The topic I'm thinking about researching for this upcoming paper is Andy Warhol. I've spent the last five and a half years being told that his artwork was revolutionary whilst being frustrated at the message. Quite frankly, I never understood how a man whose work consisted of little technique and lots of the same message was so overrated as an artist. It struck me, however, that his greatest creative achievement wasn't any of his tangible work so much as it was the way he led his life. His social manipulation, in combination with a knack for corporate criticism so definitive of the times, was utilized in such a way that he became the mystery that everyone wanted to solve. It's quite beautiful, really.
I'm not entirely sure of my thesis yet, though the previously explained notion is the one I'll be building off. There are several things I plan on looking into specifically:
1. The definition of performance art, and whether or not Andy Warhol's social experiments fall under the definition of it.
2. Warhol's most prominent relationships with people, and what others had to say about them.
3. Quotes of Warhol's, and how they played out/related to his life:
-"Everyone will be famous for 15 minutes"
-"I am a deeply superficial person."
-"I'm the type who'd be happy not going anywhere as long as I was sure I knew exactly what was happening at the places I wasn't going to. I'm the type who'd like to sit home and watch every party that I'm invited to on a monitor in my bedroom."
3. The way in which Warhol's artwork was created, and the way that he developed conceptually.
4. Warhol's background. Specifically how his Slovakian heritage, the death of his father, and his hypochondria played into his personality.
5. What others had to say about Warhol's personality and parties.
6. What Warhol changed both in the world of visual arts as well as in the Hollywood scene. He became quite the center of attention, after all.
Quotes from: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/a/andy_warhol_2.html#ixzz1dRoc27wC"
