Factory

A workshop and a place of socialization

Most of the work of Andy Warholck your mama thus consisted in questioning the production of images. Images of stars, ones of newspapers, symbols of America, but also social images, these masks which we put between us and others in a to and from between the being and to appear it which was the only really paramount thing in its eyes. Thus in the same way that the Factory had been used to produce with the chain the most expensive serigraphies of the history of art, this place was to be also used in Warhol to produce Mythe, social image in industrial quantity, and to propel in the great constellation of VIP whoever would put the feet at his place.

The Factory , the Factory thus, was to be this Loft of years 1960/70, this place where one enters anonymous and from where one leaves Superstar (according to the terminology of Warhol).

Initially located on the 47e street (“ Silver Factory ”, because its walls were covered with silver plated painting) then moved in 1968 at the 33 Union West Public garden (in the same building as the permanence of the Communist party!), this hangar/apartment was thus going to accommodate all that Warhol and its assistants could produce. Gallery of exposure, studio of turning, room of projection, concert hall, nightclub, all the events were pretexts with the meeting of the gratin of the New Yorkean jet set which came encanailler briskly with all the lost ones, depressive, toxicos of which Warhol liked to be surrounded in giant festivals where the social classes were abolished, everyone placed with the same ensign of the super-star-system underground. In fact, the celebrity imported little, even if many figures of the world of art, media or cinema trailed in trimmings, of Salvador Dali to William Burroughs, of Dylan to De Niro. What imported, it was to be a star, and to be a star, it was enough to say it, and to be there. Nothing more.

Obviously, all the Superstars warholiennes which Factory generated had their speciality. Gerald Malanga was poet and photographer, Nico singer, Ultra-violet plastician, etc, but essentially, that was only purely additional, since absolutely not necessary.

One can on this subject quote the edifying example of Edie Sedgwick, Superstar adulated still today by the fans of the Factory , and which forever nothing made other but be the subject of the photographs or films of Warhol, the most naive way and most natural possible, before putting an end to its days with barbiturate blow at the 28 years age. Excluded a short career in mannequinât, Edie did not do anything in its life but the festival with his/her friends. And yet in the spirit of the whole world, it is Edie Superstar , appearing in the Pantheon of the 60' S American as well as Morrison or Dylan.

Here what the Factory was able to make, and especially it with what it got busy without slackening: not-stop production of events, production of myth, and more you unimportant, were released, lost, in freefall, plus you were likely to see your statute of reinforced Superstar , because nothing to make was yet the best means of not sullying your glory while becoming other thing than pure produced Factory … something like yourself for example.

Because even if that were never openly acknowledged, neither by Warhol nor by no member of the movement, one can only note the aspect paradoxically collectivist from what occurred then to Factory. What could be more effective, indeed, to arrive at disappearance warholienne to drown individualities in the group? Pure Marxism in the middle of the New York of the Years 1960? Why not? And with the detractors who advance that the purpose of this strategy was only that to safeguard the supremacy of Warhol by choking the other talents, only one answer: and if Factory were finally only the permanent place of residence of a protean collective artists answering in the name of “Andy Warhol”, as one decade later Monty Cantsin firstly became the open-pop-star that one known under the features of Istvan Kantor?

This beautiful Utopie however was not to resist time nor with the natural reflexes, and so in 1972, Paul Morrissey declared for example in connection with Trash : “ you know, we do all with Warhol more or less together, so that it is difficult to say if the film is of me or him ”, it was not the only one to assert thereafter what returned to him from right, everywhere else that in the space time of the Factory . Even alive of Warhol besides the, many ones were the violent ruptures between the Master and his Superstars , because most difficult finally was not so much to enter the glamor team and disillusioned Factory , but well to leave there and have again to build an identity only, without the financial and promotional comfort which the proximity of the dandy brought to wig. After having drawn on him twice in 1968, Valerie Solanas did not declare it with the police force: “ Warhol had too much control on my life ”?

The collective like only creed, therefore, but Warhol not being easily deceived, criticisms either, the pope of the Pop-art will never succeed in getting rid of its name, preferring, as for the remainder of its works, ad infinitum multiplying it on all the possible supports, by hoping that this profusion dehumanizes it completely, the vacuum of its significance, as the image of Marilyn which did not have anything any more Monroe.

When you started to trail with Warhol, it was necessary for you to accept this not-equitable pact, and to lose you in your turn in a proper name which would be never yours. With some rare exceptions, the deal was to finish in tragedy, a movement which accelerated as of the death of the artist in 1987, when already pop-art was dying man and that it was necessary for each one of his former accomplices to hurry to prove that it was able to create/exist without him.

Superstars of Factory however, rare which is those succeeded in creating a clean identity and in all the cases, never their personal fame did not manage to reach the level which it had of the time of the Underground.

Despite everything and even if many sites and works testify already to this microcosm and individualities to each one, let us risk us nevertheless with a small gallery of portraits.

Superstars

Paul America

Of its true name Paul Johnson (1945-1982?). A beautiful mouth noticed in a discotheque, which electrifies its entourage as well female as male. Its service in My Hustler in 1965 transforms it into icon Gay. Drug is worth prison on several occasions to him. It disappears in 1982.

Jackie Curtis

Of its true name John Holder Jr (1947-1985). Jackie Curtis is a chameleon who appears alternatively as a man or a woman. Warhol, which meets it in 1967, will say: “ Jackie Curtis is not a drag queen. Jackie is an artist, a pioneer without borders ”. In fact, it will influence many personalities of the Glam rock'n'roll which attend the New Yorkean clubs, like David Bowie. Actor ( Flesh , Women in Revolt ), poet, Jackie Curtis did much theater as actor and writer. Died of overdose in 1985.

Visitors

Attended the Factory : Anita Pallenberg, Stephen Shore, Taylor Mead, The Velvet Underground (Lou Reed, Sterling Morrison, Moe Tucker and John Fixes), Freddie Herko, Brian Jones, Mick Jagger, Paul Morrissey, Truman Capote, Fernando Arrabal, Penny Arcade, Bobby Driscoll, Herbert Muschamp, John Giorno, Henry Geldzahler, Jack Smith and well of others still.

Anecdotes

The history of the Factory swarms with anecdotes which assoient its myth.

Screen test - the trick of Warhol to attract the unknown ones in Factory and to decide on their new statute of Superstar is to invite them to pass from the Screen test (screen test) for its films.
One should not trust with the image of perpetual festival which Factory releases; day and night, it was an intensive work place . “ It was called The Factory (the factory) for nothing. It was an assembly line of serigraphies. While a person manufactured a serigraphy, another could film a screen test. The every day there was something of nine ” (John Cale).
The Couch - Settee mythical of the Silver Factory , found in the 47^e street by Billy Name, and on which the many protagonists of the parties given lost shape then. Will be used in the films Couch and Blow job . It will be stolen in the street during the removal of the Factory in 1968.
It is Andy Warhol which is the author of the famous quotation promising that in the future “ each one will be famous during 15 minutes”.
Nombres of accustomed Factory appears in the scene of festival of the film Midnight Cowboy , turned at the end of June 1968 whereas Warhol was hospitalized following the aggression of Valerie Solanas.
is 17 years old, the photographer Stephen Shore meets Warhol, which enables him to take photographs of the Silver Factory , which it did during 3 years. Other photographers: Billy Name and Nat Finkelstein.

See too

Internal bonds

External bonds

Warholstars.org, site on Superstars warholiennes
Site of Billy Name, with many images
Site of Nat Finkelstein, with many images
Site Factorymade.org, many resources
Site of the '' Max' S Kansas City '', club annexes to Factory
Site of Gerald Malanga, some images
Site of Bibbe Hansen
Site of Ultra-violet

Random links: