Fame, Thou Art a Monster
I’ve been musing as to what I want. I’m at a crossroad, one those big intersections that can make or break your way. Are my wants necessary needs, or are my needs unnecessary wants? Whilst pondering, fate threw into my path an interview the actor Sam Neill recently posted on his glorious Instagram feed. He was discussing fame and whether or not he’d like to be Brad Pitt. Without hesitation he said no, he’d not like to be Brad Pitt. That being Brad Pitt comes with a loss of anonymity that he—Sam Neill the Prop—quite prefers. But in his denunciation, he dropped a juicy nugget that I shall paraphrase: ‘Through a happy series of accidents, I’m well enough known to get good and constant work. I’m happy with being able to go into Queenstown with no one paying me any mind.’ And in that instant a lot about being an artist and remaining true to oneself clicked for me.
Love him or hate him, Andy Warhol irrevocably changed the art world—every medium, every discipline. A creep to the core, the man was incredibly gifted. His undeniable ability to create works that appealed to the great masses is what made him successful in advertising and the force in the burgeoning Reaganomics art market. The pop in his pop art stood for popular and poppycock. And he loved every minute of it.
The concept of artists doing commercial work to supplement their incomes has been happening since the beginning of time. I’m pretty sure the cave painters of antiquity were gathering berries on the side to survive. What Warhol did was make it acceptable to be solely motivated by fame and money. A talented technical artist, he quickly recognised that he could make twice as much money with half the work and a whole lot of hearsay. That’s really what marketing is, isn’t it? Creating an attractive myth around a mundane object to make it attractive to the less knowledgeable masses. What kind of social commentary can a can of Campbell provide? Or a hundred and fifty multi-coloured screens of mystical performers of yore? Nought. But if you convince the people it’s cool and do a superb job in the creation of said tableau (s), in the words of Kenny Banya, it’s gold!
Though Warhol did not succumb to the demise of 15-minute fame, he did succumb to harsher personal realities of being extremely successful. Surrounded by more people than he could handle, he didn’t have a close friend. His one true confidante was a lover whom he cared deeply for, but couldn’t bring himself to fully trust. By all accounts the man was bizarre, supremely weird and quite frankly off-putting, yet what’s most frightening about Warhol was how he used and discarded people. Artists, especially the extraordinarily successful ones, have a habit of being users. Some are nicer about it than others, though none came as vicious as Andy Warhol. In his discarding of people whom no longer found valuable, he left them miserable, drug addled, borderline psychotic husks, who if they couldn’t escape died in horrific obscurity. (There are exceptions to this entourage and we know who they are, but still…) For all the money and fame in world, was it worth it for a man of such artistic brilliance to be a lonely, unhappy wretch? By the looks of the gaggle of artists--musicians, actors, writer’s, etc…-- that have come since Warhol, too many seem to think that it is.
I love Brad Pitt. I don’t know him personally, but what he markets is superb. He does what he wants, when he wants, how he wants and I admire that. And as much as you can in the bizarro world of Hollywood, he stays true to himself warts and all. And his gin isn’t half bad either (actually it’s really quite good). What I like most about him is that though he’s not a virtuoso actor, he knows what he can do and remains happily in his lane. And it’s this ability—this sense of self—that has maintained his movie star longevity. I suspect it’s also what allows him to handle everyone wanting a piece of him when he’s spotted. Yet I agree with Sam Neill, there is no way I would want to be Brad Pitt. Some people are built for that kind of attention, others are not. Every day I bust my ass, cry and pray that I get to what I’m working towards. Yes, I’ve got a little bit of Warhol in me with a business acumen that can’t be beat, but I wouldn’t mind a little Brad Pitt and a healthy dose of Sam Neill. How ironic 15-minutes passes with three quarters of an hour remaining to be wicked, wild, free and kind.
