In 1967, Warhol published his Index, a silver-wrapped compendium of interview snippets; partial transcripts of recordings with members of his Factory, where silver was the dominant color; and black-and-white photographs of his work and acolytes. This facsimile reprint gives modern readers a chance to revisit or newly share in the experience. Most famously, Index was a pop-up book, as is this edition. Crack it open, and one will encounter a two-page spread in which a pop-up of a medieval castle appears across both pages above the phrase “We’re attacked constantly.” Farther on, a red can of Hunt’s tomato paste juts out from the gutter of adjoining pages that display monochrome images of the same woman, one of them a negative and one the original black-and-white photo. More than half the book is devoted to photographs. Some show Warhol at work in his studio with objects he incorporated into his art, from Campbell’s Soup cans to Baby Ruth bars. In others, he and a colleague smile at one another as they stand near a toilet. There’s a thresholded photo of Nico from the Velvet Underground, a band for which Warhol was their manager, and stills from The Nude Restaurant, one of Warhol’s underground films. The rest of this amusing curiosity contains those interviews and transcripts. In one, Ingrid Superstar describes the interior of Warhol’s Factory as he records her, with him reminding her midway, “You have to talk for half an hour.” In another, Warhol discusses the use of double screens in his films, most notably in the 1966 work Chelsea Girls. The book is what one might expect from an artist who alternately embraced and excoriated consumerism. And it’s occasionally revelatory, if only just, as when a German reporter asks him what it means to be a Pop artist. Warhol’s reply? “It keeps me busy.”
