Words of Wisdom from a Three

'If you want to know all about Andy Warhol, just look at the surface of my paintings and films and me, and there I am. There's nothing behind it'.

'Isn't life a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?'

- Andy Warhol

There is a big clue to Andy Warhol's Type in both these statements. This is because of his reference to image, to the surface of things. Threes are acutely aware of image and the image they want, or feel they need to present to the world in order to be acceptable. As a result they present very well, often being poised, polished and alluring, and this often makes them great salespeople - especially in Western cultures where advertising uses the power of image in order to sell things. Where Threes usually get into difficulties is when they become more invested in the image than the reality, either investing more in their own image than in who they are as a person, or investing themselves in the images of other things - such as buying fashionable labels, expensive watches or bags etc, which they feel will bring acceptability or value. If they are very caught up in their image they may not know who they are or what they really want in life. Andy Warhol played masterfully with image and the branding of image - think of his Campbell's Soup pictures - and he was ahead of his time in predicting the popularity of image. Perhaps only a Three could have expressed himself so well on the subject. However Threes can also feel that people have only bought into them because of their image and can be afraid that if people got to know the real person underneath it they would be disappointed. In Warhol's case he seems to have been quite clear about what he was saying with his work. Many of his statements about it, about himself and life in general, were a forecast of things to come - pointing to both the superficiality and importance of image in late 20th and early 21st century capitalist culture.