12 Surprising Facts About Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol is best known for creating iconic Pop art paintings of Campbell's soup cans and Marilyn Monroe in the 1960s. With the Factory, his New York City studio, he made films (such as Chelsea Girls) and championed bohemian performers (including Edie Sedgwick and Nico) that he deemed superstars. He also co-founded Interview magazine and presciently declared that everyone in the future will be world-famous for 15 minutes. 

1. HIS PARENTS WERE POOR IMMIGRANTS FROM CENTRAL EUROPE.

After leaving their village in present-day Slovakia to come to America, Andrej (or Ondrej) and Julia Warhola welcomed their son Andrew Warhola to the world on August 6, 1928. The family, including Warhol's two older brothers, lived humbly in a small apartment in a working-class neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Andrej worked as a construction worker and coal miner but died of tuberculosis peritonitis when Warhol was 13.

2. HE WAS A DEVOUT CATHOLIC WHO REGULARLY ATTENDED MASS.

Warhol grew up as a practicing Byzantine Catholic, and he quietly continued to practice his religion as an adult. He went to a church on Manhattan's Upper East Side almost every day, attending Mass or praying in the afternoon. Warhol also wore a crucifix necklace, carried a rosary, and regularly volunteered at a church-run soup kitchen. Some of his art, such as his series The Last Supper, depicts religious themes, and Warhol is buried in a Catholic cemetery in Pennsylvania.

3. HE WAS THE VELVET UNDERGROUND’S MANAGER.

In 1966 and 1967, Warhol organized events dubbed The Exploding Plastic Inevitable to combine his interests in art, performance, music, and film. He featured the Velvet Underground in The Exploding Plastic Inevitable and encouraged the band to perform with Nico, one of his superstars. Warhol then co-managed the band, produced the Velvet Underground and Nico’s self-titled album, and let the band use his banana artwork as its album cover.

4. DRELLA WAS HIS NICKNAME.

Warhol's friends and creative collaborators in the Factory called him Drella, a portmanteau of the names Dracula and Cinderella. Because he was often insincere and flippant, especially in interviews, it could be hard to uncover Warhol's true thoughts. But the nickname Drella conveyed the passive-aggressive, Jekyll and Hyde-like nature of his personality. Two members of the Velvet Underground even released an album in Warhol's memory called Songs For Drella.

5. HE USED URINE TO OXIDIZE SOME OF HIS PAINTINGS.

In 1977, Warhol started creating a series of abstract paintings called The Oxidations. Using a base of copper paint, he added urine to oxidize the paint, creating unique colors and textures. Warhol encouraged his friends to urinate on the canvases. Because each person's diet and vitamin intake differed, their urine created slightly different colors in the oxidation process and turned the copper paint various shades of green, brown, and yellow. In 2008, one of his paintings in this series sold for almost $2 million.

6. HE WAS NOMINATED FOR A GRAMMY AWARD.

In the 1950s and '60s, Warhol worked as a freelance commercial artist for companies such as Harper's Bazaar, RCA Records, and Columbia Records. Besides creating cover art for the Velvet Underground, he designed album artwork for the Rolling Stones, John Cale, and Aretha Franklin. His 1971 cover for the Rolling Stones's album Sticky Fingers—a risqué image of a man's crotch (in jeans) with a working zipper—was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Album Cover. (It lost to a band called Pollution.)

7. HIS SILVER WIGS COVERED UP HIS EARLY BALDING.

In his early 20s, Warhol began going bald, so he wore wigs to obscure his hair loss. His silver wigs—he had a collection of dozens—contributed to his bohemian image and avant-garde mystique. Warhol's iconic 1986 series of self-portraits, called Fright Wig, shows his (fake) hair sticking straight up. In 2010, his purple self-portrait sold at Sotheby's for more than $32 million.

8. HE WAS A LIFELONG MAMA’S BOY.

Until her death in 1972, Julia Warhola was her son's close and constant companion. Mother and son lived and worked together in New York City for almost two decades. Julia appeared in his film Mrs. Warhol and provided calligraphy and lettering for his projects. A collection of her drawings is even on display at Pittsburgh's Andy Warhol Museum.

9. TRUMAN CAPOTE CALLED HIM A LOSER.

Warhol admired Truman Capote's work and lifestyle, but the playwright didn’t feel the same. Recalling his meeting with a pre-fame Warhol (whom Capote claimed had been essentially stalking him), Capote described the artist as "one of those hopeless people that you just know nothing's ever going to happen to. Just a hopeless, born loser, the loneliest, most friendless person I'd ever seen in my life." Despite this cruel description, Capote later warmed to Warhol, and the two men had occasional lunches and collaborated on Interview magazine.

But their relationship was more as frenemies than as BFFs. Warhol reportedly said that one of Capote's scripts was awful and that in 1980, the author had become very distant and unfriendly: "It's strange, he's like one of those people from outer space—the body snatchers—because it's the same person, but it's not the same person."

10. A RADICAL FEMINIST WITH SCHIZOPHRENIA ALMOST KILLED HIM.

In 1968, Valerie Solanas shot Warhol (as well as art critic Mario Amaya) at the Factory. Warhol fought for his life, spending two months in the hospital recovering from his chest wound. Solanas, a radical feminist author diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia who advocated overthrowing the government and eliminating men, had appeared in Warhol's film I, a Man (that's Solanas talking on a staircase). She was mad at the level of control she felt Warhol had over her life, so she shot him. Nearly two decades later, Warhol died in 1987 of a heart attack after a gallbladder surgery, possibly due to complications from the gunshot wound.

11. HE MADE A COOKBOOK, AND IT'S AS BIZARRE AS YOU'D EXPECT.

In 1959, Warhol joined forces with his friend, interior decorator Suzie Frankfurt, to create a cookbook called Wild Raspberries. Mocking the genre of stylish French cookbooks, Warhol and Frankfurt wrote recipes for "dishes" such as Omelet Greta Garbo (to be eaten alone), Roast Iguana Andalusian, and Gefilte of Fighting Fish. Although the handmade cookbooks contained 19 Warhol illustrations, Wild Raspberries wasn’t a commercial success.

12. PITTSBURGH IS A MECCA FOR HIS FANS.

Since 1994, the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh has featured a treasure trove of Warhol-related items, including his paintings, drawings, sculptures, films, and photographs. You can also find issues of Interview magazine, his audiotaped recordings, diaries, wigs, and massive perfume collection. Perhaps most interestingly, the museum houses more than 600 Warhol time capsules, containing over three decades' worth of his newspapers, business documents, and childhood mementos.