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Andy Warhol in Black and WhiteAuthor(s): Christopher LyonReviewed work(s):Source: MoMA, No. 50 (Winter, 1989), pp. 1-3Published by: The Museum of Modern ArtStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4381057 .

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i j i j * TheMuseumofModernArt

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ANDY

I N BLACK

I

I A N D WHITE

W N e w Ma r X f e M O C K by Chnstopher Lyon

5tm, c honce | The entire front page of theNew YorkPost wasot 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 11968,thedayafterhisnear-fatalshooting,and

_111 1 on February 23, 1987, the day after he died.

This apotheosis in black and white was the re-

| ward of an artist obsessed by celebrity. But it_ _ _ | was also aparticularly apt formofrecognition

_.' _ _ _ _

I A A _ _ I of an artlst who found In tablold newspapersI _ _ _ _ _ __ I someofhisearll estandmostef fectivelmages.

- _ _ __ _ __ | "Warhol'sartisitselflikeaMarchofTime

w _ A * _ senblum in the publication accompanying_ _ _ _ _ | Andy Warhol:A Retrospective (opening Feb-

v | ruary 6), "an abbreviated visual anthology of

_ , _ _ _ . .

_ A _ _ _ the most consplcuous headllnes, personalltles,> ?V _ _ - | mythic creatures, edibles, tragedies, 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 < - _ _ _ _ | a catalogue of the most pervasive forms ofiE - - . r_

s. ;}.w _ _ _ _ mass prlnt communlcatlon. Headllnes. Ads.

| Comic-strip panels. News photos. Celebrity^0; J:_ _ _ A | portraits and candids. Wanted posters. Pro-

, 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 An earlier generation had attempted to give_ | public expression to psychic experience

_ _ | throughidiosyncratic,privateimages;WarholI andhispee}stOOkhigh-impactpublicimagery_ _ _ | andmade itexpress personal concerns. What

__ _ | led them in this direction? The example of

= _ - _ = _ | other artists, the powerfully direct visual im-_ _ _ _ _ | pact of many forms of mass communication,

_ _ _ _ _ _ | 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 Zhenslvenessndvarietyolflwdarhodanbe x-for Meg. 1961. NEW YoRK<S PICTURE NEWSPAP?R ? NEW YORK'S PICTURE NEWSP^P[R e

* i b, ' en : ,> , . .. .. .. .. .. .. s T s M ' *' .' ='' . ..... \e 8 w t h.1 gisq,rbJub tw?1s ly ;e X w w^r .... ... ... .. 0r ?, . plaiIled solely by presumed influences.

s y n t h e t 1 c p O l y m e r M E T R A L U E D G E S L A , r n n t r r a r n Warholbasedhisworkofthel960

Cu la:l^[ \ stsonal 1 G A N K S C U R B C A R D S , 4 r r U " v " [ l D e p a r t m e n t f P a i n t i n g a n d S c u i p t u r e i n h i sBurtonTremaine BR9KSO W No u > o u . g . ^ . .

_2->;i-;; ; @ @ S S * that he looked for a subJect ln whlch he was

; wE _ In nosplt/ llere; Llzm gome | most interested, by which he could definehimself as an artist" and found it in "the fanKffl magazines he read to follow the lives of the

I t.: ;t : |: Fa _w_ - | stars he adored, and in the tabloids, with their| g ^ , l [ Y7 * i I -- | ads, their comics, and their screaming head-

1l3#ill | 1 <>__ _ @_ ; /w <_ | lines.Itwas'ea;y,'itwaswhathelovedandndy Warhol. Daily 9!il |- *-_ t E . . S _ oiX { found somehow de ply satisfying, and it wasNews. 1962. Synthetic 1 ^ 11 atA 14_ _ I E * _r I ground just then bei lg explored by a new gen-

polymerpainton C;IiI I we_^ I I _ _^ | erationofartis s."anvas. Collection 1111 | vA I * | * | Also in the exh bition publication, 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:RolfLauter, degree to which postwar consumer culture was

Frankfurt. a pervasive presence. It seems to have dawned

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on artistsof thefiftiesthatsuchimageryandobjectshadirreversiblyaken otalcontrolofvisualrepresentationndpublicexperience."But millionsreadabout, andwerefascinatedby, disaster and celebrity. Artists like RoyLichtenstein adrecognized nthegraphicm-pactof ads and comics an untapped rtisticpotential. However, Warholexploited to auniqueextent the realization hatimages al-ready nvestedwithpowerfulpublicmeaningscouldbe made oconveyas wellcomplexpri-

vateemotionand hought.The magerypresented y Warholn eachof

the five works hatcomprisedhis firstmajorappearancesanartist-in a displaywindowatBonwitTeller n 1961-reflects Warhol's wn"desires and deficiencies," McShine sug-gests,"foralltraffic nmetaphors fmetamor-phosis and self-transcendence."Warhol'sdesire omakehimselfover indsaparallel, orexample, n thetransformationf Popeye, hesubjectof onepaintingn thedisplaywindowshow,who "is madeanew manbyspinach somuchso that n Warhol's aintings,he seemsto bepunchinghepicture lane)."

Warhol's nfatuationwith film stars andothercelebrities ventuallyed to thecreationof someof his most amouspaintings, uchasthoseof MarilynMonroe,TroyDonahue,orElvis Presley.Warhol dentified with them

bothasobjectsof desireandasrole models.Acounterparto such magesareWarhol's aint-ings based on photos of fatal accidentsandotherdisasters,works thatgive form to ourmost undamentalears.

129 Die in Jet (Plane Crash) (1962) was thefirst of what would come t6 be called theDisasterpaintings.The event be ng reportedwas thecrash n take-off tParis f anairplaneen route o theUnited States.Manyof thosewho died werepatrons f theHighMuseum fArt nAtlanta-it was an "artworld"disaster.TheDisaster eries,mainlyderivedromnewsphotos, covers a lot of ground,McShineob-serves, romcommonaccidents oglobal rag-edy: "In most of the works, Warhol usesrepeatedmages o reinforceheobsessivewayour houghts eepreturningo atragedy, nd ostress heflash of famethat hese ittle-known

victimsachieve n death,as theirpicturesarerepeatednthousands f newspapers."

The mostpowerfulof theseearlyworksofWarhol ome from theintersection f his ob-sessions withglamoranddeath: heimagesofMarilynMonroeand, perhapsmost affect-ingly, the series devoted to JacquelineKen-nedy.Theeventssurroundingheassassinationof PresidentKennedyprovidedWarholwithaset of imagesthatrepetition, n printandonscreen n the daysfollowing he killing,madeindeliblen thenationalmemory.

Warhol's se offound magerydatesat eastto his youth n Pittsburgh.At least oneof hisearlypaintingswastakendirectly roma pho-tograph. ignificantly,hisearlywork,possiblylost,, s said o havebeenbasedon a photoof a

disaster,hebombing f a train tation nShang-haiby theJapanesen 1937.Warhol,whenastudentat CarnegieInstitute,collected tearsheets romVogue,Life,andotherperiodicals.

Inthe 1950s, whenWarholworked nNewYorkCityas acommercial rtist,hefrequentlyborrowed llustrations rom the New YorkPublic LibraryPictureCollection. He alsocopied from newspapers,according o BertGreene,anassociateand riend.Warhol seda lightbox to tracepicturesandwas usinganopaqueprojector y the late 1950s fordraw-ingsand ater orhisfirstPopartworks.

In theseearlyPoppaintings,Warhol acil-

lated between two differenttechniques, asMarcoLivingstone ointsout ntheexhibitionpublication:a loose copying, incorporatinggestural andling andxaggerated rips-a re-sponse in part to the accepted ook of NewYork School painting-and a second ap-proach, mpassive ntreatment,eplicatinghesourcematerial sclosely aspossible.Hesooncame to prefer he "cold," impassivepaint-ingsto the more"lyrical"ones.

Livingstonehas sketched he art-historicallineageof thisstyle,whichwouldbecome hecharacteristicook of Warhol's rt:"Warhol'sequationof the canvas withan appropriatedimage anbeviewedas anextension f MarcelDuchamp'sonceptof theReadymade ywayof Jasper ohns'spaintings f FlagsandTar-

gets, whichhadbeenthesubjects f consider-

ableacclaimandcriticaldiscussionwhen heywereexhibitedat the Leo CastelliGallery nNewYorkn 1958."

The mechanicalcopying of images wasonly a beginning,however. The processoftransmission lso nvolved hanges hatwouldtransformhe image.Characteristically,uchchangeswerenotimposedby Warhol irectlybutinsteadproceeded rom someunforeseenaspectof the process.Whenworkingwith anassistant,orexample-and Warhol adassis-tants romveryearly nhis commercialareer-he observed hat here s a "certain mount fmisunderstandingf what I'm trying o do,"but that he preferredthis state of affairs:

If people never misunderstandyou, and

if theydo everything exactly the way you

tell them to, they're ust transmitters of

your ideas, andyou get bored withthat.But when you work with people who

misunderstand you, instead of getting

transmissions ou get transmutations,and that's muchmore interesting in the

long run.

Far left: Andy Warhol. Untitled. 1960.Watercolor,pencil, and cut newspaperpasted on paper. Collection The Estate ofAndy Warhol.

Left:Andy Warhol. Saturday'sPopeye.1960. Synthetic polymer paint oncanvas. Collection Landesmuseum,Mainz.

- ----.......

VA publicity tillof MarilynMonroe orthe film Niagara (1953), showingcropmarksmadeby AndyWarhol.CourtesyTheEstateandFoundationofAndyWarhol.

Andy Warhol. TheSix Marilyns(MarilynSix-Pack). 1962. Silkscreen ink

onsyntheticpolymerpainton canvas.CollectionEmilyandJerrySpiegel.

Photo:Zindman/Fremont.

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After experimenting with various other

methods of printing, including the use of a

rubber stamp or woodcut, Warhol moved to

silkscreening. His initial use of the hand-cut

silkscreen soon gave way to use of commer-

cially produced photo-silkscreens. Images in

the Disaster series were among the earliest to

be producedthis way. Synthetic polymer paint

was used for backgrounds; the photographic

image was itself printed n oil-based enamel or

occasionally vinyl ink, "usually in black,"

Livingstone points out, "to reinforce the asso-ciation with newsprintphotographs."Warhol's

explorationof color, throughhis inventive use

of screenprintingprocedures, for example, or

in the late Camouflage works, added layers of

meaning and a remarkablecomplexity of vis-

ual experience to the black-and-white founda-

tion of his early work.

In his 1980 book POPism: The Warhol

'60s, written with Pat Hackett, Warhol re-

called the firstuse of silkscreening:

In August '62 1 started doing silk-

screens. The rubber-stamp method I'd

been using to repeat images suddenly

seemed too homemade; I wanted some-

thing stronger that gave more of an

assembly-line effect.

Withsilkscreening, youpick a photo-

graph, blow it up, transfer it in glueonto silk, and then roll inkacross it so

the ink goes through the silk but not

through the glue. That way you get the

same image, slightly different each

time. It was all so simple-quick and

chancy. I was thrilled with it. My first

experimentswithscreens were heads of

Troy Donahue and WarrenBeatty, and

then whenMarilyn Monroe happenedto

die that month, I got the idea to make

screens of her beautifulface-the first

Marilyns.

In this recollection, elements of technique

fuse with eroticism, glamor, and death. The

image used for the Marilyn pictures was

cropped by Warhol from a publicity still by

photographerGene Kornman for the 1953 film

Niagara. Otherwiseunaltered,

it isneverthe-less transmuted by the peculiar alchemy of

Warhol's art and becomes a contemporary

icon anda reflection of our time.Warhol's own celebrity made him anappro-

priate subject for his paintings, and self-

portraitsare an important aspect of his work.

In the 1981 painting Myths, he comments

wryly on his own fame and on his position in

American popular culture. Seen in vertical

strips of repeated images areSuperman, at the

extreme left, Mickey Mouse and Uncle Sam in

the middle, and, along the way, Howdy

Doody, Greta Garbo, andthe Wicked Witchof

the West. The extreme right-hand column is

filled with a repeated image of Warhol him-

self. It is a study in white andblack:his white-

haired head atthe very edge of the paintingand

the dark shadow of his face filling the frame,

presenting his profile with features simplified

and exaggerated by the shadow's elongation.

The retiringfigure of Warhol, who cast such a

long shadow over the culture of his time, is

elevated to the pantheon of popular heroes-

but, characteristically, it is the insubstantial,

distorted image of the artist that dominates the

frame;Warhol himself remains obscured. Off

to one side. Observing.

Above: Andy Warhol. Jackie (The Week ThatWas). 1963. Silkscreen ink on synthetic polymerpaint on canvas. Collection Mrs. Raymond Goetz.

Left: Andy Warhol.Ambulance Disaster. 1963.

Silkscreen ink on canvas. Collection The Dia ArtFoundation, New York. Courtesy The MenilCollection, Houston. Photo: Noel Allum.

Below: Andy Warhol in 1964. Photo: Ken HeymanArchive Pictures Inc.

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