Andy Warhol – Dream America SD Museum of Art – Art Exhibition Review

America. Dream America, dream nation. Where do we go if we want to understand this country? The news won’t be much help. Our media in the US is so closely tied to corporate and political structures that it is useless. You will get a lot of information. Of course, it will only be the information that the White House or Phifzer want you to see.

What else is there? History books? Aside from some brilliant but marginalized voices like Howard Zinn, Cornell West, and Noam Chomsky, you’d be hard-pressed to find anything of value. The version of history we teach and have available to us tends to be a one-sided stream of cardboard cut-out stereotypes depicting America’s “great achievements.” So where are we going? We crave meaning. Human beings are wired to search for meaning, and our eyes cannot rest on an object for more than a few seconds without seeking how it fits into our scheme or understanding of our experience.

I’d say if you want a glimpse of what makes America tick, you could do worse than spend some time at the San Diego Museum of Art’s new show, “Andy Warhol’s Dream America.” Andy puts it best; “If you want to know everything about Andy Warhol, just look at the surface of me and my paintings and movies, and there I am. There is nothing behind it.”

I don’t think Andy is being shy there. Well, at least not entirely. Surfaces are what his work is about. I know that we often identify that the surface of things does not have much to do with the depth. “You can’t judge a book by its cover” and “Beauty is only skin deep” are two of our worn responses to the surface. But in Warhol’s work, what surfaces there are! Shadows made from ink mixed with diamond dust. Greens, purples and reds that stand out from canvas and paper. Repeated celebrity faces in every color imaginable. Green Marilyn Monroe pouting at the blue eye shadow that Chairman Mao wore. Cotton candy pink and silver electric chairs nestled among cow heads that gleam in the daytime. These pieces are a miracle of color and line.

The technique is so clean and masterful that if that were all it would still be worthy enough to deserve our contemplation. This is not to say that Warhol’s meaning is cheap, superficial, or easy to understand.

At the exhibit, I sat looking at the long one-shot portraits of various New York underground called “Screen Tests” when a lady cautiously approached. She had been several times and finally decided to ask me a question. Why she told me, I have no idea. She maybe she thought that while I was sitting there apparently enjoying these movies, she should be able to help her.

“Is something going to happen?” I looked up not quite sure what he meant. “I mean, does something turn on or change?”

I explained that they were called “Screen Tests” and that Warhol did them with almost everyone he knew, but that no, nothing else would happen on the screen. I said that they were a kind of filmic portraits that revealed a lot doing very little. She nodded and said, “So no bio info coming soon?” As I answered no, she turned away from her with a disappointed look. I do not add this to mock or be above. Sometimes the hardest things to see are right in front of us.

America is all about surfaces. Walk through any city and you will see it. Sparkling glass and mirrors echo your every move. The non-reflective space is filled with repeated logos and advertisements. So maybe Andy Warhol’s art can tell us about the most prevalent features and details of this country. Everything is there; the deaths, the commercials, the old west, the celebrities, the surface. In a sense, walking through this exhibit of Warhol’s work is a photorealistic portrait of life in America, Dream America, Daydream Nation.