“Pope of Pop”
The Andy Warhol Diaries“Pope of Pop” is a public-facing title for Andy Warhol that the diary attributes to Bob Colacello’s “Out” column. Its significance in this passage lies both in the authority it confers and in Warhol’s weary response to having that authority repeatedly reduced to a catchphrase.
Use in the Diary
At a dance at John Richardson’s, reached by limousine and attended by Lynn Wyatt, Nan Kempner, and Diana Vreeland, Warhol links his own title to Vreeland’s “The Empress.” He complains that if Bob Colacello calls Vreeland “The Empress” or him “The Pope of Pop” in the column “one more time,” he will have heard it enough. The paired titles make each figure sound like the sovereign of a cultural domain, but Warhol’s phrasing makes clear that the flattering language has become tiresome through repetition.
Meaning and Function
The title casts Warhol as an authority over Pop, turning an artistic identity into a compact public persona. In the diary, however, its ceremonial grandeur is undercut by the irritation of its subject: the label is both a mark of recognition and a formula he resists hearing again. Set beside Vreeland’s imperial title, it also belongs to a shared vocabulary of fashionable distinction, rather than appearing as a solemn self-description.
