Billy Name, the in-house photographer at Andy Warhol’s Factory, has died aged 76.
The news was broken by Milk gallery in New York, who has held an exhibition of Name’s pictures in 2014.
“It is with tremendous sadness that we would like to announce that our dear friend and iconic artist Billy Name has begun his next great adventure,” the wrote in an email to The Huffington Post. “We mourn the loss of this important cultural figure and are thankful to have had the opportunity to work with him.”
The actor Joe Dallesandro Tweeted:
I just got word that we've lost Billy Name. May his journey home be peaceful. pic.twitter.com/Pfj7WyxGmd
— Joe Dallesandro (@DallesandroJoe) July 18, 2016
Dallesandro also posted on his Facebook page, “Billy was the one who made the silver Factory silver, working with Gerard Malanga and was every bit an artist as anyone else at the Factory. Soon all of us will be gone but because of Billy most of the history is recorded on film. May his journey home be peaceful.”
Born William Linich Jr in 1940, Name left his native Poughkeepsie to work as a lighting designer in Lower Manhattan.
He met Andy Warhol in 1959 and became a regular at Warhol’s East 47th Street studio space. Apart from covering the walls in silver spray paint and aluminium foil, Name became the Factory’s in-house photographer and archivist.
The subjects of photographs included Warhol Superstars such as Edie Sedgwick, Candy Darling, Baby Jane Holzer and Joe Dallesandro as well as visitors to the Factory, among them Bob Dylan and the Velvet Underground.
Name’s photographs are included on the gatefold sleeve of The Velvet Underground And Nico and the back of their self-titled third album.
Name left the Factory in 1970 and relocated to California, where The Guardian reports he became a performance poet.
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