MAGAZINE

Andy Warhol
Hang Him on my Wall
--No other artist is as much related with Pop Art as Andrew Warhola, worldwide known as Andy Warhol... The Prince of Pop.

--For many of you who still don't know this peculiar uniqueness of the artist, Warhol loved cats and images of them can be found in many of his artworks.

--One of the artist's best friends described him as a committed workaholic.

--Nevertheless, most importantly, for all of you concerned with the cause and effect magic ( ...or chemistry... ) it's quality information to state that Andy Warhol was truly and deeply obsessed by the ambition to become very, very famous and incredibly wealthy.
--What do you know!
--And he was wisely aware enough of the price he had to pay in order to achieve his goals.
--In short, he always knew deep down inside that the fastest way in order to achieve the so called American Dream, was through a breathtaking process of highly intensive hard work. Fact.

--However, one way or another, the truth is that the main turning point in Andy Warhol's career which actually brought him fame, wealth and success was way back in the early 1960s when the innovative and daring artist began to make paintings of american products such as Campbell's Soup Cans and Coca-Cola bottles, as well as comic strips like Superman and Popeye.

--Also in the very early 60s Warhol began making silk screens of celebrities, namely Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor.
--He did his best and he did that using enlarging photographs plus transferring the images onto his canvases using a projector.

--As the result of this absolutely original form of Art, Ferus Gallery in L.A. , California, exhibited his Campbell's Cans while in the mean time in New York, Stable Gallery showed the Baseball, Coca-Cola and the Do-it-Yourself Diagram paintings.

--New York City, by then, was definitely meant to become his performing stage.
--The artist wasted no time and established a Studio at 47th street in Manhattan, which became very popular and worldwide known as The Factory.
--Therefore, by then, the editorial reviews were breaking news!
Inside Andy Warhol's studio, a ramshackle place, meaning The Factory, the post-war Art World encountered the industrial revolution.
--For more than two years, Nat Finkelstein was on the Scene, documenting the explosive emergence of... Pop Art!
--Pop Art, indeed a subversive spectacle created by the constantly calculating Andy Warhol.

--The Factory years was an extraordinary photographic account of the twisted, the addicted, the nameless... and ... THE FAMOUS!
--As a member of the club, Finkelstein discreetly captured icons in the making, including Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, Allen Ginsberg, Eddie Sedgwick, along with such legends of another era as Salvador Dali and Marcel Duchamp, and of course, Warhol himself.

--Engagingly sequenced by renowned design firm Pentagram, Andy Warhol; The Factory years features Finkelstein's seminal black-and-white photographs, in addition to several series of previously unpublished colour photographs that were thought lost for the past three decades.

--Finkelstein accompanies these striking images with vivid memories, poetic recollections, and acerbic commentary, providing both visual and intellectual insight into the culture of The Factory.

--In 1964, while attending a party at The Factory, Finkelstein met Andy Warhol, who had seen his 1962 Pageant magazine photographs of a Claes Oldenburg happening in Greenwich Village.
--Intrigued by the Scene, Finkelstein offered his services and for the next three years was a constant presence at The Factory, whose activities he recorded in four books.

--As the house photographer for The Factory from 1964 to 1967, Finkelstein created spontaneous portraits not only of Factory regulars like Sedgwick and Gerard Malanga, but also of the artists and celebrities who drifted in and out of the Warhol orbit.

--Billy Name, another Factory fixture, was also producing photos at this time.

--He was on hand when Warhol presented Bob Dylan with one of his Elvis "Flaming Star" silk-screen portraits, and took pictures of Allen Ginsberg and Salvador Dali.

--He captured Sedgwick and Nico, of the Velvet Underground, at their most glamorous, and photographed the first Velvet Underground performances and recording sessions.
--In addition to painting and creating Box Sculptures such as Brillo Box and Heinz Box, Andy Warhol began working in other mediums, including record producing ( The Velvet Underground ), magazine publishing ( interview ) and filmmaking.

--Andy Warhol's avant-garde films such as Chelsea Girls, Blow Job and Empire, have become classics of the underground genre.

--Warhol's Factory was an Art Studio where he employed in a rather chaotic way " art workers " to mass produce mainly prints and posters but also other items like shoes designed by the artist.
--The Factory included a wide range of artists, writers, musicians and underground celebrities.

--Artists like Andy Warhol were attacked by critics for "capitulating" to consumerism.
--Critics were scandalized by Warhol's open embrace of market culture.
--This symposium set the tone for Andy Warhol's reception - though throughout the decade it became more and more clear that there had been a profound change in the culture of the Art World, and that Warhol was at the center of that shift.
--Valerie Jean Solanas was an american radical feminist writer, best known for her attempted murder of Andy Warhol in 1968.

--Solanas arrived in Greenwich Village ( Manhattan ) in 1966, where she wrote a play titled ...mmm...
"Up Your Ass" ...well ...about a man-hating prostitute and a panhandler.

--In 1967, she encountered Andy Warhol outside his studio, The Factory, and asked him to produce her play.

--Intrigued by the title, he accepted the script for review.

--According to Factory lore, Andy Warhol, whose films were often shut down by the police for obscenity, thought the script was so pornographic that it must be a police trap.

--He never returned it to Solanas.

--The script was then lost, not to be found until after Warhol's death, in the botton of one of his lighting trunks.
--Later that year, Solanas began to telephone Warhol, demanding he return the script of "Up Your Ass".
--When Andy admitted he had lost it, she began demanding money as payment.
--Warhol ignored these demands but offered a role in "I, a Man".

--- "I, a Man " ( 1967) is a Andy Warhol film featuring Warhol Superstars Tom Baker, Ivy Nicholson, Ingrid Superstar, Cynthia May, Bettina Coffin, Ultra Violet, Nico... and, of course, Valerie Solanas.
--Solanas appeared in the film as compensation for the script she had given to Warhol which he had lost.

--In his book Popism ( The Warhol Sixties ), Andy wrote that before she shot him, he thought Valerie Solanas was an interesting and funny person, but that her constant demands for attention made her difficult to deal with and ultimately drove him away.

--Andy Warhol did give Solanas a role in a scene in his film " I, a Man".
--In that film, she and the film's title character, played by Tom Baker, haggle in an apartment building hallway over whether they should go into her apartment.

--Solanas dominates the improvised conversation, leading Baker through a dialogue about everything from "Squishy Asses" , "Men's Tits ", and Lesbian instinct.
--Ultimately, she leaves him alone by himself, explaining " I gotta go beat my meat " ... as she exits the scene.
--On June 3, 1968, Valerie Solanas arrived at The Factory and waited for Andy Warhol in the Lobby area.
--When she arrives with a couple of friends, she produced a handgun and shot at Warhol three times, hitting him once.
--She then shot art critic Mario Amaya and also tried to shoot Warhol's manager, Fred Hughes, but her gun jammed as the elevator arrived.

--The actress Viva was on the phone with Andy Warhol, whose pop celebrity she was, when she heard loud cracking sounds coming through the receiver.
--With some justification, Viva kinkily thought "it was a whip cracking", she said later...
--...But she was hearing gunshots.

--Yes, aspiring writer-actress Valerie Solanas had walked into The Factory.

--- The downtown Manhattan headquarters for Warhol´s Pop Art Empire, Solanas pulled a 32 from the pocket of her trench coat and... blazed away!

--Wounded in the spleen, stomach, liver, lungs, and oesophagus, Andy Warhol was given a 50-50 chance to live.

--And so, on June 3, 1968, began the greatest scandal on the career of the man who made an Art form of that genre.
--Ultra Violet, Viva, and other Warhol-made superstars, gathered at Columbus Hospital and speculated on Valerie Solana's motive for shooting the artist.

--The founder of SCUM ( Society for Cutting Up Men ), Solanas had appeared as a Lesbian in Warhol's 1967 underground film, " I, a Man ", but she had always been on the outskirts of his circle.

--Reportedly, she was angry because Warhol wouldn't film an obscenely titled script she had given.

--Ultra Violet said at the hospital "this underground movie world is a mad, mad world with a lot of mad people in it. Maybe this girl was mad herself ".

--Some people thought there was no MAYBE about it.
--Surrendering later that day to a cop in Times Square, Solanas said "the police are looking at me. They want me. I am a flower child. He had to much control over my life".

--At her arraignment, Solanas stated, "It's not often that I shoot somebody. I didn't do it for nothing".
--Warhol spent two months in the hospital but didn't press charges.
--Solanas copped a plea to first degree assault, was sentenced to three years in prison, and became something of a heroine among fringe feminists.
--After serving her time, she lived quietly in New York, Phoenix, and San Francisco, where she died in 1988 at the age of 52.

--She survived by a year the man who became the very symbol of an age, the omnipresent silver-bewigged demiurge of the demimonde, the Pop Art pet of café society.

--After this assassination attempt, the Pop artist made a radical turn in his process of producing Art.
--The phylosopher of Art mass production now spent most of his time making individuals portraits of the rich and affluent of his time like Mike Jagger, Michael Jackson or Brigitte Bardot.

--Andy Warhol's activities became more and more entrepreneurial.
--He started the magazine Interview and even a night-club.
--In 1974 The Factory was moved to 860 Broadway.
--In 1975 Warhol published "The Phylosophy of Andy Warhol". In this book he describes what Art is. "Making money is Art, and working is Art and good business is the best Art."

--Though best known for his earliest works - including his silk-screen image of a Campbell's soup can and a wood sculpture painted like a box of Brillo pads - Andy Warhol's career included successful forays into photography, movie making, writing and magazine publishing.

--So he founded Interview magazine, and in recent years both he and his works were increasingly in the public eye, on american and international magazine covers, in society columns and in television advertisements for computers, cars, cameras and liquors.

--In all these endeavours, Andy Warhol's keenest talents were for attracting publicity, for uttering the unforgettable quote and for finding the single visual image that would most shock and endure.

--That his Art could attract and maintain the public interest made him among the most influential and widely emulated artists of his time.

--To say that Andy Warhol "used people", seems at once accurate and unfair. More to the point, he gave thrilling permission to a lifelong parade of extroverts, from whose emotional demands he then predictably shrank.

--His ruling passion was a don't - touch - me drive for security, symbolized by an ability to make things happen ... and lots of money!

--However, Andy Warhol's jealous autonomy explains the one big failure of his career.
--An inability to make his extraordinary comprehension of the media ( film, television, rock music, publishing, on and on ... ) really count in the entertainment industry, whose corporate instincts rebuffed his requirement of total license.

--A late-70's meeting with Lorne Michaels, an NBC producer, onlines a prime-time Warhol television show.
--The meeting, at which Andy Warhol minions did most of the talking, seemed smashingly successful until "Andy got up and left the room without a word".

--Andy Warhol could not stand paternalism in any form. Willy-nilly, then, and rather despite himself, Warhol was a type of the heroically independent modern artist pitted against the homogenizing bourgeoisie.
--This was the hidden term - a secret virtue, like his religion - in his incredible triumph as an artist.
--Compared to the success and scandal of Andy Warhol's work in the sixties, the seventies proved a much quieter decade, as the artist became more entrepreneurial.
--Andy Warhol devoted much of his time to rounding up new, rich patrons for portrait commissions - including Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, his wife Empress Farah Pahlavi, his sister Princess Ashdaf Pahlavi, Mick Jagger, "BB" Brigitte Bardot, Lizza Minnelli, John Lennon and Diana Ross.

--Andy Warhol's famous portrait of chinese communist leader Mao Zedong was created in 1973. He was also founded, with Gerard Malanga, Interview Magazine.

--Andy Warhol used to socialize at various nightspots in New York City, including Max's Kansas City, Serendipity 3 and, Studio 54.
--He was generally regarded as a quiet, shy and a meticulous observer.
--Art critic Robert Hughes called him "The White Mole of Union Square."

--Andy Warhol moved his studio superstar social club to Union Square West, across the street from Max's Kansas City. The new location had large shoes to fill. The former Factory was known for its orgies, rampant drug abuse, and spectacular art collection.

--Warhol decided to make the Back Room at Max's his home away from home. A place of respite for himself and his superstars. Andy Warhol made famous the completely neglected Back Room which was known for its Blood Red ambiance.

--In one corner was a Big Dan Flavin fluorescent sculpture, which bathed the room in a reddish light, earning it the nickname "Bucket of Blood". In the opposite corner was the round table, a black vinyl banquette. Like the Round Table at Camelot, this table ruled the roost.
--This is where Andy Warhol sat!
--Andy Warhol and his entourage called "The Bucket of Blood", home. It became a safe-haven for the artists, musicians, addicts, models and ...IMPORTANT PEOPLE !

--It was exciting but anonymous.
--Jim Morrison could gently nod into oblivion behind his shades, sitting with Nico without anybody asking for autographs. Even Janis Joplin was treated like a Lady.

--So the Pop Art Scene dines with Andy Warhol in the Back Room at Max's Kansas City.
--Andy Warhol's complete disregard for the establishment helped him rise to the top in the New York Art Scene.
--The Factory was Warhol's artistic home where he created his mass-produced experiments with american iconography and codified Pop Art.

--Max's Back Room was his very own social club where he and his cohorts created a notorious social scene that came to define the seventies.

--There was the ordinary heterosexual crowd and then you had the Warhol crowd, which was kind of a pioneer, and later in the seventies became so prevalent.
--It became the rock style!

--In the mean time, Andy Warhol guides the Velvet Underground to the stage. Soon after christening his new Factory and taking over the Back Room at Max's, Andy Warhol began to reach for new creative outlets, namely a new band famous for their car-splitting feedback, light-shows and dancers.

--Andy Warhol had begun to expand his activities from paintings and lithographs to include very peculiar movies and even a stranger rock band, The Velvet Underground.
--Besides vocals like Lou Reed and Nico, the band features a whip dance by Gerard Malanga and a fantastic light show.

--The Velvet Underground was almost entirely a Max's phenomenon. It was there that the Velvets got their start playing as the house band, it was there they could meet Brian Epstein - the man who discovered The Beatles, and guided them to mega-stardom - through plumes of marijuana smoke in his limo, and it was there at Max's that they would play their final Live Performance with Lou Reed, immortalized on their Live at Max's Kansas City record.

--The Back Room is the place where Lou Reed said "Hey babe, take a walk on the wild side".

--Lou Reed's "Walk on the Wild Side" pays homage to the Warhol's drag queens who came from rural America in search of fame.
--Lou Reed's song about drugs, transsexuality, prostitution, and oral sex, paints a vivid picture of the "girls" who made Max's their home.

--Years before the Stonewall Rebellion, the attitude at Max's was permissive toward gender and sexual role experimentations.
--In the sixties, there weren't a lot of places that let drag queens in, but Max's did. You'd be in the ladies' room primping, and Jackie Curtis and Holly Woodlaw would be in there with you putting on their makeup, chatting and carrying on like women do about their menstrual cramps and what-not.
--You'd forget. It was like talking to one of the girls!
--Like other stars discovered at Maz's Jean Michel Basquiat, defined a new genre of Art and expression.
--Andy Warhol admired Basquiat for his ability to paint the grime and grit of New York City street culture........ --Basquiat admired Warhol for his ability to make him famous.
--The two formed an unrivalled relationship that dominated the Art world.
--It was historic. Never before had Andy Warhol teamed up with another this intimately.

--People wondered aloud whether Warhol was using Basquiat, whether Basquiat was using Warhol. None of that mattered.

--What mattered was the fact that people were talking.
--On the cover of magazines, on television, in the paper.
--Basquiat became a member of Andy Warhol's entourage and quickly joined the ranks of the round table.
--If Andy Warhol was King, Basquiat was Prince, and the two reigned.

--Andy Warhol is often described by those who knew him as complex figure resistant to any type of analysis.
--He acquired an image in the media for being the artist who never spoke and who avoided interviews fervently.
--When he decided to do them, friends say he would lie.
--He is also said to have sent impersonators wearing wigs for his lecture circuit.

--Andy Warhol was so mysterious, people question the accuracy of his birth date.
--When Andy was born, there was no birth certificate issued. It wasn't until 1945, when he went to college, that it was produced.

--Some say Andy Warhol was obsessed with image and fame, and that he influenced artists to pay as much attention to their appearance as their work.
--Andy Warhol had a very modern look and was often seen immaculately dressed in a suit, with his tie askewed or his collar undone to make his look unique.

--He loved trendy things and tried to wear them before anybody else could.

--Later in his career, he was notorious for wearing black only. Since black clothes tend to look alike, he would wear a rip in his pants or do something that would indicate he wasn't always wearing the same clothes.
--Whether or not Andy Warhol consciously laboured over his appearance is a topic of discussion that people disagree on.
--While some say he was obsessed with looking good, giving beauty care tips and filling his bags with endless supplies of cosmetics, others say he deliberately tried to look good as bad as he could.

--Andy Warhol was once quoted for saying "I play down my good features and play up my bad ones. So I look awful and I wear the wrong pants and the wrong shoes and I come at the wrong time with the wrong friends, and I say the wrong things and I talk to the wrong person, and then still sometimes somebody gets interested and I freak out and I wonder ' What did I go wrong?'.

--Andy began modelling for the Zoli agency, but many say this was an endorsement of his celebrity status more than anything.

--If Andy Warhol put his philosophy into his Art, he definitely put his genius into his life!
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