October 31, 2004: Pure Decadence.

For the past week, I've been playing the part of Andy Warhol, which is ironic, since Andy Warhol played the part of himself as his artwork. His lasting contribution to Art History was not his Campbell Soup cans or his Cow Wallpaper, rather, it was the enigma of himself.

Not to over-conceptualize everything, but I realized that last year, I was David Bowie for Halloween - whom played Andy Warhol in the movie, Basquiat - and David Bowie's character, Ziggy Stardust was based briskly off of the character of, Alex from the novella/movie, A Clockwork Orange - which, of course, was exactly whom I was the year before dressing as Ziggy. I have no idea what I could become next year to keep this trend going. Perhaps I'll just be myself.

What is it about costumes and Halloween that brings out the decadence of people? Is it just the large amounts of alcohol consumed? Is it the fetish of hiding behind the protection of a mask and because of this, you feel protected to whatever you please? Is it that people just want to be slutty, or evil, or both - but feel somewhat repressed?

I usually need at least two reasons to do something - one reason is basically an excuse to do the main thing. For example, I'll go to the post office if I can get food on the way; I'll start going out with someone if I notice that their record collection is enough to borrow.

So, to dress like Andy Warhol, I decided to not only dress like him, but to act like him, to act like he acted like himself. Somewhat shy, awkward, dirty in thought -but a voyeur in most cases. I acted not that I wanted things to happen to me, but to have things happen around me. To do this, I thought I would have a deeper understand on this particular person I am at the moment obsessing about. In other words, I wouldn't just dress like him, I would be him - to the amazement and annoyance of everyone around me. And, this week, it seemed to work.

Models came into my studio during the gallery's massive Halloween party - The Monster Bash. One model which I had recently finished a portrait of, but I hadn't told her that I even did the painting - because, well, I didn't know her. She came into my studio unexpectedly and saw the huge painting, unexpectantly. She came to the conclusion that she very much liked the painting. I breathed a sigh of relief. Other models liked it as well and before I knew it, was getting names and numbers to schedule photo shoots of them for similar work.

I let at least twenty people into the party that didn't have paid tickets. Not because I liked these people - most of whom I didn't even know, but I wanted to know what would happen if they all came and ran amok. I thought it would cause a little more trouble. The party's theme was one of a haunted carnival, with rides inside that required tickets. I setup my studio as a separate ride itself: Vampire Sex Room. The cost was 200 tickets.

Above all, I took pictures of everyone around me - as long as they were doing naughty things. People - instead of being shy, seemed to be very forthcoming. I don't know if it was the turtleneck, the grey wig or just acting like I was completely ambiguous to the situation and seemed to like Everything, but below are some of the pictures I took with my Polaroid camera.