MY POP: Kelley Walker

Coming to New York in the mid-'90s, I became aware of the difference between artists: Jeff Wall was cautious, Warhol was trouble. Warhol's work seemed much more intuitive, which I liked because of its direct expression, often in the form of a failed self-negation coupled with violence. Since then, I have become conscious that, however informed, by working intuitively Warhol found in Pop his conception of a functional antagonist, a one-character avant-garde, and a duplicity achieved through a language of marketing. Warhol's direct self-promotion and soliciting-offering the prize of a glamorous dinner with the cover star of that month's Interviewte someone who commissioned a multipanel portrait, for example-point to a significant reason he achieved such success as an antagonist. Through his use of commercial strategies, Warhol honestly questioned the hegemony that had come about through the avant-garde's activity of self-maintenance. I see a similar noncynical approach in later artists such as Cady Noland. In my recent work, I attempt to continue the dialogue between a contemplative history of display and the strategies of appeal inherited from Pop. Instead of presenting objects on a pole, I silk-screened white, dark, and milk i chocolate onto canvas digitally printed with a 1960s black-and-white news photo (not unlike the ones Warhol used) of a race riot in the South. -AS TOLD TO BOB NICKAS