Andy Warhol is easily one of the most important and profoundly influential artists of the twentieth century, and of all his contributions to the development of postmodern and contemporary aesthetics, perhaps none is as significant as what was known as “the Factory.” At once a physical studio space, a kind of assembly line for art production, and a dynamic locus for social and cultural interactions between Warhol and a host of friends, lovers, fellow artists, casual acquaintances, and curious onlookers, the Factory was an integral part of the artist’s daily life and cultural practice from its emergence in 1962 until his death in 1987. Over time, the Factory has blossomed into myth, becoming a cultural shorthand for everything from dynamic experimentation and the vitality of the 60s counterculture in America to the decadence and destructiveness of drug culture and the aesthetic and moral impoverishment of art at the end of modernism. But the Factory was, at its core, a community in the most vital sense. Within it, multiple authors interacted and collaborated on the production of paintings, sculpture, experimental films, books and magazines, performances, and bohemian lifestyles writ large that are, even today, both culturally innovative and inseparable from the dynamic and heterogeneous milieu in which they were formed.
Given that the Factory was a space to see and be seen, it is not surprising that it was also the focus of many cameras. Warhol was certainly a prolific photographer, particularly in the 1970s and 80s. Yet Warhol was but one among many photographers in the Factory. They ranged from professional to amateur, Factory regulars and superstars to photojournalists and fashion photographers. Together, these photographers documented the unique and ongoing cultural phenomenon of the Factory in its day-to-day existence at the same time as they actively constructed and participated in it. It is from these various cameras that this exhibition seeks to piece together a complex and at times contradictory portrait of Warhol’s social and aesthetic sphere. Featuring photography, printed material, and film by Billy Name, Stephen Shore, Nat Finkelstein, Cecil Beaton, Richard Avedon, Brigid Berlin, Christopher Makos, Jonas Mekas, and, of course, Warhol himself, this exhibition seeks not only to offer insight into the history of the Factory as a social phenomenon, but also to show how the model of the Factory as community is deeply relevant to art and social practice in a contemporary global context.
From the Factory to the World. Photography and the Warhol Community
Richard Avedon – Cecil Beaton – Brigid Berlin – Nat Finkelstein – Billy Name – Christopher Makos – Jonas Mekas – Stephen Shore – Andy Warhol
06.06 – 22.07.2012
Teatro Fernán Gómez/ Fundación Banco Santander
Plaza de Colón, 4
28046 Madrid
Spain
Tuesday – Saturday : 10am – 9pm
Sunday : 10am – 7pm
T : +34 91.436.25.40
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