Test of Time

Dean & Britta set music to Warhol's barely moving pictures.

by A.D. Amorosi

	print	email	reply	rss feed

Published: Sep 16, 2009

[ movies/music ]

Rob Long Dean & Britta Pop: Wareham says the music gives Warhol's screen tests "focus and energy."

Between 1964 and 1966, Andy Warhol filmed nearly 500 "screen tests" with his Bolex camera. Sometimes he'd stay with his "superstars" of the Factory scene; sometimes he'd leave the room. Either way, he asked for absolute stillness from his subjects and let the drama unfold naturally. Or not.

"There's a certain blankness to my stage persona, so maybe I would've been good at that," says Dean Wareham, who, with longtime associate Britta Phillips, makes up half of the Dean & Britta duo. The pair has long been associated with dreamy, cranky, Velvet Underground-like pop (see their old band, Luna), adore '60s cinema and sound-tracked recent film fare like Noah Baumbach's The Squid and the Whale. They were born to make a live score for the Live Arts Festival's 13 Most Beautiful ... Songs for Andy Warhol's Screen Tests.

"Mary Woronov had an observation that sitting alone in front of the camera for three minutes was like taking a psychological test that often revealed two selves — first is the self you want to present," says Wareham. "It's hard to project that image for the full three minutes; most of the subjects crack at some point, and another self shows through. I'd like to try that and see what happens. But of course it wouldn't be the same without Andy being there."

Warhol's trick was to shoot at 24 frames per second for about three minutes, but then playing them back at 16 or 18 frames per second, which stretched the films to four minutes and magnified every expression that floated across the subjects' faces. Among them: Lou Reed, Edie Sedgwick, Dennis Hopper and Nico. "Some of the subjects are wonderful to look at; some are clearly uncomfortable in front of the camera," says Wareham. "If nothing else, we're lucky he made living portraits of so many figures of the '60s avant-garde."

Ben Harrison, associate curator for performance at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, approached the duo with the task of composing songs for these four-minute films. But why them?

"It's a fair question, one I asked myself a few times, by way of trying to figure out what the correct approach to this project was," laughs Wareham. "Another was, what would Warhol've liked? But there's no discernible answer to that question."

"I think the music makes watching the films on the big screen more enjoyable; it gives them focus and energy," says Wareham. "Sitting to watch a solid hour of these without music would be a challenge. And frankly I doubt Warhol really intended them to be seen that way. Actually, I'm not sure what he intended at all."

(a_amorosi@citypaper.net)

13 Most Beautiful ... Songs for Andy Warhol's Screen Tests, Fri., Sept. 18, 7 and 9 p.m., $25, Arts Bank, 601 S. Broad St., 215-413-1318, livearts-fringe.org.

Add it Up
Fabolous
Gildon Works
Seth Meicht and the Big Sound Ensemble
John Forte
Rhett Miller
Mos Def/Talib Kweli