (21): 143.
  12. ^ "Pop Artists Profit From Grocery Items". Times Record. 1964-12-03. pp. 2-C. Retrieved 2026-02-24.
  13. ^ Rublowsky, John (1965). Pop Art. New York: Basic Books. p. 174.
  14. ^ Madsen, Annelise K.; Oehler, Sarah Kelly; Siegel, Nancy; Roberts, Ellen E. (2013-12-10). Art and Appetite: American Painting, Culture, and Cuisine. Yale University Press. pp. 205–206. ISBN 978-0-300-19623-8.
  15. ^ Cruz, Décio Torres (2019-12-05). The Cinematic Novel and Postmodern Pop Fiction: The case of Manuel Puig. John Benjamins Publishing Company. p. 86. ISBN 978-90-272-6181-6.
  16. ^ Cohen, Alina (3 November 2018). "Why Pop Artists Were Obsessed with Food". Artsy. Retrieved 19 May 2025.
  17. ^ Vogel, Sabine B. (2003-05-01). ""Shopping"". Artforum. Retrieved 2026-02-20.
  18. ^ "Roy Lichtenstein. Turkey Shopping Bag. 1964 | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved 2026-02-26.
  19. ^ "Ben Birillo". Saint Louis Art Museum. Retrieved 19 May 2025.

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