Chris Makos

Chris Makos was a photographer and a recurring presence in Andy Warhol’s working and social life. The diary follows him through several overlapping roles: contributor to Interview, maker of a photographic book and exhibitions, occasional assistant, and companion on trips. Warhol’s account is openly personal and sometimes contradictory. He praises Makos’s photographs and company, complains when Makos follows his own priorities, and later describes a more reciprocal working arrangement. Together, these shifts make Makos a figure through whom the diary registers the porous boundary between artistic collaboration, friendship, and practical dependence.

Photographer in Warhol’s orbit

Makos entered the diary’s account of Warhol’s circle as a photographer. At an office gathering, he brought down a landscape photograph, while Victor brought two and had Warhol look at his first. On another occasion, Makos gave Warhol a copy of White Trash, his photographic book. Warhol thought it looked good and credited Makos with doing a good job. The brief response is significant for its directness: Makos’s work was not merely present in the social scene but could be evaluated and recognized as an independent accomplishment.

Warhol later went by cab to see Makos’s exhibition at Andrew Crispo Gallery on 57th Street. The gallery was closed, but opened for him; he admired the show, particularly two photographs placed together in one frame, a format he associated with his own earlier practice. He told Bob Colacello that Interview should give Makos two pages each month to do whatever he wanted. Although the gallery’s owner said that few photographs had sold, Warhol’s response was strongly affirmative. His proposed magazine space would have made Makos a regular contributor with room for his own choices, rather than simply a photographer brought in for a single assignment.

Makos also worked within Interview’s day-to-day machinery. Warhol recorded him photographing and interviewing Debbie Harry at the office, where she was known as the singer from Blondie and as someone who had long circulated on the edges of the same social world. Makos’s camera therefore served both editorial work and the magazine’s broader practice of turning emerging or established personalities into images and features. In a later office scene, Warhol and Makos photographed a woman named Jackie with her baby, whom Warhol described as a Madonna figure. These entries show Makos moving between commissioned or editorial encounters and photographic subjects encountered within Warhol’s own circle.

Work, credit, and changing expectations

The diary does not present their collaboration as effortless. On one trip, Warhol said he had brought Makos to help, but Makos would not carry his bag or take on the tasks Warhol expected; he was concerned with taking photographs for himself. The complaint sets out a recurring tension between Makos’s work as an independent photographer and Warhol’s wish for practical support. The same trip could place Makos in Warhol’s service while also offering him opportunities to pursue his own pictures, and the two priorities did not always coincide.

Warhol’s own portrait practice provides a useful contrast, though the diary does not identify Makos as part of its technical production. Warhol described a carefully controlled process: about sixty Polaroids taken with a Polaroid Big Shot, a selection reduced to four images, enlargement to a forty-inch square acetate, cosmetic alterations, and a silkscreened canvas finished over prepainted color fields. Portraits generally cost about $25,000 for the first canvas and $5,000 for each additional one. The account emphasizes Warhol’s control over selection, retouching, and reproduction. Makos, by contrast, appears in the diary as a photographer whose own pictures could claim space in Interview and whose attention did not always remain subordinate to Warhol’s needs.

A later change in their working arrangement was described as a relief for Makos. Warhol noted that Makos was thanking him for no longer using him to print his photographs, adding that the change had pushed Makos to hustle more and work harder. The diary does not explain the technical or financial terms of the arrangement, but it does record a consequence: ending one form of work between them gave Makos more room to pursue other work. Warhol’s phrasing makes the separation less a final break than a shift in how their professional lives intersected.

Companion and confidant

Over time, Warhol’s descriptions of Makos as a companion became unusually warm. Before a trip, after a late night packing and taking Valium, Warhol wrote that Makos was eager to set off and called him the perfect companion. He described Makos as pushy at times but not persistently so, and as childlike; he also noted that Makos was devoted to his partner, Peter Wise, and considerate in his relationships. Warhol recognized in him a shared reluctance to remain at social engagements and a capacity to get him moving from place to place. Although Warhol had begun carrying Makos’s knapsack, he said that he did not mind, because the outings felt exciting and made him feel young.

That affection was joined to a revealingly self-interested hope. Warhol offered Makos a wristwatch he wanted if Makos could persuade Jon Gould to return Warhol’s interest. The proposal places Makos in the middle of Warhol’s anxious attachment to Gould, not as a romantic rival but as someone Warhol trusted to help him approach a difficult relationship. It also shows how readily Warhol mixed gifts, friendship, and requests for assistance. Makos’s presence gave Warhol a companion for travel and a possible intermediary in a matter that preoccupied him.

The diary also records them sharing a social world beyond Warhol’s immediate work. Makos attended a Christmas Eve dinner at Fred Hughes’s Lexington Avenue home with Warhol and Jed Johnson, among other guests. At a dinner arranged by Bob Colacello, he was present with Catherine Guinness. Later, Warhol recalled that Tony had asked how Makos was doing and characterized him as a persuasive, seductive personality. This is reported as Tony’s judgment, not an objective account of Makos’s character. Another entry connects Makos to a story in a book by Dotson Rader: Makos said he recognized something of himself in one of its figures, while Warhol doubted whether much of the story was true. The episode shows how Makos’s reputation and self-presentation circulated through conversation as well as photographs.

Travel, trust, and friction

The companion role became especially prominent on journeys. In one account, Makos called from Massachusetts, where he was visiting Jon Gould. In another, he picked Warhol up early for a trip and was described as eager to leave. Warhol’s praise did not erase disagreements, but the diary increasingly associates Makos with movement and organization. On a later trip, Warhol contrasted him with Craig, who, in Warhol’s view, claimed a sexual interest that Warhol denied. Warhol said Makos was preferable company and recognized that the two men shared some habits and mannerisms. More importantly, he noted that Makos was now doing the work of accompanying him: not taking photographs or collecting telephone numbers, but helping care for and organize him.

That change matters because it answers, without resolving, the earlier complaint that Makos had concentrated on his own pictures rather than carrying Warhol’s bag. The role had become more explicitly supportive, and Warhol noticed the effort. Yet the same trip brought another strain: Warhol suspected that Makos and Craig would talk about him after dropping him off, and he knew Craig had been repeating an earlier episode. His suspicion is recorded as Warhol’s expectation, not confirmation of what Makos said. The diary thus presents trust as real but not uncomplicated; closeness does not prevent Warhol from anticipating gossip or feeling exposed.

A presence across changing circles

Makos remained part of Warhol’s life as the settings changed from the Interview office to parties, galleries, and travel. In Paris, he wandered with Warhol and Fred Hughes, visited the Café de Flore, and shared an evening that ended without meeting anyone. In London, he collected Warhol early for a Concorde flight; after their arrival, Anthony d’Offay met them and they went to the Ritz Hotel. These practical details make Makos’s companionship concrete: he was involved in departures, transport, and the ordinary logistics that enabled Warhol’s movement through social and professional worlds.

The diary also catches the tensions that could arise when companions entered those worlds together. During a trip involving a television appearance, Warhol found Billy Boy increasingly difficult and noted that Makos had come to hate him as well; the trip ended with a serious dispute between them. The episode does not establish Makos’s part in the dispute beyond that reported antagonism, but it places him alongside Warhol in judging the situation. Across the entries, Makos is neither a fixed assistant nor simply a friend. He is an independent photographer whose work Warhol admired, a colleague whose services Warhol sometimes expected, and a companion whose energy and attention could make travel feel less burdensome. The diary’s changing descriptions preserve the unsettled balance between those roles rather than resolving it into a single label.