Ready to blow your mind: Andy Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable

260 Pages·2016·2.11 MB·English

University of Iowa
Iowa Research Online
Theses and Dissertations
Spring 2016
Ready to blow your mind: Andy Warhol's
Exploding Plastic Inevitable
Alycia Faith Lentz
University of Iowa
Copyright 2016 Alycia Faith Lentz
This dissertation is available at Iowa Research Online: https://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/3128
Recommended Citation
Lentz, Alycia Faith. "Ready to blow your mind: Andy Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable." PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) thesis,
University of Iowa, 2016.
https://doi.org/10.17077/etd.if1q74gt
Follow this and additional works at:https://ir.uiowa.edu/etd
Part of theHistory of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology Commons
READY TO BLOW YOUR MIND:
ANDY WARHOL’S EXPLODING PLASTIC INEVITABLE

by

Alycia Faith Lentz

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy
degree in Art History in the
Graduate College of
The University of Iowa

May 2016

Thesis Supervisor: Professor Craig Adcock
Copyright by

ALYCIA FAITH LENTZ

2016

All Rights Reserved
Graduate College
The University of Iowa
Iowa City, Iowa

CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL

____________________________

PH.D. THESIS

_________________

This is to certify that the Ph.D. thesis of

Alycia Faith Lentz

has been approved by the Examining Committee for
the thesis requirement for the Doctor of Philosophy degree
in Art History at the May 2016 graduation.

Thesis Committee: ____________________________________________
Craig Adcock, Thesis Supervisor

____________________________________________
Dorothy Johnson

____________________________________________
Christopher D. Roy

____________________________________________
Julie Berger Hochstrasser

____________________________________________
Trevor Harvey
For my father, my husband, and Andy Warhol – the men in my life.
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It was all luck and it was all fabulous.

Andy Warhol
Popism: The Warhol Sixties

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I thank my advisor, Professor Craig Adcock, for his enthusiasm, constructive
criticism, and support. I also thank my committee, Professor Dorothy Johnson, Professor
Christopher D. Roy, Professor Julie Berger Hochstrasser, and Professor Trevor Harvey,
for their guidance over the course of my time at the University of Iowa. Sufficient
superlatives do not exist to describe the wonderful instructors with whom I have had the
good fortune to work. Thanks, too, to Laura Jorgensen, for her calm demeanor and
bottomless well of knowledge.
Many thanks to the numerous people who provided insight and rare documents
for this project, including: Peter Werbe, legendary underground Detroit DJ and long-time
staff member at the Fifth Estate; Julie Herrada, curator at the University of Michigan
Special Collections Library; and Alfredo García, compiler of The Inevitable World of the
Velvet Underground, who took pity on a poor graduate student and gave her a wealth of
information.
Thanks to William and Paulette Reed, Jason L. Reed, Robert and Joan Lentz,
Katherine Kunau, Devin Miller, and Amber Skoglund for encouragement and keen
observations.
I also thank those who cannot be here to see this project completed: L. Graydon
and Burnita Reed, J. Ivan and Florence Reed, June Boies Benz, Joseph and Wilma
Hanson, and Earlene Diamond Rosauer.
And thanks to my husband, Timothy, for coming along with me.

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ABSTRACT

Andy Warhol’s Exploding Plastic Inevitable (EPI) (1966-1967) was a drug-fueled
rock concert-cum-multimedia postmodern art event where layers of mediation mixed
with immediate experience: The Velvet Underground performed their innovative music
in front of films of themselves performing, Factory Superstars danced and performed
poetry, various Warhol films projected on the walls, flashing lights flickered on mirrored
surfaces, and a crowd of spectators – both famous and unknown – packed in to see and be
seen, to dance and trip into the early hours of the morning in New York City, Los
Angeles, San Francisco, and a variety of other cities in the United States. The EPI’s
unabashed emphasis on marketing, packaging, consumer goods, and empty celebrity are
all manifestations of Guy Debord’s fears of late capitalist excess, but beneath the veneer
of vapidity was an undercurrent of counterculture political activism and social awareness.
The EPI was a promotional vehicle for Warhol, Warhol’s Factory crew, and the
Velvet Underground, but is also a complex example of spectacle that has been under-
analyzed in recent scholarship. Original contributions include Debordian cultural
analysis, interpretation of contemporary reviews and reports, examination of the event’s
lack of art historical presence, and incorporation of music scholarship into the Warhol
historical canon. Key sources include reviews, interviews with participants and attendees,
rare documents and photographs, Aspen magazine, and advertisements from underground
publications. In creating a more complete picture of the EPI through surviving ephemera
and varied scholarly assessment, the EPI comes into clearer focus as a counterculture
underground event and an influential art/music collaboration of some of the central
cultural figures of the mid-twentieth century: Andy Warhol and the Velvet Underground.
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PUBLIC ABSTRACT

Andy Warhol’s Exploding Plastic Inevitable (EPI) was a drug-fueled rock concert-
cum-multimedia art event where layers of mediation mixed with immediate experience:
The Velvet Underground performed their innovative music in front of films of
themselves performing, Factory Superstars danced and performed poetry, various Warhol
films projected on the walls, flashing lights flickered on mirrored surfaces, and a crowd
of spectators – both famous and unknown – packed in to see and be seen, to dance and
trip into the early hours of the morning. The experience of the EPI was a potent
combination of alienation, mediation, and commercialization.
The EPI was a promotional vehicle for Warhol, Warhol’s Factory crew, and the
Velvet Underground, but is also a complex example of spectacle that has been under-
analyzed in recent scholarship. The EPI’s unabashed emphasis on marketing, packaging,
consumer goods, and empty celebrity are all manifestations of fears of late capitalist
excess, but beneath the veneer of vapidity was an undercurrent of counterculture political
activism and social awareness. Original contributions include cultural analysis,
interpretation of contemporary reviews and reports, examination of the event’s lack of art
historical presence, and incorporation of music scholarship into the Warhol historical
canon.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES viii

INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER

I. “I’M SO EMPTY TODAY”: THE BIRTH OF ANDY
WARHOL’S STYLE AND PERSONA 9

II. “WE WERE ALL FOR GETTING INTO THE MUSIC
SCENE”: ANDY WARHOL AND THE VELVET
UNDERGROUND GETTING UP TIGHT 43

III. “SOMETHING REVOLUTIONARY WAS
HAPPENING”: THE EXPLODING PLASTIC INEVITABLE
IN NEW YORK CITY 73

IV. “WE HAD A HORRIBLE REPUTATION”: THE LAST
DAYS OF THE EXPLODING PLASTIC INEVITABLE 101

V. “YOU’D BETTER TAKE DRUGS AND LEARN TO
LOVE PLASTIC”: THE AFTERMATH OF THE EXPLODING
PLASTIC INEVITABLE 137

CONCLUSION 165

BIBLIOGRAPHY 171

APPENDIX

FIGURES 181

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