Andy Warhol is a Scream. I hang him on my Wahahahahahal

Little known fact: Campbell's Soup wasn't just a random image for Andy Warhol. He had Campbell's Tomato soup for lunch every day of his life!

I went to see director David Cronenberg lecture about Andy Warhol at the AGO tonight. It was a complete fluke that I got in at all actually. Being the HUGE Warhol enthusiast that I am I've been waiting anxiously for the opening of the AGO's Andy Warhol: Supernova show (opening tomorrow) and my friend Abi, who's a member of the gallery got an E-mail about Cronenberg's lecture. I of course was dying to attend, but just my luck it was sold out. I put my name on a waiting list but I still hadn't heard anything by this afternoon. So I went over to the gallery to check it out. Turns out I was number 25 on the list but they said there was very little likelihood of anyone getting last minute tickets. However they said I could try and come back just before it started and try my luck.

The whole thing seemed to be handled really badly. I mean, it's Cronenberg and Andy Warhol. Did they not think people weren't going to come?! They had it in a space that was far too small and then they didn't even fill it with chairs. They claimed that they couldn't add anymore seats because the space was being used during the day by the art camp and they needed the extra space to store their supplies. But from what I could see that was a totally messed up excuse. ANYWAY, I was out with a friend all afternoon and I didn't look at the time until I was already late. But I got there and had only missed about 5 minutes. I asked if there was any possibility of me just squeezing myself into the back.-- Especially since I brought my own seat *hehe*. But of course the people at the door were all skeptical..."Oh, it's sold out. I don't have the authority to allow that, blah, blah." So they sent me down to the actual lecture hall and since it had already started the guy didn't care and he just let me watch from the upper balcony area. Unfortunately I found it difficult to see a lot of the projections from that far away and at times I couldn't hear everything Cronenberg was saying, but it was really interesting. I mean, what was on everybody's minds was why a movie director was curating an art show in the first place. But Cronenberg is extremely well spoken and he talked a lot about the parallels between film and visual art and the parallels between Warhol's paintings and his films...why they chose to include his films in the show/pair them with certain paintings etc. What particularly interested me though was how he went into detail about Warhol's personality and his fascination with the celebrity and how that was very connected with the idea of death.

I've never really been able to fully explain why I like Andy Warhol so much...and I still don't think I can. But it was really refreshing to hear someone not only justify Pop Art and Warhol's "style" but go into detail about the deeper complexities that the works have...that you don't see upon first glance. He was so passionate and descriptive when describing each piece rather than the regular dismissal of low art.

A couple of other people without tickets came in after me and just stood and watched.Then when it was all over we we looked at each other and said "Did you pay? " "No, did you pay?" The ticket guy disappeared so we ended up seeing the lecture for free. I guess we were meant to be there!

I didn't get to see the actual show because today was a members-only preview and Abi backed out when she thought we weren't going to get into the lecture. But I can't wait to see it! It's open to the public tomorrow but I think I'm going to wait for a couple of weeks and see it with my aunt when she's in town. I bought the special Cronenberg audio guide but I think I should probably wait to see the show before I listen to it.