Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe Reproduced Using Resene Testpots

Resene was the first to bring testpots to New Zealand back in 1981 and they now make more than one million of them a year in over 2000 different colours. But these days they’re used for much more than just testing paint colours, with many people actually using them to create art. That got them thinking - why not turn things around and use the testpots as actual art?

As part of Art Week, Resene will be reproducing a giant version of Andy Warhol’s pink and yellow Marilyn Monroe painting. Recreating Warhol’s most famous image of a celebrity is no mean feat, especially when it involves almost 4,000 testpots.

It took almost three weeks for the design team to create the replica of the iconic image. They started with a small version of the image and first worked out how to pixellate the image on a much larger scale. Each testpot was then painted and glued to the canvas, and when that didn’t work, they screwed them on. Made in sections, the eight pieces were then assembled onsite last week and attached to the side of two shipping containers big enough to support it.

The giant artwork is on display for the duration of Art Week from October 26 until November 4 in downtown’s Queen Elizabeth II Square.