Visually indistinguishable from Andy Warhol’s Flowers series, this work was created by Elain Sturtevant using one of Warhol’s own silkscreens, which he personally lent to her. While she referred to her pieces as “studies,” her practice boldly challenged the art world’s foundational ideas about authorship, originality, and value.

Where Warhol used mechanical repetition to erase the artist’s hand, Sturtevant reintroduces intentionality, her act of copying becomes an act of critique. In doing so, she reveals the ways in which meaning, fame, and marketability are constructed and endlessly replicable.

Though often dismissed or misunderstood by her contemporaries, Sturtevant found an unlikely ally in Warhol himself. When asked how he made his work, Warhol famously replied, “I don’t know, ask Elaine.”