Unusual Multimedia Show:
13 Most Beautiful … Songs for Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests
By Bruce Bellingham


Not only is this the Chinese Year of the Ox, it’s also apparently the year of Andy Warhol. A number of Warholian things are happening in town, including this one: the San Francisco Film Society’s production of 13 Most Beautiful … Songs for Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests featuring a large-scale projection of those famous Warhol shorts and a live performance by the indie pop duo Dean & Britta, formerly of Luna. This is happening at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre on Tuesday, Feb. 3. 

Between 1964 and 1965, Warhol shot 16 mm short subject “screen tests” of all sorts of characters who wandered into The Factory, his East Village studio in New York. They were actors, poets, socialites, drag queens, Warhol hangers-on – all sorts of people. Warhol called them superstars.

A few of these rarely seen screen tests will be projected on a large screen behind Dean & Britta’s four-piece band. The event will recreate the sense of what it was like to see a Warhol light show back in the sixties – something he called the “Exploding Plastic Inevitable.”

The Andy Warhol Museum and the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust jointly commissioned the project.
13 Most Beautiful ... Songs for Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests: Palace of Fine Arts Theatre, 3301 Lyon Street (at Bay); Tuesday, Feb. 3; tickets $20–$75; 925-866-9559, www.sffs.org