If you fancy a night in watching a DVD, then take a look at the selection available at Island Libraries. At just £1 per night, they’re a great bargain. Ed
The first time I heard the name of Edie Sedgwick was in 1986 when attending Art College in Southampton. Almost immediately the fashion student talking about Edie described her simply as ‘the first’.
In London in 1989, sharing a flat with a fashion designer I was handed a video of ‘Ciao Manhattan’ which starred Edie Sedgwick and thankfully I realised what all the fuss was about.
A film that recorded a star burning extremely brightly.
Many films over the years, many books and exhibitions about Andy Warhol and surprisingly very little about Edie Sedgwick.
The fact that she was so beautiful and unique and yet unobtainable to recreate on film, brings ‘Factory Girl’ and the story of her extraordinary destructive qualities into fruition.
The film is well directed and the work of Sienna Miller is a fitting tribute to a model who was clearly determined to be remembered as the first.
If anyone has seen a picture of Edie Sedgwick they would get quite a chill from ‘Factory Girl’, moments that come quite suddenly and fleetingly, are quite uncanny for their near accuracy.
It also brings a human quality to the facts and shows that the artist has to be responsible for the muse or the destructive process will ignite.
Simply, rather than blaming the memory of Andy Warhol and his fascination with capturing the Zeitgeist of the time, it is in keeping with the theory that love was always around Edie in New York and still is. The city never sleeps.
Yet, glamourous, unique and totally a super-nova is enough to explain why Edie Sedgwick was the first.
