Photography always occupied a central place in Andy Warhol’s work, as a process essential to the development of his silkscreen paintings, and as a theoretical pillar of the Pop Art movement. Initially, he appropriated images from various sources, including advertising and newspapers, introducing a collaborative element into his work. But when he purchased Polaroid’s Big shot camera in 1970-71, Warhol found the vehicle which would generate a new form of creative expression for him. Ideal for portraits, the Big Shot was a close-up camera with a fixed focal length of three feet. The flash was built in and the only adjustment necessary was to bring the subject into focus. While the mechanics of taking the photos were thus extremely basic, Warhol created a portrait process which transformed the sitting into an event. His subjects were usually wined and dined at the Factory, with Andy joining the proceedings after lunch had been finished. He would interview his sitter, making a tape of the conversation, and then move quickly on to the shoot. If the sitter were a woman, white makeup was applied to her face and she frequently wrapped a cloth around her chest, establishing a simple, almost classical framework for the portrait. Vincent Freemont recollects that “making the face unnaturally white compensated for the effect of the flash cube, flattened and softened the surface of the woman’s face, and hid unwanted wrinkles. This softening effect also helped with the high contrast which developed when the Polaroid was transferred to the acetates that were used to make the silkscreens and eventually, the paintings. It would take about half an hour for the sitter to be transformed into what often looked like some strange cast member of a western Kabuki theater.” That seems to be a fair characterization of this shot of Bianca Jagger, which is somewhat in contrast to the more glamorous Polaroid of Farah Fawcett, which may also be seen in the Collection.
