New World of Coca Cola Displays Warhols

By Odette Yousef

Atlanta, GA – The new World of Coca Cola explores how the Coke bottle became an iconic pop culture image, through the early works of Andy Warhol.

Workers were putting the final touches on the Warhol exhibit yesterday by mounting the signature piece. The piece is a 1961 depiction of a contoured Coke bottle - black crayon on canvas, and very large. It, along with thirty or so other Warhols at the exhibit, shows the artist's earliest, and lesser-known, pieces on Coke.

SCHELSTRAETE: I don't think we can tell the history of Coca Cola without Warhol.

Peter Schelstraete, a huge Warhol fan, is Coca Cola's Global Brand Director.

SCHELSTRAETE: For him, Coca Cola's really representative of democracy, of accessibility. He said, you know, the richest people in America drink the same thing as the poorest people.

The pieces are on loan from the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh.

The new World of Coca Cola opens on May 24th.