Art and Andy

On Andy Warhol | Bryan Appleyard

Sadly, Bryan Appleyard has stopped regular blogging again. (He disappeared for quite a while, popped back for a few weeks, but now is only notifying readers of his feature articles and interviews in the press.)

Anyway, the link above is to his recent, very lengthy, article on Andy Warhol, containing much erudite discussion of modern art in general, and a little in the way of biographical detail. It's fine writing.

I'm not sure, but I think I had read and forgotten this strange story of how he came to be shot:

Valerie Solanas was a radical feminist who believed in the violent creation of an all-female society. In 1967 she asked Warhol to produce her play Up Your Ass, but he lost the script and Solanas started demanding payment. Finally, in June 1968, she turned up at the Factory and shot him in the chest. It was a grievous wound – Warhol had to wear a corset for the rest of his life to, as he put it, “keep my insides in” – and he only just survived.

As Appleyard notes, his work went down in quality after this, but you do get the feeling Bryan still has a soft spot for him.