Thirty Years After His Death, Andy Warhol's Spirit Is Still Very Much Alive | Hacker News Reader

Thirty Years After His Death, Andy Warhol's Spirit Is Still Very Much Alive

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36 pointsprismatic14 comments

I got intrigued with Warhol after I found out he'd supported the Velvet Underground and suggested they work with Nico. It was a strange suggestion, but the results were brilliant.

I'm also really interested in his "Factory" idea, basically a very wild art studio. It reminds me a bit of Erdős, Grothendieck's seminars, and hackerspaces all at the same time. Basically, get a bunch of talented people with very different skills and perspectives in the same place, with a bunch of stuff to work with, add drugs, and see what happens.

If you're not familiar with it already then I highly recommend checking out Songs for Drella. Lou Reed and John Cale put aside there differences after Warhol's death to record something of a eulogy for him. It offers an interesting perspective on the early days of the Velvet underground, their relationship with and subsequent falling out with Warhol, and Warhol's life in general. It's beautiful, haunting, and heartbreaking.

Thank you for the recommendation, never would have found this and am loving it!

The myth and reputation surrounding The Factory has made it a popular point of reference for a lot of artists, many of whom identify their own studios or creative spaces as spiritual successors.

An equally interesting, albeit different space would be The Haçienda (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ha%C3%A7ienda).

And if anyone is after some bite-sized Warhol, you may enjoy this Twitter feed, sampling from Warhol's diaries - https://twitter.com/WarholLives

The Andy Warhol Museum is worth the trip to Pittsburgh. We have this cultural concept that iconoclastic artists are temperamental and difficult to work with, but from all accounts Warhol was a consumate professional in his work, always seeking to give his clients his absolute best work, on time, on budget. And he worked constantly, maybe even obsessively. Very inspiring.

In a large part, he also birthed the modern idea of having a whole level of other artists underneath him, that did the majority of his paintings, screen prints, films, magazines - you name it. His name was much like a trademark for a product. He produced works en-mass, often as cheaply as possible.

His art studio was named, "The Factory" after all...

This is well and good - artists employing people to do much of the actual work dates to at least the Renaissance, but Warhol isn't known to exactly treat these people well - you could even call him exploitative. His nickname was, "Drella" (Dracula + Cinderella)

How many people, for example, who hung out to The Factory in its hey-day, or worked with Warhol, then had their lives destroyed by severe drug addictions - perhaps even while being a part of a film he was shooting? His public indifference to some of these deaths is astounding - perhaps because he himself was severely addicted to drugs (amphetamines).

Take a walk on the Wild Side.

>> the bullet piercing his lungs, gall bladder, spleen, intestines, liver, and esophagus

Unlucky guy.

Here's a skin detection algorithm that references one of his art installations: https://www.google.com.tr/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http...

“Andy Warhol. Phoney, radical Andy Warhol. Burgeois capitalist.” [1]

[1] https://youtu.be/Bw0Rmt2S0uQ?t=10m27s

Thanks for the link, how amusing. This confirms my suspicions.

After reading watching his doc [1] we were was inspired to build our art startup : https://PoPteam.io

no algos here - all hand crafted just as warhol liked it.

[1] https://youtu.be/UQXpqQO4vaE

Warhol is one of the few artists that if you hate thaer work you should accept the fact that you really love it

Warhol hated mass production and expressed those feelings, oddly, by participating in it

If you look at a piece by Warhol and think, 'this is unimaginative clutter produced in such a scale that bars any kind of creativity or intimacy of expression' then Warhol just managed to have you speak the opinion that the art was produced in response to

Now you have the opinion and can use it to examine elements of your own life, beyond warhol's work

who will look at a room filled with campbells soup can paintings and think, 'such care and consideration went into each one.. theses are all individually such good paintings'?

then go home afterward and look at a cabinet full of campbell's soup cans think 'good soup'

I had this opinion already. When I go to a gallery and see Worhol's dull, unskillful work I find it a total waste of time.

This for me is the part I hate about modern art. Stop being self-referential and paint something that takes skill.

I happen to agree with your first para, but I think indifference and dislike are separate

I am indifferent to warhols work because I already agree with the inherent message and find little beyond that message

You can even dislike Warhol for other reasons, but it still remains that disliking the work for its mass production qualities means you are responding as intended

As for your second para.. you seem to be an adherent of a dull and unskillful ideology

I think all art takes skill, of varying types of skill, but more specifically a lot of modern art(o) consists of paintings that inarguably required a lot of skill to paint

You seem to be arguing something other than modern art

Personally I think it's dangerous to apply limitations on how others can express thaemself

(o) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_art

It's a cheap win. I dislike being punched in the face. I have no intention of going to an art gallery where they punch people in the face and then say "told you so".

I like skill and flare. Warhol had neither. I don't expect a painting to be like a photo. I just find Warhol devoid of any interest whatsoever. And his apartment had none of his genre in either, probably because he knew he was simply playing the media. Just like Damien Hirst or Tracy Emin and their entourage of sycophants.

I love many of the pics on that link. I wouldn't put Warhol anywhere near any of those artists.

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