«I LIKE TO WORK WHEN I'M NOT WORKING»

Warhol's true faith, of course, was in the Factory—that "travesty of religion," Indiana calls it, in which "devotees 'confessed' to a godlike camera and were 'absolved' by inclusion in a community of dysfunction." Admirers of the Factory frequently invoke the precedent of the Renaissance atelier, but, as Indiana points out, the industrial hierarchy whose formal name was Andy Warhol Enterprises owes far more to the studio system of Irving Thalberg. Like Thalberg and Walt Disney, Warhol conjured a market for his own work through savvy farming of talent, business instinct, and relentless oversight. Like them, he wrapped an industrious creative culture in a cloak of casual glamour. Like them, Warhol benefited from the historical accident of film—the superstars were hardly the first artists and outcasts to embrace a subversive hedonism, simply the first to be captured doing so on celluloid. And like Thalberg and Disney, Warhol demonstrated a selfishness and self-absorption so severe, it seemed to those around him a serene charisma implying an ethical order. But Warhol sat idly by as his Factory superstars disappeared and despaired, as they drugged out, deteriorated, and died. And "there is no evidence," as Hickey notes, "to suggest that his overriding project was anything more profound than to make the art world safe for Andy Warhol."

Newweek
Dec 3 2009