Warhol Had It Right

 

 

The idea of an egalitarian society was seen as an attainable utopia in the 1960s. Andy Warhol, as well as many other pop and minimalist artists of that era realized the importance of an equal society, and that art could be an expression of that equality, expressed through repetition of common or utilitarian forms, advertisements, photographs in the newspaper and so on--such that the celebrity and the commoner could experience and enjoy the world on an equal footing. (A Coke is Coke whoever drinks it and it costs the same and is available to everyone.) The Queen can come to America and eat the same hot dogs and share a common experience with thousands of other people. She could order the hot dogs and have them shipped to England, but it wouldn't be the same experience. Pop art is that way as well, where everything is reduced to the common elements and can't be otherwise parsed or divided based on status or class.

"What’s great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest. You can be watching TV and see Coca-Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and just think, you can drink Coke, too. A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are the same and all the Cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it."

"In Europe the royalty and the aristocracy used to eat a lot better than the peasants—they weren’t eating the same things at all. It was either partridge or porridge, and each class stuck to its own food. But when Queen Elizabeth came here and President Eisenhower bought her a hot dog I’m sure he felt confident that she couldn’t have had delivered to Buckingham Palace a better hot dog than that one he bought for her for maybe twenty cents at the ballpark. Because there is no better hot dog than a ballpark hot dog. Not for a dollar, not for ten dollars, not for a hundred thousand dollars could she get a better hot dog. She could get one for twenty cents and so could anybody else."