Between 1965 and 1967 Stephen Shore was at The Factory in New York City taking pictures of Andy Warhol (August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) and his ‘superstar’ friends. Shore, who first met Warhol when he was 17, shows us the likes of Edie Sedgwick, Lou Reed and Warhol himself working and hanging out.
The Factory was split into three studios. The first was known as the Silver Factory because Name, the in-house photographer and Warhol’s lover, covered the walls and ceiling with foil and silver paint.
“Well, different people were there for different reasons, but Andy worked every day. He was not a morning person, but he came in every afternoon and he had a 4-by-8-foot sheet of plywood as a table, and he would work. He always had something going on. There were other people who came, and there was a famous couch at the Factory, and they would sit and stare into space all day. And I remember at the time finding this just baffling, while Andy was so industrious. They would sit there waiting for the evening, when Andy would be invited to some party, and whoever was in the Factory went along. But I think I fitted in, and, as I say, a number of people there were my friends. Even when I went through periods of not going to the Factory, these were the same people I was spending time with.”
– Stephen Shore talking to David Campany
Yoko Ono at The Factory by Stephen Shore
Exploding Plastic Inevitable at The Factory
The Exploding Plastic Inevitable, originally called the Erupting Plastic Inevitable and later also known as Plastic Inevitable or EPI, was a series of multimedia total works of art (gesamtkunstwerk) organised by Warhol and director Paul Morrissey (February 23, 1938 – October 28, 2024) in 1966 and 1967, featuring music by The Velvet Underground and Nico, screenings of Warhol’s films and performances by the like of actor Mary Woronov and artist Gerard Malanga.
Andy Warhol superstar Lou Reed of The Velvet Underground at The Factory. Warhol briefly managed the band.
“…in retrospect I see Andy was very open about his process. What I saw every day was someone making aesthetic decisions. He would try different color combinations, different printing techniques, and he’d say, ‘Oh, Stephen, what do you think of this color?’ And it wasn’t that he actually cared what I thought or [that] he was insecure; I think it was because some people like to work not in solitude but with people around them. It gave Andy energy to focus, and he would ask them questions to draw their energy into him.”
– Stephen Shore talking to David Campany
Andy Warhol superstars Gerard Malanga and Sally Kirkland at a party hosted by Mr Kenneth, Jackie Kennedy’s hair stylist.
Andy Warhol superstars
Arguable the ultimate Andy Warhol superstar, Edie Sedgwick
These pictures are from: Factory: Andy Warhol by Stephen Shore. Yo c an see more of Shore’s work from the time in The Velvet Years: Warhol’s Factory 1965-67. Many of Shore’s Factory photos appeared in Andy Warhol’s Moderna Museet catalogue (1968).
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