Customer Reviews

The Philosophy of Andy Warhol : From A to B and Back Again

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Seriously, at a certain point when I was around 18 or 19, this was my Bible, or my Little Red Book - I and a handful of friends (Warhol died at about the same time) took every syllable here very, very seriously.

This is kinda funny to me now, but it's a great book still, a truly unique cultural artifact. Warhol - as always maintains the trademark deadpan aloofness here, which had a few odd purposes beyond simply looking cool: there were rare instances when he'd drop his guard and a hint of social relevance would enter the frame, which did run contrary to most of what Warhol did, here especially. Doing so would turn art into something didactic, and - as a joke doesn't work if you have to explain the punch line, art flops if you have to lead your viewers, or readers, by the hand into your meaning. Thus Warhol's stylish glibness and affected cool served a brilliant purpose - it made demands of everyone who came into contact with it.

Here we have Warhol's epigrams - spread out like some artboy approximation of 'Quotations From Chairman Mao Tse-Tung,' all about equally quotable, useless, devoid of literary merit, yet (unlike the leaden and ideologically bankrupt Chairman) also stylish and memorable, even at their most zoned out.

The other great method behind Warhol's facades is here as well - the same impulse that turned canned soup into the artworks of a once very, very poor 2nd-generation immigrant's child (if you were going hungry, Campell's soup would in fact become, and possibly remain, a beautiful thing, and we all know that beautiful things are and always will be one of the most fitting of subjects for art). These cryptic sayings and jottings all seem constructed to get us all to see the small stuff for what it is, and learn to appreciate it for that.

Warhol was like Elvis - all things to all people. And about as maddening, contradictory and semiotically intriguing as Elvis. This slim little book is one of his strangest and most magnificent achievements.

-David Alston

I read this book knowing next to nothing about Andy Warhol. After reading it, I feel more or less the same way. Although it is entertaining and a sure quick read!

This book is a collection of paragraphs by the late 60's pop artist. It is divided into 15 chapters: Love (puberty) Love (prime) Love (senility) Beauty, Fame, Work, Time, Death, Economics, Atmosphere, Success, Art, Titles, The Tingle, and Underwear. Don't be fooled by the numerous chapters though; this is a very thin book. Each chapter has a topic, some as short as one paragraph long. There's a lot of division but not a lot of content. Most of Warhol's observations on life, some general, some personal, range from interesting and unique decadent philosophies to brief, meaningless nuggets as unnecessary as anything you'll find in a Larry King column. I enjoyed many parts of this book such as Warhol's unapologetic feelings towards spending money (Economics) since such unbridled greed is not something that most rich people are honest enough to admit (and is also specific to the 1970's and 1980's greed and decadence of New York). I also enjoyed but was somewhat mystified by Warhol's thoughts about sexuality and beauty. He seems detached and objective about his feelings about those subjects. Warhol never gives any clues too broad about his preferences- which I find appealing, seeing that it's very unique for a man, even if he's bisexual or homosexual, to not be like "Sex! Sex! Sex!" Unfortunately, the book is written with competence but not great articulateness. The opposite of wordy, it's not quite a quote book, but I'd definitely downgrade the title from "philosophies" to "monologues."

According to page 208 of the Warhol Biography 'Holy Terror; Andy Warhol Close Up' by Bob Colacello (1990), Warhol delegated the actual writing of the book to Colacello and Pat Hackett. Colacello wrote the first draft and Hackett wrote the version that was published. Warhol's contribution was to set up the deal, offer a few suggestions and one-liners, and read the finished pages before they were sent off to the publisher. He brought them on his book tour to "remind him" what "he" had written.

If a silkscreen created by Warhol's assistants (carefully aping his art style) but signed by Warhol is still "authentic," does that mean an autobiography written by Warhol's assistants (carefully aping his speaking style) but credited to Warhol on the cover is still an "authentic" autobiography?

Andy's response to an excess of abstract art was Pop Art.

Andy's response to an excess of abstract philosophy was Pop Philosophy.

This book is not so much about Andy Warhol as it is about Warhol making philosophy pop. To make philosophy pop, Andy shared his observations and values, just as to make art pop, Andy shared the Campbell soup he enjoyed so often.

Philosophy has been abstract for so long, we had forgotten it could be anything else. It had belonged to academicians for so long, we had forgotten it could belong to anyone else.

Andy worked with the topics of abstract philosophy, such as love, beauty, time, death, economics and art ... but he rendered them pop by talking about them the way ordinary people talk about them. Not that Andy seemed ordinary but what do you call concerns of pimples (in "Beauty"), not being able to shop on Sunday (in "Economics"), or waiting in line for movies (in "Time"). Views of Andy's but also acts of making topics previously owned by abstract philosophy into instances of pop philosophy.

Pop philosophy can also move beyond the limitations of stuffy abstract philosophy. Andy offers a chapter on something not to be found in academic philosophy: not "Power" but "Underwear Power". The same commercialism found in pop art can be found here in pop philosophy: "Buying is much more American than thinking..."

So philosophy needn't be just about thinking, it can be about our everyday lives: loving, working and buying underwear. Andy liked having loud music on when doing art so he wouldn't think too much. Perhaps thinking too much gets in the way of good philosophy. If your underwear fits well, there may be no need to work out a lengthy critique of dialectical reasoning. But can you accuse Andy of living an unexamined life?

Warhol should not be underestimated. His contributions and challenges to society are not limited to areas he is well known for such as painting, movies, interviewing but extend even to philosophy and the spirit in which we live each day. Warhol lives. If we practice pop philosophy in the manner he suggests in this book, we may find our lives worth living a good deal more than academic philosophers have shown. Forget the doctorate, go to your own school of Warhol.

This is one of my 5 favorite books of all time. I'm not a huge fan of Andy's art, but his PHILOSOPHIES are AMAZING! He's got such a creative mind. Willing to look at things from underneath instead of only from the front. Such great thoughts as, "If there's one person I would really like to put on retainer it would be a boss. Someone that tells you what to do so you don't need to make all of your own decisions." And, "The best space is an empty space. I feel bad making art for a living - which really just wastes all that wonderful empty space. The only thing better than an empty room is an empty room with a little hole in the wall that looks over into another empty room." These might not be the best examples, but just two off the top of my head. His little commentaries on life will open your mind & hopefully cause you to look at your own daily life in your own twisted philosophies. Enjoy!

I used to think that Andy Warhol was not a real artist, only a great self promoter. This book, written in his own words, proved my prejudice to be completely wrong and uncalled for. Much of what we encounter today in popular culture was forecasted in this book by Warhol. If only the best economists could even be 10 percent as right about their forecasts!

It is said that the genius is never fully understood. Calling Andy Warhol a genius is debatable, but there is no denying that he was a successful artist and businessman who has become an American legend. The strange façade and self-important aura surrounding Warhol has generated curiosity for decades. The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: From A to B and Back Again doesn't answer the innumerable questions surrounding the king of Pop Art, but it does allow the reader a peek inside the inner thought process of the artist. In the end, the book leaves you with even more questions, as doors become opened and never entered frequently throughout Warhol's random discussions about everything from self-image and jealousy to the proper way to encompass nothingness. The most enlightening of these discussions, however, is Warhol's recurring obsession with television and voice recording and his fascination with the beauty in mistakes and "leftovers" as they can be directly correlated with his works. The artist's fascination with true "Americana" and the rise of consumerism is better understood when you become temporarily engulfed in his era. There is something for everyone in this book of unspoken observations, amusing tales of fame and popularity, and personal dilemmas that we can all relate to at some point in life. The philosophies of A and B are endlessly entertaining and offer readers a new way to think about the everyday.

THE Philosophy of Andy Warhol is intensly funny, witty, and real. Andy tells of daily acounts with many super stars and various B's and it just goes to show you that Andy Warhol is a true master mind. This book is true..simple..and as real as you can get. Read it and realize, think, know and understand that you are reading HIS philosophy...it all makes very much sense...if your Andy Warhol.

This book lets you into the mind of Andy Warhol. It makes you realize what an interesting and different person he was. He is so funny and quirky and sarcastic. He had so many stories to tell. No wonder everyone loved him. I'm a big fan of Warhol, and this book is wonderful. It's great. a must-read, in my opinion.

When viewing a piece of famous art, a person might ask themselves, "what exactly was the artist thinking?" or they might wonder what the artist was like to be able to produce the work that they do. In the case of Andy Warhol, the biggest art star of the last 100 years, these questions are answered in his autobiographical work, "The Philosophy of Andy Warhol : (From A to B and Back Again)".

Famous not only for his artwork, but in fact more for his lifestyle and public image, Andy gives us a peek into his own mind through his thought processes, phobias, vices and conversations with friends whom he usually refers to simply as "B". This book sometimes reads like an artist's manifesto with chapters on love, beauty, money, work, time and atmosphere which consists of short thoughts on the particular subject, intermingled with brief anecdotes of encounter's Andy has had which helped to form his unique opinions. Other chapters consists may entirely consist of a conversation he has with a friend. The chapter on Death is empty due to his relative inexperience on the topic at the time of writing. Some of the chapters seem to be a rhetoric about a particular person or event that Andy must have felt demonstrated a particular topic.

The only problem I had with this book was the chapter entitled, "Tingle". This chapter consists of the details of a phone call with B who lists, in exhausting detail, her obsessive compulsive cleaning habits. It wouldn't be so bad if it only lasted a page or two, but at 24 pages long, this is a good chapter to skip.

Most of the time, Warhol's writing style is much less carefully constructed and more of a stream-of-consciousness kind of thought pattern. This aspect makes the book this much more entertaining as we get a better glimpse into Warhol's mind, in fact it doesn't seem that a better view into his mind would be available than this which shows his methods of thinking, conversations with himself and all written by the actual artist.

Overall, at it's worst, this book is an amusing and entertaining read that forces the reader to examine their own opinions about the topics presented. At it's best, this book is another stroke of brilliance on the part of Andy Warhol. Some may wonder if he knew the apparent absurdity of some of the material within, but this question is answered when reading about how careful he was with his public and private image. The conclusion is that this book further cements Warhol's star status, a move that I can only believe was a deliberate one.