I Shot Andy Warhol

By EmilyH on September 14th, 2009, 1:29 am 0 Comments

A clip of the I Shot Andy Warhol video game created by Cory Arcangel

While I was exploring the “New Media  Art” website, an artist named Cory Arcangel caught my interest.  This was probably because when I began to Google his name, the first project that was recognized, was his piece titled I Shot Andy Warhol (above).  Personally, I tend to enjoy any project that Warhol is a part of, but this was very different.

Cory Arcangel, who was born in 1978 and currently resides in Brooklyn, is a digital artist.  He studies the relationship between technology and culture.  This involves hacking and manipulating technologies, such as video games, software and films in order to challenge conventional thinking and consumerism art.  He usually finds flaws in the technology and creates new meanings using humour.

For his project, I Shot Andy Warhol, Arcangel hacked an old Nintendo game called “Hogan’s Alley’ and replaced the targets with pictures of the Pope, Flavor Flav and Andy Warhol.  This project was featured in many museums during the peak of new media technology.

I think that Arcangel uses an interesting process in which he dismantles and recodes the videogame, however, this is not one of my favourite pieces.  I somewhat understand why the fairly random characters (Flavor Flav, the Pope) are featured in the game and why the player must only shoot Warhol.  Perhaps Warhol is portraying everything Arcangel makes fun of, including pop culture.  Either way, I enjoy some of his other works, such as Super Mario Clouds and Sweet 16, much more than I Shot Andy Warhol.

Category: blog | Tags: Andy Warhol consumerism Cory Arcangel hacking video game | Permalink: I Shot Andy Warhol