Robert Mapplethorpe and Patti Smith in Mapplethorpe’s annex studio on the ground floor of the Chelsea Hotel.
Photo: Albert Scopin Schöpflin
When asked by the critic and art historian Michael Stoeber if the apartments at the Chelsea Hotel were “portraits of their occupants,” the photographer Albert Scopin replied, “Definitely. That amazed me. The magnitude of it was new to me.” Those likenesses, uncanny in the way a dog and its owner might begin to resemble one another, are unmistakable while paging through Chelsea Hotel, a new collection of Scopin’s photographs taken in and around the historic locale between 1969 and 1971. These images, long considered lost, resurfaced in 2016. In the book, they are paired with Scopin’s reflections on the people — Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe lounging in his annex studio on the ground floor; a woman named Lola who left her apartment just twice a week, “once to see her shrink and once to go shopping” — and their lives at 222 West 23rd Street.
Below is an excerpt of Scopin’s photos and reflections from the book, which was released in late April by Kerber Verlag.
After his father died in 1964, Stanley took over management of the hotel. If an artist couldn’t pay the bill, Stanley didn’t put them out on the street but let them pay him with a painting, or else he would put up with their threadbare prevarications for months.
Shirley had studied dance and choreography with Martha Graham and Hanya Holm. When success eluded her, her shrink suggested a career switch. In the early 1950s Shirley became an acknowledged filmmaker.
His official name is Holger Mischwitzky, born Holger Radtke. He is a well-known German cinema and stage director, and a pioneer and co-founder of the LGBTQ movement in Germany. I found his energy astonishing.
Chancy Dévaureaux modeling Charles James’ “Clover Leaf” dress on the roof of the Chelsea.
Holly was an American actor and transgender activist. In the early 1970s she was one of the Warhol superstars and part of the Factory scene. Lou Reed sang about her in 1972 in “Walk on the Wild Side.”
The hotel staff having a party in the laundry cellar.
His real name was John Curtis Holder Jr., and he grew up in the East Village, where his grandma ran a bar called Slugger Ann’s. Andy Warhol, who cast him in a few movies, said of Curtis: “Jackie is not a drag queen. Jackie is an artist.”
Patti was focused in some ways but anarchic in others. Her room was the epitome of “creative” chaos.
He had studied at Cambridge University in England — not Cambridge, Massachusetts, as he never failed to point out. As he talked, he would slowly undress as if it were the most natural thing in the world. I took pictures and listened.
She had the room next to mine for at least a year. She left her room twice a week: once to see her shrink and once to go shopping.
Kleinsinger was at the Chelsea for 25 years. He was known for his apartment full of tropical birds, snakes, lizards, spiders, and a small baby hippo.
He had a relatively small apartment at the Chelsea. When I went into his kitchen — more of a niche really — to fetch some coffee, I found all his kitchen cupboards, shelves, and worktops full of round tins for film footage.
His father was a politician and a friend of Theodore Roosevelt. When Taylor was 32, he dropped out of his “normal” career; he had been a broker for Merrill Lynch.
She was one of the first people I got to know at the Chelsea and she lived in room 403. The room was very dark and full of objects that I couldn’t rightly make sense of. There were crystal balls and books in plastic covers on weighty furniture. Stella was a luminary.
She was a pianist; he was a sculptor, painter, and illustrator. A charming, touching couple. They were among the original Chelsea inhabitants.
The exterior of No. 222.
Photo: Albert Scopin Schöpflin
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