Brett Superstar Stole My Name

it’s all post-Warholian to us

“What type of people buy your paintings?”

“You’re not supposed to talk about that. Let’s just talk about boots and Chinese food.”

– Student reporter and Andy Warhol, 1966

Barbara Feldon. Andy Warhol.

Not that it’s any coincidence, necessarily–if you care a whit about fashion, art, pop culture, the shade of Warhol falls long over the landscape–but we’re having a Warhol-in-ascendence moment, seeing his inky fingerprints everywhere. Maybe we tuned in because of the row of Warhol films at Clinton Street Video or The Warhol Look: Glamour, Style, Fashion that jumped off the shelf at us at Powell’s or photos of Linah Cocaine in full maquillage. From jaunty striped shirts to Reed soundtracks, to drawn-in eyebrows (either on a print or a face), silkscreens, overpainted photos and prints, and our favorite photo of Diana Vreeland, a Warhol Polaroid, we’re seeing the Everywhere Man everywhere. Even his doorstop of a diary (that we picked up at SMUT) is serving as a bedside table, holding up our copy of The New English Dandy and The Rova Improvisations by Clark Coolidge.

We used to write Mr. Warhol off with a big red lipstick X because he was the only artist anyone who knew nothing about art would ever name drop (oh, and Picasso). Boring, we thought. And how much was Warhol and how much was hype. But here at the barricades at the intersection of art and fashion and design, a position Warhol mined like never before, we take it all back. (Most of it.)

What got us started on all of this is that Brett Superstar (unrelated to Mona Superhero? same middle name?) is having a show at Redux (811 E Burnside), opening with a reception this Friday.

POSTED: May 31st, 2006 | AUTHOR: lisa | FILED UNDER: art | TAGS: art | No Comments »

---