Andy Warhol in Black and White
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$QG\:DUKROLQ%ODFNDQG:KLWH $XWKRU V &KULVWRSKHU/\RQ 6RXUFH0R0$1R :LQWHU SS 3XEOLVKHGE\The Museum of Modern Art 6WDEOH85/http://www.jstor.org/stable/4381057 . $FFHVVHG Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The Museum of Modern Art is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to MoMA. http://www.jstor.org i j i j * TheMuseumofModernArt A A A A A MembersQuarterly Z V lt Jg V | ... J .. > _,,;',,.,^1,,.. ,,,,, I- ANDY q IN BLACK I IAND WHITE W N e w Ma r X f e M S T O C K by Chnstopher Lyon 5tm, c honce | The entire front page of theNew YorkPost was ot showers. I , e | NEw YoRKs FRIDAY, NovEMBER 3, 1961 lo Ce t | | n w - , I devoted to Andy Warhol twlce: on June 4, I I Pages85 88 1 1968,thedayafterhisnear-fatalshooting,and _111 1 on February 23, 1987, the day after he died. This apotheosis in black and white was the re- _ _ _ _ | was also aparticularly apt formofrecognition | ward of an artist obsessed by celebrity. But it _.' _ _ _ _ I A A _ _ I of an artlst who found In tablold newspapers I _ _ _ _ _ __ I someofhisearllestandmosteffectivelmages. - _ _ __ _ __ | "Warhol'sartisitselflikeaMarchofTime _w _ _ _ _ _ | Andy_ Warhol:AA * Retrospective _ I senblum(opening in the publication accompanyingFeb- v | ruary 6), "an abbreviated visual anthology of _ , _ _ _ . > ?V _ _ _ - | mythicA creatures,_ _ edibles,_ tragedies,the most consplcuous headllnes, personalltles,art- b _ -_ . =s s r - __ | worKs, even ecologlcal proDlems ot recent t I_ | decades. If nothing were to remain of the years ,) _ 1 1962 to 1987 but a Warhol retrospective, fu- E | ture historians and archeologists would have a 9 : _ | fuller time-capsule to work with than that of- i _ _ _ | feredbyanyotherartistoftheperiod." s t : _ A A I A survey of Warhol's early sources reads as _ |1 iE < - - . - r_ _ _ _ _ | a catalogue of the most pervasive forms of s. ;}.w _ _ _ _ mass prlnt communlcatlon. Headllnes. Ads. 0^0; J:_ _ _ A | portraits and candids. Wanted | Comic-stripposters. panels. News photos.Pro- Celebrity , X: .L * 00_ _ _ _ _ _ | duct logos and packaging designs. Warhol's _ ,; ; t; _ _ ^_ _ _ | appropriation-thenowclichedterm-ofthese _iL ; i ; f > z _ _ _ _ _ t formscanbeseeninthecontextofanongolng _ _ | cultural redefinition. Whole new provinces I of potential subject matter were annexed for modern art and a broader audience was X addressed. l _ _ | public expression to psychicAn earlier generationexperience had attempted to give A I andhispee}stOOkhigh-impactpublicimagery_ _ | throughidiosyncratic,privateimages;Warhol _ _ _ | andmade itexpress personal concerns. What __ _ | led them in this direction? The example of _= _ __ _ - _ | _ pact of = many _ forms of | othermass artists, thecommunication, powerfully direct visual im- _ _ _ _ _ _ | and the artists' own distinctive personalities _ _ _ _ _ | allplayedarole.Therewereprecedentsforthe use of comics, forexample, intheearly work of Warhol' s friend Philip Pearlstein and in cer- See Pog e 3 tain works of Jasper Johns. But the compre- AndyWarhol.ABoy {W3 DAILY NEWS Ez ; DAILYS NEWS X Zhenslveness andvariety lolflwdarhod cantbe ex- * ib, 'en :,> , ............. s Te s.M ' *' .' =''' . ..... \e. 8 ws t h.1, gisq,rbJub tw?1s ly.;elXlw w^r ............... 0r ?,: . plaiIled solely by presumed influences. for Meg. 1961. NEW YoRK<S PICTURE NEWSPAP?R ? NEW YORK'S PICTURE NEWSP^P[R e Cu la:l^[ \ stsonal 1GANKS CURB CARDS, 4r 1 rU" | r l v"[l | Department of Painting and Scuipture in his synthet1cpOlymerBurtonTremaine MET RALU EDGESBR9KS LA, 4 3 DOWNrn n tr wor a r u>oun I Warholbasedhisworkofthel960sareexam . g .^ .. _2->;i-;; ; @ @ S S * that he looked for a subJect ln whlch he was ; wE1 _ In nosplt/ llere; Llzm gome | most interested, by which he could define _Kffl magazines he read to follow himselfthe as an artist"lives and foundof it in "thethe fan |I t.: ;tg ^ : , l |: Fa[ Y7 * i I -- | _w_ ads, their comics, -and | theirstars he adored,screaming and in the tabloids, head-with their Andy Warhol. Daily1l3#ill 9!il | 1|- <>__ *-_ t E . S __ oiX {@ _ found somehow; /w <_de ply | lines.Itwas'ea;y,'itwaswhathelovedandsatisfying, and it was News. 1962. Synthetic 1 ^ 11 atA 14_ _ I E * _r I ground just then bei lg explored by a new gen- canvas.polymerpainton Collection C;IiI 1111I we_^| vA I * | I *I | Also_ in the exh _^ bition | erationofartispublication, s." Benja- Museum fur Moderne ,-Xh l r 5f _rrss min H. D. Buchloh, an art historian and critic, Kunst,Frankfurt. -: 1t l | pointsouttheimportanceofrecognizing"the Photo:Rolf Lauter, degree to which postwar consumer culture was Frankfurt. a pervasive presence. It seems to have dawned on artistsof the fifties that such imageryand objectshad irreversiblytaken total controlof visual representationand publicexperience." But millions readabout, and were fascinated by, disaster and celebrity. Artists like Roy Lichtensteinhad recognized in thegraphic im- pact of ads and comics an untappedartistic potential. However, Warholexploited to a uniqueextent the realizationthat images al- readyinvested with powerful public meanings - ----........ , .*. , ,... ,,*,........# :s couldbe madeto convey as well complexpri- vateemotion and thought. The imagerypresented by Warholin eachof the five works that comprisedhis first major appearanceas anartist-in a displaywindow at BonwitTeller in 1961-reflects Warhol'sown "desires and deficiencies," McShine sug- gests, "forall trafficin metaphorsof metamor- k 0 phosis and self-transcendence." Warhol's :f-.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0: : desireto makehimself over finds a parallel,for V example,in the transformationof Popeye, the A publicitystill of MarilynMonroe for s subjectof one paintingin the displaywindow the film Niagara (1953), showing show, who "is madea new manby spinach(so cropmarks made by AndyWarhol. muchso thatin Warhol'spaintings, he seems CourtesyThe Estateand Foundation to be punchingthe pictureplane)." of AndyWarhol. Warhol's infatuationwith film stars and othercelebrities eventually led to the creation of some of his mostfamous paintings, such as those of MarilynMonroe, Troy Donahue,or Andy Warhol. The Six Marilyns~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~S~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~1 Elvis Presley. Warholidentified with them (Marilyn Six-Pack). 1962. Silkscreen ink bothas objectsof desireand as role models.A on syntheticpolymer paint on canvas. counterpartto suchimages are Warhol's paint- CollectionEmily and JerrySpiegel. ings based on photos of fatal accidentsand Photo:Zindman/Fremont. other disasters, works that give form to our mostfundamental fears. 129 Die in Jet (Plane Crash) (1962) was the disaster,the bombing of a trainstation in Shang- first of what would come t6 be called the hai by the Japanesein 1937.Warhol, when a Disasterpaintings. The event be ng reported studentat Carnegie Institute, collected tear was thecrash on take-offat Parisof an airplane sheetsfrom Vogue, Life, andother periodicals. en routeto the United States. Many of those In the 1950s, when Warholworked in New who died werepatrons of the HighMuseum of YorkCity as a commercialartist, he frequently Art in Atlanta-it was an "artworld" disaster. borrowed illustrationsfrom the New York The Disasterseries, mainlyderived from news Public LibraryPicture Collection. He also photos, covers a lot of ground,McShine ob- copied from newspapers,according to Bert serves, fromcommon accidents to globaltrag- Greene,an associateand friend. Warhol used "In most edy: of the works, Warhol uses a light box to tracepictures and was using an 4 : repeatedimages to reinforcethe obsessive way opaqueprojector by the late 1950s for draw- ourthoughts keep returning to a tragedy,and to ings andlater for his firstPop artworks. stressthe flash of fame thatthese little-known In these early Pop paintings,Warhol vacil- - i@^| victimsachieve in death, as theirpictures are lated between two different techniques, as f;s repeatedin thousandsof newspapers." MarcoLivingstone points out in the exhibition The most powerfulof these early worksof publication:a loose copying, incorporating Warholcome from the intersectionof his ob- gesturalhandling -and exaggerated drips-a re- sessions with glamorand death: the imagesof sponse in part to the accepted look of New Marilyn Monroe and, perhapsmost affect- York School painting-and a second ap- ingly, the series devoted to JacquelineKen- proach,impassive in treatment,replicating the nedy.The events surrounding the assassination sourcematerial as closely as possible.He soon of PresidentKennedy provided Warhol with a came to preferthe "cold," impassivepaint- set of images that repetition,in printand on ings to the more"lyrical" ones. screenin the days followingthe killing, made Livingstonehas sketchedthe art-historical indeliblein the nationalmemory. lineageof this style, whichwould become the Warhol'suse of foundimagery dates at least characteristiclook of Warhol'sart: "Warhol's to his youth in Pittsburgh.At least one of his equationof the canvas with an appropriated earlypaintings was takendirectly from a pho- imagecan be viewedas anextension of Marcel tograph.Significantly, this early work, possibly Duchamp'sconcept of the Readymadeby way lost,,is saidto havebeen based on a photoof a of JasperJohns's paintingsof Flags and Tar- gets, whichhad been the subjectsof consider- ableacclaim and critical discussion when they were exhibitedat the Leo CastelliGallery in New Yorkin 1958." The mechanical copying of images was only a beginning, however. The process of transmissionalso involvedchanges that would transformthe image. Characteristically,such changeswere not imposedby Warholdirectly but insteadproceeded from some unforeseen aspectof the process.