ANDY WARHOL: AMERICA - Rare Fine Copy of The First Hardcover Edition/First Printing: Double-Signed by Andy Warhol - ONLY DOUBLE-SIGNED COPY ONLINE

1st Printing. Signed. 224 pages. Published in 1985. Retrospective collection of black-and-white photographs, with accompanying text. Andy Warhol's finest achievement as a photographer and reporter. The First Hardcover Edition. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions, particularly the Softcover Edition. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original. Most copies were printed as paperbacks only. The First Edition is now rare. A brilliant production by Andy Warhol and Barbara Richer: Oversize-volume format. Cream cloth boards with titles embossed on cover and spine, as issued. Photographs and text by Andy Warhol. Printed on pristine-white, thick coated stock paper in the United States to the highest standards. In pictorial DJ with white titles on the cover and spine, as issued. Presents Andy Warhol's "America". His response to (and implicit rejection of) Robert Frank's "The Americans" (1959). A celebrity-obsessed "take" on the very same America that Robert Frank traversed before him, and found sad and wanting, this is a Warholian celebration in response to Frank's elegy. Like Frank, Warhol travelled the length and breadth of continental USA. His running commentary reflects the "start-stop" journey in gossipy prose. No one considers Andy to be a great writer because he isn't. But no one can deny that his writing is inimitably his alone. That's why Penguin reissued the book as a Modern Classic. "The thing is, if you're a celebrity yourself, everybody expects you to know all the great people, and you don't want to let them down. I've met 80% of the people you'd think I've met, and the other 20%, I'm dying to meet" (Andy Warhol). Warhol was an anomaly of American entertainment/celebrity culture: He was a diehard fan of celebrities who was (as he himself admits) a celebrity. His fans were, by the same token, many of the same celebrities. As this collection shows, his very first act when he met a celebrity was not to shake his or her hand, but, always camera-ready, to take a photograph. So the 80% are all here. An absolute "must-have" title for Andy Warhol collectors. This copy is very boldly and beautifully signed in black pen-marker on the DJ Front Cover by Andy Warhol. It is signed directly on the cover itself, not on a tipped-in page. It is very boldly and beautifully signed again on Page 19 in black pen-marker by the artist. This title is a late-modern photography classic. As far as we know, this is the only such double-signed copy of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. Please note: 99.9% of "signed" Warhols passed off online - especially eBay - are fakes. The discerning collector's eye will know right away an authentic Andy Warhol signature when they see it. This is the inimitable Real Thing. A rare signed copy thus. Lavishly illustrated with black-and-white plates. One of the greatest artists of the 20th century. A fine collectible copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER ANDY WARHOL TITLES IN OUR CATALOG) ISBN 0060154772.…