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journalist, had been an editor and movie critic at the New York
Herald Tribune,
this great writers' paper in New York. Because he had been an editor of the arts
section, and Virgil Thomson was one of the writers there, he had gotten to know
Virgilandreallyrespectedhim.HethoughtofVirgilasthisgrandoldmanofarts
and letters in New York. I was just out of college, and my father, as sort of a rite
of passage, wanted me to meet Virgil. So he made an appointment, and we went
over to the Chelsea together.
IwasjustbeginningtoembarkonthinkingIwantedtobecomeapainter.And
that's how my father introduced me to Virgil: “This is my son. He wants to be a
painter.” We went up to his apartment, which was the former Chelsea manager's
apartment. Because it had been a manager's apartment, it had all this beautiful
wooden cabinetry and period Victorian fixtures. There was a grand piano. It was
a modestly-scaled apartment, but it had these beautiful trappings and appoint-
ments. It had a little Hans Arp wall relief.
Virgil himself must have been in his eighties or nineties then—a very old
man.MyfatherhadtoldmethathewaskindofabridgefigurebetweenEuropean
ModernismandPost-WarAmericanintellectuals.Because,whenhewasinParis,
he had known Gertrude Stein and Picasso. So in a way, by the time he was the
musiccriticforthe
Herald Tribune,
hehadalreadylivedonelifeandbroughtthe
experiences of that life with him. My father said that he was the most beautiful
writer at the Tribune. He would come back to the Tribune office after a perform-
ance and hand write his reviews on legal pads, and tear off the review, page after
page, and send it down to Copy. They didn't edit it. He could write absolutely to
spec, mellifluously just in pen and ink.
So when I met him, I said, “Oh, I want to be a painter.”
He said to me, “Oh yes, I know well the smell of oil paint.”
Now I realize that's just something people say. Like, “I know what the paint-
er's life is.” But at the time, I was horrified because I was then working in acryl-
ic. I thought, “Oh, to be a real painter, you have to work in oil!” From then on, I
worked in oil. I never worked in acrylic again. It wasn't because he'd given me
this great art advice—I just was caught up in the romantic definition of it.
Thomson was kind of old womanish and owlish. He was fond of himself as a
raconteur. We had a very formal “tea with your grandmother” visit. He was quite
cattyandbitchy,whichwasnotwhatIexpected. Hisgeneral,perfunctorywayof
addressing us, addressing the world, was catty.
But it was a marvelous glimpse of the Chelsea for me, and this man who had
lived there. That was my introduction to Virgil Thomson and the Chelsea Hotel.
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