For some, death can be a smart career move. Quite how smart a move depends a lot on who you are and how you die. As we approach the 60th anniversary of the death of Marilyn Monroe, we can learn a few lessons about the art and implications of dying a huge public personality.
As with any icon, the brand of Marilyn Monroe far transcends Marilyn Monroe the person, and even more so Norma Jeane Mortenson, as she was until 1946. The Wikipedia page “Marilyn Monroe in popular culture” has entries for almost every year since her death, charting a posthumous career that extends across most media forms.
She has been referenced in adverts for cheese, cars and whisky, and in multiple music videos. She lends her name to a Christian metalcore band, a jewellery collection and a pair of skyscrapers in Ontario. She is the subject of countless pieces of visual art, including caricatures, collages and digital prints.
Her visual image has been a recurring theme for artists, notably Andy Warhol, who produced several pieces using images of her face, and who channelled Marilyn himself in photographs by Christopher Makos. In turn, Warhol’s representations have become a touchstone for subsequent artefacts including a 70cm-high plastic figurine, a Nike Warhol/Monroe custom AirMax shoe and a 3,000-piece Lego reproduction.
And now she is the subject of a US$22 million (£18 million) Netflix biopic, Blonde, starring Ana de Armas, based on Joyce Carol Oates’ fictionalised account of her life, published in 2000. Why does this fascination endure so many decades after her death? https://www.youtube.com/embed/aIsFywuZPoQ?wmode=transparent&start=0
Perfect storm
Monroe made her name as a ‘blonde bombshell’, a glamorous pin-up model and Hollywood actress/singer who was a favourite focus for the voracious mid-century male gaze. But she was by no means the first, following in the high-heeled footsteps of Mae West and Jean Harlow. Nor was she the last: Anita Ekberg, Jayne Mansfield, Kim Novak and Doris Day all came after. So what elevates Monroe above mere celebrity into the status of icon?
