Andy Warhol was an American visual artist, film director and producer. A leading figure in the pop art movement, Warhol is considered one of the most important American artists of the second half of the 20th century. His works explore the relationship between artistic expression, advertising, and celebrity culture that flourished by the 1960s, and span a variety of media, including painting, silkscreening, photography, film, and sculpture. Some of his best-known works include the silkscreen paintings Campbell's Soup Cans (1962) and Marilyn Diptych (1962), the experimental films Empire (1964) and Chelsea Girls (1966), and the multimedia events known as the Exploding Plastic Inevitable (1966–67).
Batman Dracula is a 1964 black and white American superhero fan film produced and directed by Andy Warhol without the permission of DC Comics, who owns the character Batman.
The Factory was Andy Warhol's studio in Manhattan, New York City, which had four locations between 1963 and 1987. The Factory became famed for its parties in the 1960s. It was the hip hangout spot for artists, musicians, celebrities, and Warhol's superstars. The original Factory was often referred to as the Silver Factory. In the studio, Warhol's workers would make silkscreens and lithographs under his direction.
Gerard Joseph Malanga is an American poet, photographer, filmmaker, actor, curator and archivist.
Empire is a 1965 American black-and-white silent art film by Andy Warhol. When projected according to Warhol's specifications, it consists of eight hours and five minutes of slow motion footage of an unchanging view of New York City's Empire State Building. The film does not have conventional narrative or characters, and largely reduces the experience of cinema to the passing of time. Warhol stated that the purpose of the film was "to see time go by."
John Giorno was an American poet and performance artist. He founded the not-for-profit production company Giorno Poetry Systems and organized a number of early multimedia poetry experiments and events. Giorno's creative journey was marked by collaborations, groundbreaking initiatives, and a deep exploration of diverse art forms. He gained prominence through his association with pop art luminary Andy Warhol, sparking a creative partnership that propelled his career to new heights.
Blow Job is a 1964 American silent film directed by Andy Warhol. It depicts the face of an uncredited DeVeren Bookwalter as he apparently receives fellatio from an unseen partner. While shot at 24 frames per second, Warhol specified that it should be projected at 16 frames per second, slowing it down by a third.
Flesh is a 1968 American film directed by Paul Morrissey and starring Joe Dallesandro as a hustler working on the streets of New York City. It highlights various Warhol superstars, in addition to being the film debuts of both Jackie Curtis and Candy Darling. Also appearing are Geraldine Smith as Joe's wife and Patti D'Arbanville as her lover.
Janet Susan Mary Hoffmann, known professionally as Viva, is an American actress, writer and former Warhol superstar.
Patricia D'Arbanville is an American actress known for her appearance in Andy Warhol projects.
Blue Movie is a 1969 American erotic film written, produced and directed by Andy Warhol. It is the first adult erotic film depicting explicit sex to receive wide theatrical release in the United States, and is regarded as a seminal film in the Golden Age of Porn (1969–1984). The film stars Warhol superstars Viva and Louis Waldon.
Lonesome Cowboys is a 1968 American Western film directed by Andy Warhol and written and produced by Paul Morrissey. The film is a satire of Hollywood Westerns, and was initially screened in November 1968 at the San Francisco International Film Festival, where it won the Best Film Award. On May 5, 1969, it was shown for initial viewings at the New Andy Warhol Garrick Theatre in New York City.
Eat (1964) is a 45-minute underground film created by Andy Warhol and featuring painter Robert Indiana, filmed on Sunday, February 2, 1964, in Indiana's studio. The film was first shown by Jonas Mekas on July 16, 1964, at the Washington Square Gallery at 530 West Broadway.
The Screen Tests are a series of short, silent, black-and-white film portraits by Andy Warhol, made between 1964 and 1966, generally showing their subjects from the neck up against plain backdrops. The Screen Tests, of which 472 survive, depict a wide range of figures, many of them part of the mid-1960s downtown New York cultural scene. Under Warhol's direction, subjects of the Screen Tests attempted to sit motionless for around three minutes while being filmed, with the resulting movies projected in slow motion. The films represent a new kind of portraiture—a slowly moving, nearly still image of a person. Warhol's Screen Tests connect on one hand with the artist's other work in film, which emphasized stillness and duration (for example, Sleep and Empire, and on the other hand with his focus after the mid-1960s on documenting his celebrity milieu in paintings and other works.
Isabelle Collin Dufresne, known professionally as Ultra Violet, was a French-American artist, author, and both a colleague of Andy Warhol and one of his so-called Superstars. Earlier in her career, she worked for and studied with surrealist artist Salvador Dalí. Dufresne lived and worked in New York City, and also had a studio in Nice, France.
Sleep is a 1964 American underground film by Andy Warhol. Lasting five hours and 21 minutes, it consists of looped footage of John Giorno, Warhol's lover at the time, sleeping.
Taylor Mead's Ass is a film by Andy Warhol featuring Taylor Mead, consisting entirely of a shot of Mead's buttocks, and filmed at The Factory in 1964.
The Exploding Plastic Inevitable, sometimes simply called Plastic Inevitable or EPI, was a series of multimedia gesamtkunstwerk events organized by Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey in 1966 and 1967, featuring musical performances by The Velvet Underground and Nico, screenings of Warhol's films, such as Eat, and dancing and mime performance art by regulars of Warhol's Factory, especially Mary Woronov and Gerard Malanga. In December 1966 Warhol included a one-off magazine called The Plastic Exploding Inevitable as part of the Aspen No. 3 package.
Eating Too Fast is a 1966 Andy Warhol film made at The Factory. It was originally titled Blow Job #2 and features art critic and writer Gregory Battcock (1937–1980). The film is 67 minutes long and is, in effect, a black and white sound film remake of Warhol's Blow Job (1964). Battcock had previously appeared in Warhol's films Batman Dracula (1964) and Horse (1965).
American artist and filmmaker Andy Warhol directed and produced nearly 150 films. Fifty of the films have been preserved by the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 2014, the Museum of Modern Art began a project to digitize films previously unseen and to show them to the public.
