Lincoln Five Dollar Bill, Circa 1995

Steve Kaufman   Famous Artists

Steve Kaufman is an American artist, he was born in New York in 1960. Passionate about art, he did his first personal exhibition at the age of eight. At twelve, he got an odd job at Macy's in New York, where he painted knickknacks representing dogs. He then worked as Andy Warhol's assistant before opening his own studio in Los Angeles in 1989. A socially devoted artist, Steve Kaufman employed several homeless people to assist him in his work as a painter. In fact, he made a painting representing three homeless people, which allowed him to raise 4,720,000$ for associations. Steve Kaufman never left Los Angeles or his studio since then.

Kaufman's work is a lot like Pop Art. The artist likes to use techniques of this movement, in order to represent icons of the past century, such as Marilyn Monroe, Jacky Kennedy or Princess Diana. The artist stands out due to his constant renewal: Kaufman is adamant and refuses to restrain himself to a style or in a well-defined operative mode, and incessantly moves on from one technique to another. He adopted the collage technique for the portraits of Marilyn and Princess Diana. He superimposes images, layers of paint and symbolic elements on the key photo, placed right at the center of the canvas.

Steve Kaufman is well-known all around the world and is appreciated by his public. Not only did he decorate the walls of the White House or the Smithsonian Institution, his works are also present in hundreds of private and public collections. He is often described as the new Andy Warhol.
He worked with many associations all his life, more than 150 per year on an average, which helped him shape his image as a common man.
He passed away in 2010 due to a heart attack.