Andy Warhol & Pittsburgh... (York: live, homeless, rated)

[Hopes]

Originally Posted by bradjl2009

There are much more deserving famous locals than that weirdo.

A museum wouldn't attract as many tourists for them.

[Heit]

Originally Posted by fleetiebelle

I can't imagine how difficult it must have been for Warhol to be an artistic gay man in the heart of Pittsburgh in its steely blue collar heyday. I don't think he snubbed the city as much as he went someplace where he could be himself and thrive doing what he wanted to do.

Ah, yes, yet another chance for making a negative comment about Pittsburgh.

Back in those days if you were gay you keep that to yourself. I assure you he was not the only gay person living in a steely blue collar town in the Northeast.

His roots are of a positive nature and they are of Pittsburgh. He left his hometown and moved away, for whatever reason, like so many do, not because it was Pittsburgh.

[creepsinc]

Originally Posted by Heit

Ah, yes, yet another chance for making a negative comment about Pittsburgh.

Back in those days if you were gay you keep that to yourself. I assure you he was not the only gay person living in a steely blue collar town in the Northeast.

His roots are of a positive nature and they are of Pittsburgh. He left his hometown and moved away, for whatever reason, like so many do, not because it was Pittsburgh.

Most of Fleetibelle's comments about Pittsburgh seem to be positive. I doubt Pittsburgh in the 40s could be described as "gay-friendly", but I guess it's true that not many places back then were.

[Heit]

Originally Posted by creepsinc

Most of Fleetibelle's comments about Pittsburgh seem to be positive. I doubt Pittsburgh in the 40s could be described as "gay-friendly", but I guess it's true that not many places back then were.

I hear you. That is my point. It was not the town of Pittsburgh itself. Pick just about any place back then, aside from areas of CA and things would have been similar. Back then a persons sexual preference was kept to themselves.

[fleetiebelle]

Originally Posted by creepsinc

Most of Fleetibelle's comments about Pittsburgh seem to be positive. I doubt Pittsburgh in the 40s could be described as "gay-friendly", but I guess it's true that not many places back then were.

Exactly. NYC was a little more open, and the fact that it's the center of the advertising world would make it a lock for Warhol to go there to live.

[Joshbarblahblah]

Originally Posted by fleetiebelle

That might be stretching it a bit. Warhol studied under Robert Lepper at Carnegie Tech, who was a pioneer in was would now be called Graphic Design (as opposed to Fine Art.) A lot of his coursework involved advertising and corporate communications (logos, etc.) So, yeah, he might have been influenced by Pittsburgh's industrial nature, but he had an eye for popular culture and he studied it in in school.

I disagree. His attempts to remove himself from his own work (one of the main goals of his career) are a perfect reflection of mass-production, industrialization, etc. His work cannot be reduced to simply "pop culture" when everything about it - from original concept to technique, exists solely within the framework of an impersonal, machine-driven industrial world--a world far more similar to Pittsburgh than New York.

The original Andy Warhol museum was actually in Eastern Europe (Slovakia, I believe). They wanted to claim him as their own before Pittsburgh did.


At any rate, Pittsburgh should have a museum for him. He's arguably the most important American artist of the 20th century (possibly of all of American history - which is not an uncommon argument, though I probably wouldn't make it). He deserves to have his own museum. Who cares if it's here or in New York?

[Tombstoner]

I think this issue would make for a great focal point for a gallery at the Warhol -- "You can take the boy out of Pittsburgh but did it take Pittsburgh out of the boy?" It could be a fascinating treatment of the degree to which people--and specifically artists--can ever really distance themselves from their roots.

[Heit]

Originally Posted by Tombstoner

I think this issue would make for a great focal point for a gallery at the Warhol -- "You can take the boy out of Pittsburgh but did it take Pittsburgh out of the boy?" It could be a fascinating treatment of the degree to which people--and specifically artists--can ever really distance themselves from their roots.

How does anyone distance themselves from the place in which they were born? Figuratively yes, literally no.

[greg42]

Originally Posted by Heit

How does anyone distance themselves from the place in which they were born? Figuratively yes, literally no.

Replace "born" with "grew up", then you might have it right. Though it's so common in Pittsburgh, plenty of people don't grow up where they were born. I can tell you, having moved at age 2 from the place I was born, I don't think that place had much if any effect on my later life.

[Heit]

Originally Posted by greg42

Replace "born" with "grew up", then you might have it right. Though it's so common in Pittsburgh, plenty of people don't grow up where they were born. I can tell you, having moved at age 2 from the place I was born, I don't think that place had much if any effect on my later life.

O.K., "grew up" in Pittsburgh. Obviously I was referring to him being "born" AS WELL as "growing up" in Pittsburgh, since that is what we have been talking about here. I'll try to be more specific next time.