Kuwait was the setting for a five-day exhibition trip in January 1977, recorded by Andy Warhol as a sequence of official appointments, blunt first impressions, and social encounters. His diary presents the country through the narrow but revealing lens of a visiting artist: the exhibition organized with local cultural officials, the displays and customs he encountered, and the company gathered around him. The account is less a general portrait of Kuwait than a record of how a scheduled cultural visit became, for Warhol, a mixture of boredom, curiosity, and unexpected hospitality.

Arrival and First Impressions

Warhol flew to Kuwait on January 15 with James Mayor, who had arranged the journey. The itinerary included a stop in Frankfurt, and Warhol noted his irritation at initially being assigned a second-class seat before securing the available first-class one. The flight arrived late at night. At the airport, a representative named Nadja, who had arranged the exhibition through the Council for Culture, met the party; the visitors were also offered unfamiliar coffee. These details establish Kuwait as a destination reached through cultural connections and planned hospitality, rather than as an independent holiday stop.

The following day, the visitors were driven around in two cars, although they used only one. Warhol first took the place they were shown for a dump, then acknowledged that it was chic—a correction that exposes the limits of his immediate judgments. He noticed warm sunlight and passing Rolls-Royces and large American cars. Later, the group went to the souk for what Warhol described as local color. He recorded women dressed in black, the crowded marketplace, a sudden chill, and the party’s status as the only foreigners there. The entry keeps these observations within the visitor’s perspective: the market is presented as a scene he inspected, not as a comprehensive account of local life.

Cultural Appointments and the Exhibition

On January 17, the party visited the National Museum of Kuwait. Warhol dismissed the museum as having little history, remarking on its small galleries, sparse display of coins, a few objects he associated with Alexander the Great, and dresses from the previous day. His comments register his impatience with the visit as much as they describe the collection. Tea and coffee with the director were followed by a formal call on the secretary-general of the Council for Arts, where Warhol noticed dirty handprints on a wall and people standing around. He also observed that official conversations seemed to follow a repeated sequence of questions about where visitors were staying, how long they would remain, and when they would leave or return.

The exhibition opening took place at the Arts Council Hall. Before the event, Warhol had sent a copy of The Philosophy of Andy Warhol to a minister of state, whose name he recorded uncertainly; the minister said he had read it and praised its ideas. At the opening, Warhol carried gold scissors on a red cushion and cut the ribbon before an audience that included television crews and the press. The small, carefully staged action contrasts with his earlier impatience at ceremonial calls: here he was not only a visitor but the invited artist at the center of a public event.

The visit also brought Warhol into contact with local art and collecting. At a Kuwaiti artist’s atelier, he saw three artists working in each room, sitting on the floor and painting on rugs and pillows. He found one painter’s style reminiscent of Picasso and Chagall and judged the work insufficiently individual; those assessments remain his own, rather than neutral conclusions about Kuwaiti art. He did, however, remark that the building was the only one he had seen in Kuwait with a design he liked, though it was modeled on the Ford Foundation building. At collector Fahad al Dabbous’s home, he saw paintings including works by Salvador Dalí and learned that the collector had bought Marilyn and Flower prints. The private collection and the official exhibition together show art appearing both as public cultural presentation and as part of a wealthy collector’s home.

Social Customs and Private Hospitality

Warhol’s entries set formal receptions beside more informal encounters. At the United States ambassador’s dinner, arranged through cultural attaché Mr. Bater, dinner was served late, and Warhol found the evening boring. He also noted that alcohol was prohibited by law, while wealthy Kuwaitis could obtain liquor privately. This observation follows his visit to Fahad al Dabbous, where drinks were served, linking the rule to the social distinctions he saw among his hosts rather than treating it as an abstract fact.

The trip’s most warmly described gathering was a dinner at Nadja’s home on January 19. About sixty people attended; Warhol noted Nadja’s large family and described the men dancing together. The food pleased him, and the party lasted until 2:30 in the morning. Fred Hughes attracted attention for his dancing, and someone gave him $40. James Mayor admired a guest’s robe and received it; Jed Johnson admired a nose ring and received that as well. Warhol noted that he did not know the custom and therefore received nothing. The episode gives the account one of its clearest reversals: the itinerary that had often seemed tedious culminated in a gathering he called the best party of the trip, where attention and gifts circulated through spontaneous acts of appreciation.

Departure and the Trip’s Aftermath

On January 20, Warhol and his companions left Kuwait for Rome on an Alitalia flight lasting five and a half hours. During the journey, he read the Rome Daily American and learned that Jimmy Carter had been inaugurated. In Rome, the group encountered several familiar figures, and the diary records a further change in the quarrel that had surfaced in Kuwait. The previous day, Fred Hughes had told Warhol that he should go to Germany because he was becoming a fading star there; Warhol was angry at the way Fred put it. After arriving in Rome, Fred apologized and said Warhol did not have to go. The disagreement gives the end of the Kuwait episode a personal consequence: the trip’s official purpose had unfolded alongside tensions over Warhol’s career and travel, and the departure brought a temporary easing of that conflict.

Kuwait’s significance in the diary lies in this accumulation of sharply different settings rather than in a single dramatic event. The museum and official calls test Warhol’s patience; the exhibition makes him the focus of a public ceremony; the atelier and private collection place art in contrasting settings; and Nadja’s dinner offers a vivid social counterpoint to the formal schedule. His changing assessments—from dismissing a place before recognizing its chic character to calling the final party the trip’s best—make Kuwait a record of encounters in which first impressions were sometimes unsettled by the next room, appointment, or invitation.