First hydrate, then carve out the better part of your day for a dose of information and exhilaration, because, indeed, this is a field trip where mylar balloons, exclusive to this exhibit, tease and cavort as discoveries are made and cows stare contentedly. Suppress the instinct to start on the fourth floor of the Andy Warhol – From A to B and Back Again, where Andy Warhol – From A to B and Back Again has taken residence. Elvis, Brando and the Brillo Pad sculptures are there in tactile glory, defining the King of Pop Art, but consider that 2 comes before 4, and check out the works on paper on the lower floor. With skill and verve, Warhol's work displays a treasure of commercial illustrations that forecast his understanding of where to use color, how to manipulate pattern and use of embellishment.

With a new appreciation for the artist as painter and technician, the viewer gets primed for the main event. And yes, it's arresting to view the early Dick Tracy, for example, activated with dramatic slashes of crayon. The rows of Campbell's soup (Scotch Broth – a Hearty Soup!) and Green Stamps coalesce the culture, bringing to mind Warhol's remark that “A Coke is a Coke, and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking.” Though residing in a different stratosphere, we all share the Pop Icons in the next rooms: Marilyn Monroe and Liz Taylor, blonde or brunette? (Later on, check out the fifth floor for more portraits, where Warhol's mother Julia shares wall space with Debbie Harry.)

From there, a turn into a darker alley introduces a Warhol unfamiliar to most. The Death and Disaster paintings lure with the lurid – yes, that is an electric chair – and those are some large male body parts in the glass case! After comfortable cows wallow on wallpaper, festooned with relentlessly cheerful hibiscus paintings, big power pieces offer more surprises. Two huge Rorschach paintings loom in glorious gold and foreboding black. Transwomen and drag queens – there's Andy! - confront us face to face. A giant Chairman Mao imposes and supposes what's to come. The Last Supper, suffused in camouflage, portends a treacherous world, and wouldn't you know that Warhol presaged the camo craze way before the rest of us? Open the alphabet soup that is Andy Warhol – From A to B and Back Again, and discover an artist you thought you knew, shows at SFMOMA through September 2, 2019.