From Publishers Weekly
"I always feel that my words are coming from behind me, not from me"—this expertly chosen and edited first collection of interviews with inarguably the most influential artist of his and our time shows that for Warhol (1928–1987) the interview was an art form like any other. Again and again, with a variety of interlocutors ranging from the innocent to the fake (as when poet Gerard Malanga asks deliberately loaded questions) to the actively hostile, Warhol expertly controls the situation. But Warhol's judolike feints, in which questioners, tipped over by the weight of their preconceptions, are left clutching at thin air, are less about concealing anything than they are about adding intrigue and tension—entertainment value, if you will—to an inherently absurd and artificial situation. Goldsmith, a conceptual artist, poet and radio host, contributes vividly written general and individual introductions that set up each piece perfectly. In gathering this book, he has performed a service not only for Warhol scholars but for anyone interested in the bewildering transformations of American culture, where "everyone and everything is interesting."
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Booklist
Warhol was fascinated by every aspect of celebrityhood, including the ubiquitous celebrity interview. For Warhol, interviews were performances, sly assaults on pretension and verisimilitude. So intrigued was he with the curious tension between the potential for revelation in interviews versus the predictable format, he started the magazine Interview. And, a celebrity himself, he often granted interviews and proved to be a challenging subject. Writer and radio host Goldsmith now presents the first collection of Warhol interviews, some never before published and all hilarious, arch, and indicative of Warhol's peculiarly prescient and pervasive genius. Over the course of three decades, Warhol toyed with his interlocutors, vamping and evading, and concealing shrewd social and aesthetic insights within seemingly insipid remarks. Warhol was, indeed, a mirror, a spinning disco ball reflecting the superficiality and pathos of human existence, and Goldsmith's meticulous and arresting collection, brilliantly introduced by Reva Wolf, is a key addition to the Warhol canon. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
