| rev:text
| - I used to go to this museum a lot when I lived in Pittsburgh, especially when the admission was cheaper. I had fun checking out the works of Patti Smith, John Cale, Brigid Polk, Warhol himself, etc. That was back when I had a Mohawk, Laga hosted punk bands from around the world, I was an art school freak with friends trying to do the next "Factory" before "hipster" was a verb and "Williamsburg" was a state of mind, and of course, when the admission price was not a joke. Boy, those were the days, weren't they kids?
The Warhol has events. I liked these events. Some were very interesting. I just wish they could've be open to everyone. For example, in May 2006 I attended Richard Hell's book reading here. It was wonderful in the adolescent and perverted way that Richard Hell was, is, and will always be. Unfortunately, the museum printed very, very few general admission tickets, which left my husband and a mutual friend of ours both sitting outside while every bastard from the Post-Gazette and City Paper got admitted so they could ooh and aah over Mr. Hell's reading and write pretentious reviews of it the next day. The saddest part of our "outing," sadder than watching two paying customers get shut out for not being "important" enough, was how each and every floor of exhibits remained virtually unchanged from when I'd toured the museum in art school. There are only so many times you can marvel at the va-voom of Candy Darling's wigs or the sliminess of Lou Reed's personality before you get bored. And when my husband and I came back in 2009, I noticed that the museum was YET AGAIN showing most of the same stuff it had always shown.
Then, there's the admission price: $20. $20?!?!? In a city with an average individual income of 24K and falling? C'mon, folks. This is not how you run a cultural institution while you brag that Pittsburgh is so much better than NYC and/or is the world's most livable city forever and ever, amen, because MUSEUMS! Most other cities' museums cost less than Pittsburgh museums, and their exhibits actually - get this - change more than once a decade. In NYC, even the big museums like the Met offer blocks of time where you pay nada, zero, zilch for admission. Between the steep prices and the exclusive events, the Warhol is sending the message that culture is closed to all but the upper-middle class of Pittsburgh. Do working-class people deserve to see working-class art, or is ALL art only for rich folk?
Three stars because Warhol was a huge influence on my painting, drawing, and graphic design work 15 years ago, and because if you've never seen it before, The Warhol is a nice little taste of 60s/70s counterculture NYC in Pittsburgh. The other two stars will come when the admission price is lowered, when the exhibits change more frequently (especially once Glenn Wonsettler left, the Warhol got much more boring) and when event tickets aren't reserved primarily for the media. Pittsburghers aren't a wealthy lot - and if UPMC/Jeffy Romoff has anything to say about it, they never will be - but they work hard, and everyone, regardless of income, deserves to be able to see art.
|
![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)
![[cxml]](/fct/images/cxml_doc.png)
![[csv]](/fct/images/csv_doc.png)
![[text]](/fct/images/ntriples_doc.png)
![[turtle]](/fct/images/n3turtle_doc.png)
![[ld+json]](/fct/images/jsonld_doc.png)
![[rdf+json]](/fct/images/json_doc.png)
![[rdf+xml]](/fct/images/xml_doc.png)
![[atom+xml]](/fct/images/atom_doc.png)
![[html]](/fct/images/html_doc.png)