Andy Warhol
Was the most Glamorous Figure of 20th Century American Art
Born in Pennsylvania in 1928 to czech parents he lived most of his life in New York
Much about his life was eccentric
He wore a silver wig, he liked to go to the dry cleaners and stand in the corner
Enjoying the smells and sounds of the chemicals and cleaning machines
he Loved Airports and Used to go Through Airport Security Multiple Times
Just Because he Said he Found it Fascinating and Kind of Inspiring
Andy Warhol's great achievement was to Develop a generous and Helpful view of two major Forces in modern society
Commerce and Celebrity
he Spent Most of his life as an International Celebrity
but he was also very Keen on Business
There Are Four Big Ideas Behind Andy Warhol's Work
Which Can Teach Us a more Inspired way of Looking at the World and prompt us to build a better society
We Spend too much of our Life Wanting something Better and extraordinary, it's normal to feel that the exciting things are not where we are
Andy Warhol aims to remedy this by getting us to look again at things in everyday life
he performed his magic most famously on soup cans
Putting them on the wall and looking at them helps us to see their beauty
to notice they're appealing labels as strong but elegant forms
Perfectly fitted to their uses, in the same spirit of redirecting our attention
Andy Warhol made a video of himself eating a hamburger
During The 1960s, Warhol groomed a retinue of bohemian and countercultural eccentrics
To whom he gave the title superstars
Including Nice, Joe Dallesandro, Edie Sedgwick, Viva, Ultraviolet, Holly Woodlawn
and Jackie Curtis and Candy Darling
Warhol understood that celebrities have an Important power
They can distribute glamour and prestige
He thought that glamour needed to be redistributed
in such a way that society could work better
for example, he suggested that the president of the United States
Could use his status to shift perceptions
As he wrote, if the president would go Into a public bathroom in The Capitol and have the TV cameras film him
Cleaning the toilets and saying
But why not? Someone's got to do it
Then that would do so much for the morale of people who do the wonderful job of keeping the toilets clean
He didn't call his place in New York a studio, the prestigious term used by artists since the renaissance to describe their place of work
Instead he Called it 'The Factory'
We tend to feel that the idea of art and the idea of a factory don't really mix, but Warhol's point
Was that business and art actually do very much belong together
As he wrote, being good in business is the most fascinating kind of art
During the hippie era, people put down the idea of business, they'd say money is bad and working is bad
But making money is art and working Is art and good business is the best art
The lesson of The Factory is that we can organize ourselves to produce good things more reliably and cheaply
One example of this for Warhol
Was Coke, he pointed out the wherever in the world you go, Coke is always the same and is always quite Nice
Art has generally not been able to live up to this ideal of being good and
widely distributed
Artists make a few things but only a few people ever get to own them
Warhol tried to counteract this.
One day, after reading that Picasso had made four thousand masterpieces in his lifetime
Wahol set out to make 4,000 prints in one day
as it turned out It took him one month to make 500
The lesson we Can draw from Warhol is that mass production needs to apply beyond making prints and other kinds of high art
We need the organizing,
commoditizing and branding powers of business to reliably produce and distribute the good things in life, like high quality child care,
psychotherapy, career advice and beautiful architecture, Just to start the list
Most art doesn't have much of an impact on the world but Warhol was extremely keen on
large-scale impact, he mastered many genres from drawing, painting and printing to photography
audio recording, sculpture and theatre, he started a magazine,
designed clothes, managed a band, made 60 films and had plans to start his own TV chat show
Warhol was able to extend his work into different channels, partly because of his populism
being a populist meant that he was unafraid to reach people where they started
the chat show is a quintessential populist medium
Because it Plays - What Masses of People find Funny and Interesting
Warhol was a populist out of Generosity he Wanted to translate the things he Cared about like
Sensitivity A love of Glamour and Spectacle and Playfulness Into Objects and Experiences That Could Touch Many Many People
The Only Pity Is that he Never Quite finished what he, Did he Could Have Founded his Planned TV
Chat Show then gone On in Ever Broader and Broader
Partnerships To Start A Fashion Label Designer Hotel Maybe a financial Advisory Service A
Supermarket Chain Or an Airport This is the Task Still open To people, who, Had Drawn to Art but, also want to change the World
Andy Warhol Died in 1987 When he was Only 58 after Complications
Following Routine Gallbladder Surgery in A new York Hospital
He is buried at a small Cemetery near Where he was Born in Bethel Park Pennsylvania
His Example Is Still an Invitation to us to change the world in A mass Populist Way Through Art
'My Name is Andy Warhol and I just Finished Eating a hamburger'