Through the early works of Andy Warhol and Eduardo Paolozzi, this book traces the development of their deep obsession with the machine. Looking at the way that both artists began in the late 1940s and the years following, the book illustrates their fascination with popular culture and the methods that they used in creating their art. Common to all their methods of making works was their hand-made quality. Only in the 1960s did the artists make the step to mechanical means to create their own artworks, resulting in the iconic images that are integral to our culture. As Warhol said of himself, there is only surface, with nothing underneath.

Keith Hartley is Chief Curator and Deputy Director at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh. His recent publications include From Death to Death and other Small Tales: Masterpieces from the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and the D.Daskalopoulos Collection (2013) and Surreal Encounters: Collecting the Marvellous (2016).