Andy Warhol x Crocker Art

On March 29th, 2016, my friend Victoria and I went to see the Andy Warhol exhibit at the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento, California. It was a nice and warm spring day, and we were extremely excited to reach the museum. Once we arrived we looked around the permanent collection before we headed into the Warhol exhibit space. You could say we were trying to leave the best for last and we were not disappointed.

As I reflect on my time spent at this exhibit, the Hi-Fructose exhibit of 2017 also comes to mind. The Crocker does a wonderful job of making the temporary exhibits interactive and informative. For the Warhol exhibit, one of the things that stood out to me most was a space called after his "Factory". It was a room separate from the main part of the exhibit that allows visitors of all ages to have some fun and create some Warhol style crafts and is even a good place for a photo op. There was a table of black and white photos, bright colorful cardstock, and bright colored pencils. The idea was to add color to the portraits as Andy Warhol would. My friend and I chose a headshot of Judy Garland and Michael Jackson and created two unique but very pop art inspired masterpieces (well at least we thought so). 

Before and After the pop portrait activity.

As for the main exhibit, we could not take photos, but it was marvelous. There were 168 works on loan from The Andy Warhol Museum. It was a really big deal for me and I am sure other local art lovers to have so many of Warhol's works so close to home. One of my personal favorites was the Prince portrait, which immediately had me thinking of his song "purple rain" as Andy Warhol chose purple as the skin tone color. As the exhibit was titled Portraits, there were numerous notable people who are fortunate enough to have inspired Warhol to make portraits.

(As photos were not allowed this image is sourced from artnet.com) 

What I did not know before was that Andy Warhol would create black and white silent films of a vast range of individuals on a Bolex camera at The Factory. He would have people do screen tests on a plain backdrop and have them chat or sit still for the entirety of the film roll. These silent black and white films capture people's personalities, unique characteristics, expressions, etc in a matter of three minutes. It was a very interesting aspect of Warhol's work because it showed he was very interested in people as individuals. I came to know this because visitors had the chance to create their own screen test, and I saw myself in a way I never really had before. I noticed the way my lips turn down as I close my mouth when I am nervous. The way I prefer to have my hair down because it provides me more comfort and makes me feel less self-conscious. These are little things that are unique to me that I had never noticed until the screen test. But, I also noticed how my genuine smile looks as I am laughing at the questions my good friend Victoria was asking. Or how my eyes always scan the room as I think over the question and state my answer. 

My Screen Test from this Exhibit

Overall, this exhibit was beautifully done. It was one of my favorite exhibits I was lucky enough to go visit and I left with a greater sense of who Warhol was and who I am as well.