1
00:00:26,360 --> 00:00:31,198
-He made his fantasies
into reality.

2
00:00:31,331 --> 00:00:35,335
-I think he was truly original.

3
00:00:35,469 --> 00:00:41,543
-There's such a breadth
to his work.

4
00:00:41,676 --> 00:00:45,947
-He created magic
with his camera.

5
00:00:46,079 --> 00:00:50,450
-The legacy he left with
these pictures is so profound.

6
00:00:52,620 --> 00:00:56,423
-I really came to think of him
as the archetype

7
00:00:56,558 --> 00:01:00,795
for an out gay American artist.

8
00:01:00,929 --> 00:01:04,666
He is such a complicated figure.

9
00:01:04,799 --> 00:01:07,602
The task at hand is to
understand the human being

10
00:01:07,735 --> 00:01:12,406
as a really full artist
and as a person of his world.

11
00:01:12,540 --> 00:01:16,878
-We see this world that's gone.
It's passed.

12
00:01:17,011 --> 00:01:22,584
It's lost, but we see it
through George's eyes.

13
00:01:22,717 --> 00:01:25,419
-George Platt Lynes
isn't an household name,

14
00:01:25,553 --> 00:01:29,023
and the story of his life
as a little boy from New Jersey

15
00:01:29,156 --> 00:01:30,290
ending up going to France,

16
00:01:30,424 --> 00:01:32,125
knowing all these
incredible people,

17
00:01:32,259 --> 00:01:34,394
producing some of the most
important photography
ever done,

18
00:01:34,529 --> 00:01:36,931
and then tragically,
being somewhat ostracized

19
00:01:37,065 --> 00:01:39,166
and dying penniless--

20
00:01:39,299 --> 00:01:41,803
I mean, that's a story
worth knowing about.

21
00:01:47,341 --> 00:01:53,113
-George felt that his male
nudes were the best
of his work.

22
00:01:53,246 --> 00:01:58,987
None of it was done
at the behest of any
commercial entity.

23
00:01:59,119 --> 00:02:04,859
He was entirely dependent on
his own sense of inspiration.

24
00:02:04,993 --> 00:02:10,598
It all came out of him,
so he was free.

25
00:02:10,732 --> 00:02:16,638
-That was his art, and he
wasn't able to practice it
legally.

26
00:02:16,771 --> 00:02:21,075
-George tells us that it wasn't
always the way it is now.

27
00:02:21,208 --> 00:02:24,344
He's this great creative genius

28
00:02:24,478 --> 00:02:29,083
who was propelled
by his aesthetic imagination,

29
00:02:29,216 --> 00:02:32,386
by his need to suppress
his gay identity

30
00:02:32,520 --> 00:02:36,423
and his need to express it
at the same time.

31
00:02:37,859 --> 00:02:44,431
That just ground him down until
he expired of a broken heart.

32
00:02:45,900 --> 00:02:48,703
-I'm not sure why
George Platt Lynes

33
00:02:48,836 --> 00:02:51,405
still to this day
does not receive the acclaim

34
00:02:51,539 --> 00:02:53,841
that I think the work should.

35
00:02:55,843 --> 00:02:58,646
-Toward the end of his life,
George destroyed

36
00:02:58,780 --> 00:03:03,751
an enormous number
of his portraits of people.

37
00:03:03,885 --> 00:03:09,256
-George was very ill
and conscious of what he wanted

38
00:03:09,389 --> 00:03:13,561
or didn't want to survive
as his legacy.

39
00:03:15,897 --> 00:03:18,700
-Could you imagine
if this legacy was lost?

40
00:03:38,619 --> 00:03:43,390
-George Platt Lynes was
a very young, aspiring writer.

41
00:03:43,524 --> 00:03:45,660
-When George was 18 years old,

42
00:03:45,793 --> 00:03:48,730
his family sent him
off to Paris.

43
00:04:00,373 --> 00:04:02,910
-This ambitious kid
from New Jersey

44
00:04:03,044 --> 00:04:06,914
who wanted so much to be part
of the cultural scene

45
00:04:07,048 --> 00:04:09,016
of his moment.

46
00:04:28,736 --> 00:04:32,874
The romance of the 1920s
in Paris.

47
00:04:35,143 --> 00:04:36,944
It was the summit of all

48
00:04:37,078 --> 00:04:39,213
that anyone
who was interested in culture

49
00:04:39,346 --> 00:04:42,750
could possibly have
lived through.

50
00:04:42,884 --> 00:04:47,088
-That expatriate scene in Paris
was laced through

51
00:04:47,221 --> 00:04:50,057
with queer relationships.

52
00:04:51,859 --> 00:04:55,229
-These modernists, all sorts
of writers, visual artists,

53
00:04:55,362 --> 00:05:00,168
and dancers interacting
with each other.

54
00:05:00,300 --> 00:05:02,937
-They all seem to be connected
by Gertrude Stein.

55
00:05:03,070 --> 00:05:07,307
She is the red thread that
runs through this world.

56
00:05:10,343 --> 00:05:13,480
-The family took George
to meet Gertrude Stein.

57
00:05:13,614 --> 00:05:15,382
She thought he was adorable.

58
00:05:15,516 --> 00:05:19,020
And he was part of
Gertrude Stein's salon.

59
00:05:19,153 --> 00:05:21,522
-What an influence on George.

60
00:05:21,656 --> 00:05:23,958
-He's mentioned in her infamous

61
00:05:24,091 --> 00:05:26,961
"Autobiography
of Alice B. Toklas"

62
00:05:27,094 --> 00:05:30,264
as "Baby."

63
00:05:30,397 --> 00:05:32,867
-George came back
to the United States.

64
00:05:33,000 --> 00:05:34,268
He was accepted at Yale.

65
00:05:34,401 --> 00:05:37,370
He wrote to Stein and he said
that Yale was boring.

66
00:05:37,505 --> 00:05:39,439
It had no interest for him.

67
00:05:47,347 --> 00:05:48,916
Stein snapped back at him,

68
00:05:49,050 --> 00:05:52,787
and she said that he was
supposed to go back to school.

69
00:05:55,355 --> 00:05:58,893
He told her that he wanted
to go to salons in New York.

70
00:06:09,436 --> 00:06:12,405
He dropped out of Yale in 1926.

71
00:06:12,540 --> 00:06:15,576
What was he going to do?

72
00:06:15,710 --> 00:06:19,180
-George connected with
the literary and art world

73
00:06:19,313 --> 00:06:20,715
in New York.

74
00:06:20,848 --> 00:06:23,718
He was introduced
to Monroe Wheeler

75
00:06:23,851 --> 00:06:25,620
and to Glenway Wescott.

76
00:06:25,753 --> 00:06:28,022
Monroe and Glenway
were expatriates

77
00:06:28,155 --> 00:06:30,625
who were part
of the Stein circle.

78
00:06:30,758 --> 00:06:32,660
-Glenway was, in his day,

79
00:06:32,793 --> 00:06:35,596
the most famous writer
in the United States.

80
00:06:35,730 --> 00:06:37,865
Early on, he acquired a lover
who would be with him

81
00:06:37,999 --> 00:06:41,736
for the next 60 or 70 years--
Monroe Wheeler.

82
00:06:41,869 --> 00:06:44,138
Monroe went on to be
one of the founders

83
00:06:44,272 --> 00:06:47,440
and directors
of the Museum of Modern Art.

84
00:06:47,575 --> 00:06:49,744
Monroe and Glenway
were famously,

85
00:06:49,877 --> 00:06:52,680
I would say, serial polygamists.

86
00:06:52,813 --> 00:06:54,515
They had an open relationship.

87
00:06:54,649 --> 00:06:56,584
In their relationship,
they came usually three

88
00:06:56,717 --> 00:06:59,053
or sometimes even four.

89
00:06:59,186 --> 00:07:03,557
But the two of them had
a bond that never failed.

90
00:07:03,691 --> 00:07:06,260
When Glenway came to New York,

91
00:07:06,394 --> 00:07:09,397
George went over to the hotel
down in the Village

92
00:07:09,530 --> 00:07:12,633
where Glenway was staying.

93
00:07:12,767 --> 00:07:14,467
On the table,
Glenway had a photograph

94
00:07:14,602 --> 00:07:16,671
of his lover Monroe.

95
00:07:16,804 --> 00:07:19,373
George picked it up, whistled.

96
00:07:19,507 --> 00:07:22,510
And we still have Glenway's
journal that said, "Uh-oh."

97
00:07:23,978 --> 00:07:27,315
George went into that ménage

98
00:07:27,447 --> 00:07:32,019
and was with them for about
30 years of his life.

99
00:07:32,153 --> 00:07:34,221
So, he was the first,
and I was the last.

100
00:07:39,260 --> 00:07:43,764
Glenway went back to Paris
and encouraged George to visit.

101
00:07:43,898 --> 00:07:47,401
George had started a little
bookstore in New Jersey.

102
00:07:47,535 --> 00:07:49,403
He sold it six months later.

103
00:07:49,537 --> 00:07:50,838
He had just enough money
left over

104
00:07:50,972 --> 00:07:52,373
from the proceeds of that sale

105
00:07:52,506 --> 00:07:57,244
to buy himself a steamship
ticket back to Paris.

106
00:07:57,378 --> 00:07:59,113
By then, Glenway and Monroe
were living

107
00:07:59,246 --> 00:08:01,549
in Villefranche-sur-Mer,
which is on the Riviera,

108
00:08:01,682 --> 00:08:06,387
and they lived in a nice hotel
above a popular sailors' bar.

109
00:08:06,520 --> 00:08:08,889
And upstairs,
Jean Cocteau lived.

110
00:08:09,023 --> 00:08:10,958
One of George Lynes'
first photographs

111
00:08:11,092 --> 00:08:14,228
was of Cocteau with a spyglass

112
00:08:14,362 --> 00:08:16,664
because Jean would like
to sit up in his window

113
00:08:16,797 --> 00:08:19,834
and wait for the fleet
to come in.

114
00:08:19,967 --> 00:08:24,739
George lived with them
for another year there.

115
00:08:24,872 --> 00:08:26,941
-While in France
in the late '20s,

116
00:08:27,074 --> 00:08:31,078
they made the so-called
Travel Albums--

117
00:08:31,212 --> 00:08:33,848
these very, very
intimate snapshots

118
00:08:33,981 --> 00:08:36,751
and some early portraiture
of George Platt Lynes,

119
00:08:36,884 --> 00:08:39,920
Glenway Wescott,
and Monroe Wheeler.

120
00:08:57,905 --> 00:09:02,376
George set his sights
on Monroe Wheeler.

121
00:09:02,511 --> 00:09:07,048
Whatever George went after,
he invariably got.

122
00:09:07,181 --> 00:09:11,352
-George decided that
he was going to love Monroe

123
00:09:11,485 --> 00:09:13,054
and that Monroe should love him,

124
00:09:13,187 --> 00:09:14,955
and that Glenway
just had to be thrown in

125
00:09:15,089 --> 00:09:18,659
because that was
all part of Monroe's life.

126
00:09:33,040 --> 00:09:37,578
-George packed up
and came back to New York.

127
00:09:37,711 --> 00:09:40,147
George would send Monroe
letters,

128
00:09:40,281 --> 00:09:43,384
and their correspondence
brought them closer.

129
00:09:43,518 --> 00:09:47,221
-At Yale, in the Beinecke
Rare Book and Manuscript Library,

130
00:09:47,354 --> 00:09:50,758
they have the papers
of George Platt Lynes.

131
00:09:50,891 --> 00:09:53,861
I spent a very steamy summer
in the library

132
00:09:53,994 --> 00:09:58,466
reading the correspondence
between Lynes,

133
00:09:58,599 --> 00:10:01,235
Glenway Wescott,
and Monroe Wheeler,

134
00:10:01,368 --> 00:10:04,839
Lynes is in America,
and Monroe Wheeler is in Paris.

135
00:10:04,972 --> 00:10:07,542
And the letters
early in their relationship

136
00:10:07,675 --> 00:10:10,277
are really erotically charged.

137
00:10:15,416 --> 00:10:18,786
Desire is something
that survives time.

138
00:10:18,919 --> 00:10:20,154
It feels very fresh.

139
00:10:20,287 --> 00:10:21,856
It feels,
when you're in the archive,

140
00:10:21,989 --> 00:10:24,959
that it is as new
as the day he wrote it.

141
00:10:25,092 --> 00:10:28,195
"I have loved no one but you.
I dream of you.

142
00:10:28,329 --> 00:10:30,965
I will do everything in my
power to make you happy,

143
00:10:31,098 --> 00:10:34,201
to make you glad you came,
to make you love me more.

144
00:10:34,335 --> 00:10:37,471
Believe in me."

145
00:10:37,606 --> 00:10:39,541
There are also these telegrams.

146
00:10:39,673 --> 00:10:42,476
There's one that says,
"Your love has made me strong.

147
00:10:42,611 --> 00:10:45,880
I fear and regret nothing."

148
00:10:46,013 --> 00:10:47,781
I mean, some of them
are so poetic.

149
00:10:47,915 --> 00:10:50,251
"All here is wind and wisteria,

150
00:10:50,384 --> 00:10:53,354
and I long for
your shadowy beauty."

151
00:10:59,793 --> 00:11:02,429
This is 1928.

152
00:11:02,564 --> 00:11:04,999
I guess he was 21 years old.

153
00:11:05,132 --> 00:11:07,268
And he looked incredible.

154
00:11:11,005 --> 00:11:15,309
-George really, originally,
hoped to be a writer.

155
00:11:15,442 --> 00:11:17,211
-Over a dinner with Glenway
and Monroe

156
00:11:17,344 --> 00:11:20,748
when they were visiting back
in New Jersey to see him,

157
00:11:20,881 --> 00:11:23,117
he was in despair
because he had realized

158
00:11:23,250 --> 00:11:25,620
he didn't have the talent
to be a writer.

159
00:11:25,786 --> 00:11:28,455
Now what?

160
00:11:28,590 --> 00:11:30,625
That evening, they told George,

161
00:11:30,758 --> 00:11:32,193
"Let's look
at your photographs."

162
00:11:32,326 --> 00:11:33,994
The travel photographs
that George had been making

163
00:11:34,128 --> 00:11:36,665
when the three of them
had traveled around Europe.

164
00:11:36,797 --> 00:11:39,266
And it was Glenway who said,
"George, why don't you see

165
00:11:39,400 --> 00:11:41,702
if you can make a living
doing this?"

166
00:11:41,835 --> 00:11:48,610
-Their encouragement got him
serious about photography.

167
00:11:48,742 --> 00:11:52,079
-He gave himself an exhibition
in his former bookshop,

168
00:11:52,213 --> 00:11:55,382
of his first portraits
and some of the landscapes.

169
00:11:55,517 --> 00:11:58,052
His father giving a rare
edition of "Huckleberry Finn,"

170
00:11:58,185 --> 00:12:01,288
and so he sold that and that
was his next steamship ticket

171
00:12:01,422 --> 00:12:02,957
back to France.

172
00:12:03,090 --> 00:12:05,392
George, by now,
was fascinated with photography

173
00:12:05,527 --> 00:12:08,729
and was taking photographs
of some of the artists

174
00:12:08,862 --> 00:12:10,497
and the writers
and the musicians

175
00:12:10,632 --> 00:12:13,801
that clustered
around Glenway and Monroe.

176
00:12:21,108 --> 00:12:25,513
-With Gertrude Stein's portrait
for "Four Saints in
Three Acts,"

177
00:12:25,647 --> 00:12:27,414
he became a hotshot.

178
00:12:43,464 --> 00:12:48,902
-The fact that Platt Lynes
was self-taught is incredible
to me.

179
00:12:49,036 --> 00:12:52,540
-He managed,
by dint of sheer willpower,

180
00:12:52,674 --> 00:12:56,176
to learn
how to be a photographer.

181
00:12:59,079 --> 00:13:03,083
-Photographers in those days
were vying to--

182
00:13:03,217 --> 00:13:07,021
"I want to be
considered an artist."

183
00:13:07,154 --> 00:13:11,025
Like, photography is art--
is it?

184
00:13:11,158 --> 00:13:13,060
-There were very few outlets.

185
00:13:13,260 --> 00:13:15,597
I mean, there were
very few galleries

186
00:13:15,730 --> 00:13:17,364
that showed photography.

187
00:13:17,498 --> 00:13:20,034
Almost no museums.

188
00:13:20,167 --> 00:13:24,739
-On the third steamship trip
that George made over
to France,

189
00:13:24,872 --> 00:13:26,874
he had a very fortuitous voyage.

190
00:13:27,007 --> 00:13:30,010
He met the New York gallerist
Julien Levy

191
00:13:30,144 --> 00:13:32,446
over a bridge game,
I think it was.

192
00:13:32,580 --> 00:13:35,916
A year later, George was being
invited by Julien

193
00:13:36,050 --> 00:13:38,452
to show his photographs.

194
00:13:38,586 --> 00:13:40,254
And that was really
one of the first

195
00:13:40,387 --> 00:13:43,023
photography art exhibitions
in New York.

196
00:13:43,157 --> 00:13:45,826
And then off he went,
like a meteor.

197
00:13:45,959 --> 00:13:47,895
-Julien Levy pairs
George Platt Lynes

198
00:13:48,028 --> 00:13:51,533
with Walker Evans in 1932
for an exhibition.

199
00:13:51,666 --> 00:13:53,568
It was noticed. It was reviewed.

200
00:13:53,702 --> 00:13:55,402
George is included
in the first exhibition

201
00:13:55,537 --> 00:13:57,871
at the Museum of Modern Art
that features photography,

202
00:13:58,005 --> 00:13:59,541
in 1932, called

203
00:13:59,674 --> 00:14:02,910
"Murals by American Painters
and Photographers."

204
00:14:03,043 --> 00:14:04,612
-I think that was
a monumental event

205
00:14:04,746 --> 00:14:07,448
in the early part
of George Platt Lynes' career.

206
00:14:07,582 --> 00:14:10,851
-That sort of made him a name.
People knew who he was.

207
00:14:10,984 --> 00:14:16,957
-Suddenly, the entire art world
was looking at George.

208
00:14:17,091 --> 00:14:20,562
-George started to get
fashion assignments
in New York,

209
00:14:20,695 --> 00:14:23,163
and he started his first studio.

210
00:14:25,866 --> 00:14:28,135
-George's first assignment
for Saks

211
00:14:28,268 --> 00:14:32,306
was photographing the feet
of famous women.

212
00:14:34,375 --> 00:14:36,343
-Within a few more years,
he became the most important

213
00:14:36,477 --> 00:14:38,613
fashion photographer
in New York.

214
00:14:38,747 --> 00:14:41,215
He became the top of the game.

215
00:14:41,348 --> 00:14:44,118
We're talking now about a boy
that's 26,

216
00:14:44,251 --> 00:14:46,186
and that was his time,
that was his day,

217
00:14:46,320 --> 00:14:47,555
and he was very successful,

218
00:14:47,689 --> 00:14:50,090
made a lot of money,
and lived well.

219
00:14:50,224 --> 00:14:53,127
-I love George Platt Lynes'
fashion pictures.

220
00:14:53,260 --> 00:14:55,730
I think they're so odd
and beautiful.

221
00:14:55,864 --> 00:14:57,431
There was always an edge,

222
00:14:57,565 --> 00:15:01,402
something that made you think
a little, that had a story.

223
00:15:04,972 --> 00:15:07,975
-There was Lynes
taking these women,

224
00:15:08,108 --> 00:15:09,677
and taking these clothes,

225
00:15:09,811 --> 00:15:13,080
and putting them in
the most fabulous settings

226
00:15:13,213 --> 00:15:17,217
that could've been out
of a surrealist painting.

227
00:15:17,351 --> 00:15:19,019
He is creating a world

228
00:15:19,153 --> 00:15:21,321
that looks like the world
of nobody else,

229
00:15:21,455 --> 00:15:25,660
especially at a time
when fashion and advertising

230
00:15:25,794 --> 00:15:29,930
was trying to make
everything look real.

231
00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:38,105
From George Platt Lynes,
we get to see a whole new way

232
00:15:38,238 --> 00:15:40,542
of looking at the 1930s.

233
00:15:56,724 --> 00:15:59,861
-It was fascinating
watching my uncle work,

234
00:15:59,993 --> 00:16:03,030
and I remember going to
his studio on Madison Avenue.

235
00:16:03,163 --> 00:16:04,799
-It's a lively studio.

236
00:16:04,933 --> 00:16:06,366
-Totally unpretentious.

237
00:16:06,500 --> 00:16:10,437
-He wore workman's overalls
cinched at the waist.

238
00:16:10,572 --> 00:16:12,540
-Usually he would have
his shirt off,

239
00:16:12,674 --> 00:16:15,442
and sometimes he'd be
smoking a little Cherub.

240
00:16:15,577 --> 00:16:19,614
-He moved like poetry,
like a dancer.

241
00:16:21,381 --> 00:16:22,983
-It was New York in the summer,

242
00:16:23,116 --> 00:16:26,420
so it was hotter than hell, and
there's no air conditioning,

243
00:16:26,554 --> 00:16:28,288
but you've got to
photograph a fur coat

244
00:16:28,422 --> 00:16:30,123
for, you know, the winter line.

245
00:16:30,257 --> 00:16:31,726
What are you going to do
to make it happen?

246
00:16:31,860 --> 00:16:35,028
So, he went and got
close to 50 ice blocks,

247
00:16:35,162 --> 00:16:36,698
and he made an ice-block wall.

248
00:16:36,831 --> 00:16:39,032
Which was also problematic
because then they melted,

249
00:16:39,166 --> 00:16:41,536
and so it had
all this water damage.

250
00:16:41,669 --> 00:16:44,939
-He did have a few innovations,
like he had a ring light.

251
00:16:45,072 --> 00:16:49,611
Sometimes you see the circle
in the eyes of the model.

252
00:16:49,744 --> 00:16:53,882
-He created a way of working
that is kind of a template

253
00:16:54,014 --> 00:16:57,217
for a lot of photographers
who came after him.

254
00:17:02,824 --> 00:17:06,628
-George Platt Lynes really,
really excelled in portraiture.

255
00:17:06,761 --> 00:17:10,565
Someone who's really
a master of studio control.

256
00:17:10,698 --> 00:17:11,866
Posing.

257
00:17:12,000 --> 00:17:13,601
Lighting.

258
00:17:15,469 --> 00:17:19,007
-He just had an instinct
about how to light things.

259
00:17:19,139 --> 00:17:20,440
-George devised
a way of lighting

260
00:17:20,575 --> 00:17:23,210
as if it came
from nowhere and everywhere.

261
00:17:23,343 --> 00:17:26,480
-A volume of light
without intensity.

262
00:17:26,614 --> 00:17:28,883
George also loved
the large-format camera

263
00:17:29,017 --> 00:17:32,654
because it could see with
greater clarity than the eye.

264
00:17:32,787 --> 00:17:36,758
And so that's why you see
incredible detail and clarity

265
00:17:36,891 --> 00:17:38,458
in his images.

266
00:17:38,593 --> 00:17:40,895
That's also why he had
to put perfect subjects

267
00:17:41,029 --> 00:17:42,797
in front of the camera, too.

268
00:17:48,503 --> 00:17:51,706
-The diversity of influences
was so strong.

269
00:17:51,839 --> 00:17:58,111
It was mythology,
surrealism, and theater.

270
00:17:58,245 --> 00:18:00,815
-They're very sensuous
photographs,

271
00:18:00,949 --> 00:18:04,084
but also electrically charged.

272
00:18:04,217 --> 00:18:07,187
-He had a gay sensibility.

273
00:18:07,321 --> 00:18:08,723
-There is a lot of emotion.

274
00:18:08,856 --> 00:18:12,961
There's a lot of
authentic sexual energy.

275
00:18:13,093 --> 00:18:14,494
-At Harper's Bazaar,

276
00:18:14,629 --> 00:18:17,031
Diana Vreeland
in the editor's letters

277
00:18:17,164 --> 00:18:18,432
is talking about,

278
00:18:18,566 --> 00:18:22,670
"Not everybody has a jukebox
in their studio,

279
00:18:22,804 --> 00:18:24,572
but Lynes does."

280
00:18:25,873 --> 00:18:29,109
-He did stuff that people
weren't supposed to do,

281
00:18:29,242 --> 00:18:32,547
and he wasn't
ashamed of doing it.

282
00:18:32,680 --> 00:18:35,148
-You don't see an antecedent
to his style.

283
00:18:35,282 --> 00:18:36,784
He invented it.

284
00:18:36,918 --> 00:18:40,054
-There's nothing like it
anywhere else.

285
00:18:40,187 --> 00:18:43,156
-He was a genius at it.

286
00:18:43,290 --> 00:18:45,225
-He created a way of seeing.

287
00:18:45,359 --> 00:18:47,629
He created a way
of photographing.

288
00:18:47,762 --> 00:18:50,932
-He just wanted
to get that moment.

289
00:18:51,065 --> 00:18:53,200
And suddenly he'd click.

290
00:18:57,337 --> 00:19:02,510
-In 1934, Europe was moving
towards war,

291
00:19:02,644 --> 00:19:06,814
and Glenway and Monroe
moved back to the United States

292
00:19:06,948 --> 00:19:09,249
and set up an apartment
with George

293
00:19:09,383 --> 00:19:13,688
at 89th Street
off of Madison Avenue.

294
00:19:13,821 --> 00:19:18,092
-Monroe and George had
their own bedroom.

295
00:19:18,225 --> 00:19:21,261
-It was three guys
living together.

296
00:19:21,395 --> 00:19:24,364
That worked as a beard
for Wescott and Wheeler.

297
00:19:24,632 --> 00:19:28,468
-It was a threesome, as much
as threesomes usually are.

298
00:19:28,603 --> 00:19:31,773
I don't think
they're ever perfect.

299
00:19:31,906 --> 00:19:33,373
-All of them had lovers.

300
00:19:33,508 --> 00:19:35,143
Sometimes they were two,
sometimes they were three,

301
00:19:35,275 --> 00:19:38,445
sometimes there were
a ménage of four.

302
00:19:38,579 --> 00:19:41,049
-Monroe and Glenway's
relationship was like US Steel.

303
00:19:41,181 --> 00:19:43,551
Nothing was going to
change that.

304
00:19:43,685 --> 00:19:47,387
But also, George was part
of the relationship.

305
00:19:49,157 --> 00:19:50,390
They had no rules.

306
00:19:50,525 --> 00:19:52,827
I think they're to be credited
for that.

307
00:19:52,960 --> 00:19:54,327
We're still pretty stodgy

308
00:19:54,461 --> 00:19:56,531
thinking about relationships,
I think.

309
00:19:56,664 --> 00:20:01,035
-They made a triumph
of their trilogy.

310
00:20:08,475 --> 00:20:11,679
-To talk about George's circle
is to talk about

311
00:20:11,813 --> 00:20:15,550
a remarkable moment
in cultural history.

312
00:20:15,683 --> 00:20:21,522
George was allied to some
of the great transatlantic,

313
00:20:21,656 --> 00:20:25,258
cosmopolitan figures,
many of whom were gay,

314
00:20:25,392 --> 00:20:28,696
or lesbian, bisexual.

315
00:20:28,830 --> 00:20:34,869
-This is the social and
cultural milieu of New York,

316
00:20:35,002 --> 00:20:36,403
of the United States.

317
00:20:36,537 --> 00:20:40,273
-A circle of people
who were, you know, central

318
00:20:40,407 --> 00:20:43,911
to the cultural life
of their time.

319
00:20:44,045 --> 00:20:48,281
George lived in
an avant-garde moment.

320
00:20:50,518 --> 00:20:54,555
-All those people sort of
became like a collective.

321
00:20:57,491 --> 00:21:02,930
There's this fantastic
interconnectedness.

322
00:21:03,064 --> 00:21:04,532
-The friendships,

323
00:21:04,665 --> 00:21:06,299
the intimate relationships,

324
00:21:06,433 --> 00:21:08,870
the love affairs, the fights.

325
00:21:10,938 --> 00:21:12,707
The success stories,

326
00:21:12,840 --> 00:21:14,609
the failures.

327
00:21:36,931 --> 00:21:40,067
-People, I think,
don't always appreciate

328
00:21:40,201 --> 00:21:43,604
how key that period
of between the wars was

329
00:21:43,738 --> 00:21:48,776
in developing American culture.

330
00:21:48,910 --> 00:21:52,412
-These artists suddenly
are ripe for rediscovery,

331
00:21:52,547 --> 00:21:56,217
for relevance to our
contemporary moment.

332
00:21:56,349 --> 00:21:57,718
"The Young and The Evil"

333
00:21:57,852 --> 00:21:59,854
was an exhibition about
this group of artists

334
00:21:59,987 --> 00:22:02,623
who were in New York
in the '30s and '40s

335
00:22:02,757 --> 00:22:04,258
and who were friends
with each other

336
00:22:04,391 --> 00:22:06,794
and were influencing each other
with a lot of fluidity

337
00:22:06,928 --> 00:22:08,863
between their
intellectual projects,

338
00:22:08,996 --> 00:22:12,700
their artistic projects, their
social and their sexual lives.

339
00:22:12,834 --> 00:22:15,536
-When you look at the art
that these guys were making,

340
00:22:15,670 --> 00:22:18,506
they were addressing it
to each other.

341
00:22:18,639 --> 00:22:21,142
They're a model
for a group of friends

342
00:22:21,275 --> 00:22:23,778
who are creating
culture together.

343
00:22:25,412 --> 00:22:26,981
And I think what's happening now

344
00:22:27,114 --> 00:22:29,416
is there's, like,
a lot of gay artists

345
00:22:29,550 --> 00:22:32,587
who are in their 20s
and early 30s

346
00:22:32,720 --> 00:22:35,690
who are making work
which, in their mind,

347
00:22:35,823 --> 00:22:39,359
is coming out of new
and untold freedoms

348
00:22:39,492 --> 00:22:41,529
around representing
gay sexuality,

349
00:22:41,662 --> 00:22:43,931
but had this precedent
that in many cases

350
00:22:44,065 --> 00:22:46,801
they're not even aware of
that was nestled into

351
00:22:46,934 --> 00:22:50,104
the early part
of the 20th century.

352
00:22:54,976 --> 00:22:57,011
In the case of Lynes
and his friends,

353
00:22:57,144 --> 00:23:00,314
they're like the first
gay American artists

354
00:23:00,447 --> 00:23:01,916
in a full sense.

355
00:23:02,049 --> 00:23:04,752
-"Oh, before Stonewall,
everyone was in the closet."

356
00:23:04,886 --> 00:23:06,821
Not true.

357
00:23:26,908 --> 00:23:28,509
-It was an age in which

358
00:23:28,643 --> 00:23:31,812
cocktail parties were common.

359
00:23:38,653 --> 00:23:40,054
-If you were at a gay
cocktail party,

360
00:23:40,187 --> 00:23:41,822
you were very likely to meet
some gay creative types.

361
00:23:41,956 --> 00:23:44,491
Now, people don't have
cocktail parties anymore.

362
00:23:46,227 --> 00:23:48,362
They don't know
what they're missing.

363
00:24:08,816 --> 00:24:12,153
-There are some people
whose special task in culture

364
00:24:12,286 --> 00:24:13,486
is almost like a bee.

365
00:24:13,621 --> 00:24:15,423
They're like
the cross-pollinators.

366
00:24:15,556 --> 00:24:17,425
And Lynes was clearly that.

367
00:24:17,558 --> 00:24:19,527
-Everything floated
around George,

368
00:24:19,660 --> 00:24:23,664
his parties, his connections.

369
00:24:23,798 --> 00:24:27,467
-Lynes lived
somewhat luxuriously.

370
00:24:27,601 --> 00:24:28,836
Not even "somewhat"--

371
00:24:28,970 --> 00:24:32,472
he was an extremely
luxurious man.

372
00:24:32,606 --> 00:24:33,975
He wanted to, like,
be surrounded

373
00:24:34,108 --> 00:24:38,846
by sumptuous, beautiful people
and things.

374
00:24:38,980 --> 00:24:41,549
-He wanted to live,
you know, a glamorous life,

375
00:24:41,682 --> 00:24:44,585
in some of the best years in
the history of New York City.

376
00:24:44,719 --> 00:24:47,555
-He had dinners
and cocktail parties.

377
00:24:47,688 --> 00:24:49,623
And then...

378
00:24:49,757 --> 00:24:51,692
...people went into the bedroom.

379
00:24:51,826 --> 00:24:53,995
The party kept going.

380
00:24:54,128 --> 00:25:00,935
-It was opulent and exciting
and very sexy.

381
00:25:02,703 --> 00:25:04,805
-He was drinking.
He was cavorting.

382
00:25:04,939 --> 00:25:07,008
He was enjoying
everyone's snappy patter.

383
00:25:07,141 --> 00:25:09,276
And there was probably a lot
of snappy patter,

384
00:25:09,410 --> 00:25:12,947
you know, in New York
in the '30s and '40s.

385
00:25:19,353 --> 00:25:23,224
-They're a group of people
that were extremely modern

386
00:25:23,357 --> 00:25:24,925
and asking questions

387
00:25:25,059 --> 00:25:27,728
about what relationships
can be on every level,

388
00:25:27,862 --> 00:25:30,731
and how they could be different.

389
00:25:30,865 --> 00:25:32,600
Part of what looks
so contemporary

390
00:25:32,733 --> 00:25:34,035
about George Platt Lynes,

391
00:25:34,168 --> 00:25:36,637
and about this group
of artists in general,

392
00:25:36,771 --> 00:25:40,174
is the way that their art
that deals with sexuality

393
00:25:40,307 --> 00:25:41,709
seems fun.

394
00:25:41,842 --> 00:25:43,611
One of the things
that's really deadly

395
00:25:43,744 --> 00:25:45,579
about looking at
this group of artists,

396
00:25:45,713 --> 00:25:47,581
and about this time in history,

397
00:25:47,715 --> 00:25:49,884
is to try and be way
too serious about it,

398
00:25:50,017 --> 00:25:53,487
in which it's like, "Oh,
these incredible masters,

399
00:25:53,654 --> 00:25:55,556
which have been
forgotten to time."

400
00:25:55,689 --> 00:25:56,957
It's like, you know,

401
00:25:57,091 --> 00:26:00,027
when Paul Cadmus and his
bisexual boyfriend,

402
00:26:00,161 --> 00:26:02,596
Jared French,
and Jared French's wife,

403
00:26:02,730 --> 00:26:05,633
the painter and photographer
Margaret French,

404
00:26:05,766 --> 00:26:08,135
started a collaborative,
they called it PaJaMa,

405
00:26:08,269 --> 00:26:10,671
which was short for the first
letters of their names--

406
00:26:10,805 --> 00:26:13,107
Paul, Jared, Margaret.

407
00:26:13,240 --> 00:26:15,176
And PaJaMa is silly.

408
00:26:15,309 --> 00:26:16,710
Like, it's a silly name.

409
00:26:16,844 --> 00:26:18,345
And the work that they did
was take pictures

410
00:26:18,479 --> 00:26:20,781
of their friends, like,
naked in Fire Island.

411
00:26:20,915 --> 00:26:22,783
Like, this is not,
like, the society

412
00:26:22,917 --> 00:26:25,520
for contemplating
existential dread.

413
00:26:25,653 --> 00:26:29,223
Like, this is funny.

414
00:26:29,356 --> 00:26:33,894
These are people who were
pushing homoeroticism in art

415
00:26:34,028 --> 00:26:35,564
to a very far point,

416
00:26:35,696 --> 00:26:39,867
as far as it had ever been done
in art since antiquity.

417
00:26:40,000 --> 00:26:42,303
And at the same time,
it's important to acknowledge

418
00:26:42,436 --> 00:26:46,575
that they are buoyed
on all this whole current
of privilege.

419
00:26:46,707 --> 00:26:51,779
You know, they are white men
who are more or less affluent.

420
00:26:51,912 --> 00:26:55,249
They were not outsiders.
They were not on the margins.

421
00:26:55,382 --> 00:27:00,955
So, I think that all of these
forces kind of lifted them up

422
00:27:01,088 --> 00:27:05,192
so that they were free to go
so far in this one way.

423
00:27:16,237 --> 00:27:19,773
-George was as beautiful
as a Greek statue.

424
00:27:21,842 --> 00:27:25,946
-He was so spectacular-looking,
you know.

425
00:27:26,080 --> 00:27:29,984
I was overcome by it.

426
00:27:30,117 --> 00:27:35,122
-I remember him always
with a suntan,

427
00:27:35,256 --> 00:27:37,024
which became more
and more pronounced

428
00:27:37,158 --> 00:27:40,261
as his hair
became whiter and whiter.

429
00:27:43,464 --> 00:27:46,066
He was obsessed
with beautiful people

430
00:27:46,200 --> 00:27:49,203
because he knew
he was one of them.

431
00:27:59,313 --> 00:28:04,519
-He didn't like not being
the center of attention.

432
00:28:04,653 --> 00:28:07,955
He would charm the birds
out of the trees if he could,

433
00:28:08,088 --> 00:28:11,225
usually to his own advantage.

434
00:28:16,330 --> 00:28:19,166
-Very self-centered,
egotistical.

435
00:28:19,300 --> 00:28:22,436
Very loving, at the same time.

436
00:28:33,314 --> 00:28:37,484
-George could be extremely
wicked, extremely catty,

437
00:28:37,619 --> 00:28:42,189
extremely devilish,
didn't mince words.

438
00:28:42,323 --> 00:28:44,959
-You can just imagine this
person behind the typewriter

439
00:28:45,092 --> 00:28:47,562
just popping off his letters
with incredible wit,

440
00:28:47,696 --> 00:28:51,232
with incredible humor,
with incredible innuendo.

441
00:29:08,215 --> 00:29:12,086
-He had a canary, and he only
taught him to speak one thing,

442
00:29:12,219 --> 00:29:15,724
which was when somebody
walked into the room,

443
00:29:15,856 --> 00:29:17,958
the canary always said,

444
00:29:18,092 --> 00:29:20,394
"Get a load of you."

445
00:29:23,497 --> 00:29:25,966
-George was never hidden.

446
00:29:26,100 --> 00:29:28,670
George's brother Russell
was asked at one point

447
00:29:28,802 --> 00:29:31,640
when it was that George
came out of the closet,

448
00:29:31,772 --> 00:29:33,107
and Russell has always said

449
00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:34,975
that George never came
out of the closet--

450
00:29:35,109 --> 00:29:37,244
he was never in it.

451
00:29:39,581 --> 00:29:41,782
-George wanted it to be

452
00:29:41,915 --> 00:29:44,719
a perfectly normal
thing of life.

453
00:29:44,852 --> 00:29:46,420
Okay, fine. So what?

454
00:29:46,554 --> 00:29:49,724
Everybody is different,
thank God.

455
00:29:58,032 --> 00:30:00,501
-George had come
out of this really

456
00:30:00,635 --> 00:30:04,773
straitlaced Episcopalian family,

457
00:30:04,905 --> 00:30:10,545
with a minister father
and a high-society type mother,

458
00:30:10,679 --> 00:30:17,652
and here's flamboyant,
fearless, unfiltered George.

459
00:30:17,786 --> 00:30:20,888
Oh, my.

460
00:30:21,021 --> 00:30:25,426
-When Monroe left and went home
to Europe with Glenway,

461
00:30:25,560 --> 00:30:30,532
George was devastated and cried
on his father's shoulder

462
00:30:30,665 --> 00:30:33,267
at some point
and made it quite clear

463
00:30:33,400 --> 00:30:36,470
that Monroe was the most
important person in his life.

464
00:30:36,604 --> 00:30:38,439
-His father was
a Victorian gentleman.

465
00:30:38,573 --> 00:30:41,308
I mean, he knew
the Oscar Wilde trials.

466
00:30:41,442 --> 00:30:45,479
He couldn't believe that George
was stuck in this mess.

467
00:30:45,613 --> 00:30:47,381
George didn't think of it
as a mess.

468
00:30:47,515 --> 00:30:52,620
He thought of it as
a really wonderful situation.

469
00:30:52,754 --> 00:30:56,090
-Russell Lynes, who was George
Platt Lynes' younger brother

470
00:30:56,223 --> 00:30:58,492
just by a couple of years,

471
00:30:58,626 --> 00:31:03,531
did everything the straight
way, in every sense of
that word.

472
00:31:03,665 --> 00:31:05,966
He went to Harvard.
He got married.

473
00:31:06,100 --> 00:31:09,738
He was an editor
of Harper's Weekly.

474
00:31:09,870 --> 00:31:14,074
-Russell loved his brother,
and George loved Russell.

475
00:31:14,208 --> 00:31:17,311
They were deeply devoted
to one another.

476
00:31:21,415 --> 00:31:24,552
-He was my favorite uncle.

477
00:31:24,686 --> 00:31:29,022
My memories of him are,
of course, very fond.

478
00:31:29,156 --> 00:31:32,025
Uncle George loved
to be in the sun.

479
00:31:32,159 --> 00:31:34,228
And once we were out
in the middle of this lake,

480
00:31:34,361 --> 00:31:36,897
he stripped down to a jockstrap.

481
00:31:37,030 --> 00:31:38,800
That was all he had on.

482
00:31:38,932 --> 00:31:42,236
And though I was
a fairly young teenager,

483
00:31:42,369 --> 00:31:48,909
I knew that
Uncle George was gay.

484
00:31:49,042 --> 00:31:51,178
And I was brought up in a family

485
00:31:51,311 --> 00:31:53,581
where it didn't matter
who you were

486
00:31:53,715 --> 00:31:57,786
unless you were, you know,
a right-wing Republican.

487
00:32:38,459 --> 00:32:41,261
-Lincoln Kirstein and George
were classmates

488
00:32:41,395 --> 00:32:44,833
at the Berkshire School,
which is a prep school.

489
00:32:44,965 --> 00:32:46,901
But it wasn't really
until later,

490
00:32:47,034 --> 00:32:48,469
after George moves
to New York City

491
00:32:48,603 --> 00:32:53,207
with Glenway and Monroe,
that they really form a bond.

492
00:32:53,340 --> 00:32:55,275
Lincoln was a great,
great supporter

493
00:32:55,409 --> 00:32:58,078
of George's work early on.

494
00:32:58,212 --> 00:32:59,614
-The thing I remember
about Lincoln

495
00:32:59,747 --> 00:33:02,483
was that he was
astonishingly handsome.

496
00:33:02,617 --> 00:33:05,753
I mean, he walked in a room
and everybody's, "Mm?"

497
00:33:09,223 --> 00:33:10,859
We have to thank Lincoln
for the fact

498
00:33:10,991 --> 00:33:14,696
that we have a major
ballet company in this town.

499
00:33:18,465 --> 00:33:20,067
-With his passion for dance,

500
00:33:20,200 --> 00:33:23,303
Lincoln Kirstein brought
Balanchine to
the United States.

501
00:33:23,437 --> 00:33:25,038
Started the American
Ballet Company,

502
00:33:25,172 --> 00:33:27,241
which became
the New York City Ballet.

503
00:33:27,374 --> 00:33:29,209
That gave George
a lifetime position

504
00:33:29,343 --> 00:33:32,012
as the official photographer
for the ballet,

505
00:33:32,145 --> 00:33:35,048
which he did for about 30 years.

506
00:33:41,823 --> 00:33:45,927
-George was at his best working
with a group of dancers.

507
00:33:46,059 --> 00:33:49,764
-He seems very, very intuitive
in exploring the body,

508
00:33:49,898 --> 00:33:51,365
exploring corporal form.

509
00:33:51,498 --> 00:33:54,602
-You think about dance
as being something in motion.

510
00:33:54,736 --> 00:33:59,206
And how do you convey
the magic of that experience?

511
00:33:59,339 --> 00:34:02,342
-Highly structured, very
classical, very sculptural--

512
00:34:02,476 --> 00:34:05,013
that's what Balanchine used
to love about George's work.

513
00:34:05,145 --> 00:34:08,315
-Balanchine said that
George Platt Lynes' photographs

514
00:34:08,448 --> 00:34:10,818
would be all that would
be remembered of his work

515
00:34:10,952 --> 00:34:12,554
in 100 years.

516
00:34:20,695 --> 00:34:25,432
-Once George found the ballet,
he found the guys.

517
00:34:25,567 --> 00:34:27,835
-Many of the dancers
were people

518
00:34:27,969 --> 00:34:32,439
who ended up posing for him
without clothes.

519
00:34:35,175 --> 00:34:37,444
-You didn't really often
see photographs

520
00:34:37,579 --> 00:34:40,048
of the male nude from the 1930s.

521
00:34:46,386 --> 00:34:48,856
-There were a lot of other
people who were doing

522
00:34:48,990 --> 00:34:52,259
fashion work, portrait work
at that time.

523
00:34:52,392 --> 00:34:56,463
But in terms of doing
the male nudes,

524
00:34:56,598 --> 00:35:01,803
George Platt Lynes
is singular in that regard.

525
00:35:01,936 --> 00:35:04,772
-The nudes were an essential
part of his work.

526
00:35:04,906 --> 00:35:10,110
They were the heart,
the dynamo that ran everything.

527
00:35:10,243 --> 00:35:12,747
-This was the most important
work to him.

528
00:35:12,880 --> 00:35:16,383
-His true intent was
the creation of art.

529
00:35:18,620 --> 00:35:21,789
-He loved the male body,
and it shows.

530
00:35:21,923 --> 00:35:27,061
It's the energy, it's
the tension of the photograph.

531
00:35:27,194 --> 00:35:30,330
He brought drama,
he brought theatre.

532
00:35:30,464 --> 00:35:32,499
Good photographs
are always demanding.

533
00:35:32,634 --> 00:35:34,068
You want to spend time
with them.

534
00:35:34,201 --> 00:35:36,037
You want to flirt with them.

535
00:35:36,169 --> 00:35:38,372
You want to look at them,
"Hmm, gee,

536
00:35:38,506 --> 00:35:40,608
wish I was in that room."

537
00:35:42,710 --> 00:35:44,912
-The art that he valued
the most,

538
00:35:45,046 --> 00:35:46,514
these nude photographs,

539
00:35:46,648 --> 00:35:48,482
was being made
in the same studios,

540
00:35:48,616 --> 00:35:51,251
in the same spaces,
with the same props,

541
00:35:51,385 --> 00:35:53,554
as the advertising
and fashion work.

542
00:35:53,688 --> 00:35:57,759
And you see the same props
showing up again.

543
00:36:01,461 --> 00:36:03,665
-It is genuinely erotic

544
00:36:03,798 --> 00:36:06,868
and, at the same time,
really sophisticated.

545
00:36:08,736 --> 00:36:10,872
This is where his strength was.

546
00:36:11,005 --> 00:36:12,472
This is where he is unique.

547
00:36:12,607 --> 00:36:16,276
This is where he stood out.

548
00:36:16,410 --> 00:36:19,747
-George Platt Lynes'
strongest work

549
00:36:19,881 --> 00:36:22,382
were his male nudes.

550
00:36:22,517 --> 00:36:25,185
I think it's inevitable that
that's the work

551
00:36:25,318 --> 00:36:28,890
that he will be remembered for.

552
00:36:35,195 --> 00:36:41,234
-From the very beginning,
George photographed the nudes.

553
00:36:41,368 --> 00:36:43,805
-The first subject was himself.

554
00:36:43,938 --> 00:36:47,207
His first nudes
were self-portraits.

555
00:36:47,340 --> 00:36:49,844
He made a valentine that he
gave to his new boyfriend,

556
00:36:49,977 --> 00:36:51,278
Monroe Wheeler,

557
00:36:51,411 --> 00:36:54,481
of self-portraits
that were nude.

558
00:36:54,615 --> 00:36:57,284
Late in their lives,
still in Monroe's room,

559
00:36:57,417 --> 00:37:00,521
next to his bed,
was that valentine.

560
00:37:00,655 --> 00:37:02,623
He kept it forever.

561
00:37:07,695 --> 00:37:13,601
-His brother, Russell, was one
of his first portrait models.

562
00:37:13,735 --> 00:37:16,504
-The next series
were Yale friends

563
00:37:16,637 --> 00:37:18,405
of his younger brother Russell,

564
00:37:18,539 --> 00:37:20,373
who were willing
to take their clothes off,

565
00:37:20,508 --> 00:37:23,310
and George practiced on them.

566
00:37:36,090 --> 00:37:38,760
-A lot of this material
that I was finding

567
00:37:38,893 --> 00:37:41,328
came from the papers
of Monroe Wheeler,

568
00:37:41,461 --> 00:37:43,564
from his personal holdings
that are now

569
00:37:43,698 --> 00:37:46,000
in the hands of a man
named Vincent Cianni.

570
00:38:01,516 --> 00:38:03,618
-It's an amazing documentation

571
00:38:03,751 --> 00:38:07,054
of not only
their love for each other,

572
00:38:07,188 --> 00:38:11,058
but the kind of very physical
sexual relationship

573
00:38:11,192 --> 00:38:12,860
they had with each other.

574
00:38:27,175 --> 00:38:29,277
-So, I was going through
these archives with him,

575
00:38:29,409 --> 00:38:33,247
and he pulled out these
little folder of photographs.

576
00:38:33,380 --> 00:38:39,352
And in it was a brown paper
envelope that they had come in,

577
00:38:39,486 --> 00:38:42,489
and on one of them
it said "Intimacies,"

578
00:38:42,623 --> 00:38:48,029
and on another, it said,
"MW-GPL Private."

579
00:38:48,162 --> 00:38:50,631
Sounds good.

580
00:38:50,765 --> 00:38:53,801
The images that were inside
them were photographs

581
00:38:53,935 --> 00:38:57,538
that have never been reproduced
of George Platt Lynes

582
00:38:57,672 --> 00:39:01,876
and Monroe Wheeler
in the early '30s, having sex.

583
00:39:10,350 --> 00:39:12,720
-They were basically selfies

584
00:39:12,854 --> 00:39:16,023
that they made of each other
at the time.

585
00:39:19,026 --> 00:39:23,564
-What really struck me
about them was the intimacy,

586
00:39:23,698 --> 00:39:29,369
the real gentleness
of the sexuality in them.

587
00:39:29,503 --> 00:39:32,472
It was so sweet.

588
00:39:51,959 --> 00:39:54,061
-George Platt Lynes felt
that the word pornography

589
00:39:54,195 --> 00:39:58,299
was too loosely used
in describing male nudes--

590
00:39:58,431 --> 00:40:00,701
they were immoral
or somehow wrong.

591
00:40:00,835 --> 00:40:03,037
They came out of a lineage
of the male nude

592
00:40:03,170 --> 00:40:06,741
in the history of art
going back to antiquity.

593
00:40:06,874 --> 00:40:10,177
-The definitions between art
and pornography, to me,

594
00:40:10,311 --> 00:40:12,380
it lies in the intent.

595
00:40:12,513 --> 00:40:15,316
If it's not meant
to be pornography,

596
00:40:15,448 --> 00:40:17,118
I don't think that it is.

597
00:40:17,251 --> 00:40:21,889
Lynes, I think saw himself,
rightfully so,
as a fine artist,

598
00:40:22,023 --> 00:40:23,357
which isn't to say
that fine artists

599
00:40:23,490 --> 00:40:25,059
cannot also make pornography.

600
00:40:25,192 --> 00:40:30,497
-That line between pornography
and eroticism is very fine.

601
00:40:30,631 --> 00:40:32,033
-They're intimate.

602
00:40:32,166 --> 00:40:35,336
And are we to say that every
intimate photograph

603
00:40:35,468 --> 00:40:38,005
is pornographic?

604
00:40:38,139 --> 00:40:40,741
-George did not like
pornography.

605
00:40:40,875 --> 00:40:43,577
That didn't mean
he didn't eroticize

606
00:40:43,711 --> 00:40:45,246
a lot of his photography.

607
00:40:45,379 --> 00:40:49,050
But it never went over the edge
into pornography, ever.

608
00:40:49,183 --> 00:40:53,187
It was always more elegant
than pornography.

609
00:40:53,321 --> 00:40:55,656
-We did discover a few pieces,
though.

610
00:40:55,790 --> 00:40:57,224
-I suspect.

611
00:41:07,969 --> 00:41:09,737
-Part of what I love
about Lynes' work,

612
00:41:09,870 --> 00:41:12,606
it's the first time
you really see the male body

613
00:41:12,740 --> 00:41:15,309
in an art photographer's work

614
00:41:15,443 --> 00:41:20,214
without the excuse of physique
or classicism.

615
00:41:20,348 --> 00:41:22,984
It's just people as they are.

616
00:41:25,119 --> 00:41:27,054
At the time that Lynes
was making this work,

617
00:41:27,188 --> 00:41:30,091
it was completely
groundbreaking even to show
the male nude

618
00:41:30,224 --> 00:41:33,461
or to have, like, an erection
in a photo.

619
00:41:33,594 --> 00:41:36,130
And you see people in a way
that they wouldn't have been

620
00:41:36,263 --> 00:41:40,801
able to express themselves
publicly at the time.

621
00:41:40,935 --> 00:41:46,307
-You had to be very chary
and wary about anything gay.

622
00:41:46,440 --> 00:41:51,145
-These images are still
dangerous and provocative.

623
00:41:51,278 --> 00:41:55,282
We can only begin to imagine
what this was like

624
00:41:55,416 --> 00:42:00,988
in the 1940s and '50s,
during the McCarthy years,

625
00:42:01,122 --> 00:42:05,326
when one could be jailed
for this material.

626
00:42:05,459 --> 00:42:08,662
And yet, George did them.

627
00:42:08,796 --> 00:42:12,700
- The times were, um...
problematic

628
00:42:12,833 --> 00:42:15,302
in terms of people
within that circle

629
00:42:15,436 --> 00:42:17,605
not really sort of understanding

630
00:42:17,738 --> 00:42:19,840
the power dynamics
that were going on.

631
00:42:19,974 --> 00:42:22,743
George Platt Lynes
considered himself modernist.

632
00:42:22,877 --> 00:42:24,612
Modernists,
it was their duty, really,

633
00:42:24,745 --> 00:42:27,815
to break social
sort of artistic taboos.

634
00:42:27,948 --> 00:42:34,523
Of course, interracial
relations were taboo during
the period.

635
00:42:34,655 --> 00:42:38,726
Same-sex relationships
were also taboo.

636
00:42:38,859 --> 00:42:40,795
So, they really loved this idea

637
00:42:40,928 --> 00:42:45,800
of mixing the erotic,
the homoerotic with the racial

638
00:42:45,933 --> 00:42:48,369
as a means of showing
that they're modernist,

639
00:42:48,502 --> 00:42:50,037
that they're a sort of vanguard

640
00:42:50,171 --> 00:42:52,273
you know,
against the status quo.

641
00:42:52,406 --> 00:42:53,741
But at the same time,

642
00:42:53,874 --> 00:42:58,112
there's a very exploitative
aspect to that.

643
00:43:00,448 --> 00:43:02,716
-It was not written about.

644
00:43:02,850 --> 00:43:04,185
The work was never published.

645
00:43:04,318 --> 00:43:08,155
It was never shown in museums
or galleries.

646
00:43:10,157 --> 00:43:14,161
-When you know you're making
work to share with the world,

647
00:43:14,295 --> 00:43:18,032
there's a different kind
of energy that goes into that.

648
00:43:18,165 --> 00:43:20,067
When you're making work
for yourself

649
00:43:20,201 --> 00:43:23,538
and for maybe a very
small circle of friends,

650
00:43:23,671 --> 00:43:25,406
it can be whatever you want.

651
00:43:25,540 --> 00:43:29,143
And it can be as daring
as you want to be.

652
00:43:29,276 --> 00:43:34,915
But it must have been difficult
for him to be making work

653
00:43:35,049 --> 00:43:37,118
that he knew no one
was going to see.

654
00:43:37,251 --> 00:43:39,588
And maybe that's part of what,
the reason why

655
00:43:39,720 --> 00:43:41,989
it's so potent still.

656
00:43:59,840 --> 00:44:04,378
-Here I have a collection
of mostly vintage

657
00:44:04,513 --> 00:44:06,515
George Platt Lynes pictures

658
00:44:06,647 --> 00:44:08,916
from different eras.

659
00:44:09,049 --> 00:44:10,718
Then a whole series of pictures

660
00:44:10,851 --> 00:44:14,288
which are of three
different models together

661
00:44:14,421 --> 00:44:18,459
and a series of them
sort of disrobing.

662
00:44:18,593 --> 00:44:20,394
And what we discovered

663
00:44:20,529 --> 00:44:24,899
once these were printed
in a large format,

664
00:44:25,032 --> 00:44:29,203
was George had Scotch-taped
their eyes closed

665
00:44:29,336 --> 00:44:33,642
to possibly have them
not become aroused,

666
00:44:33,774 --> 00:44:35,176
or so he could direct them

667
00:44:35,309 --> 00:44:39,146
and they would have to just
act on their own

668
00:44:39,280 --> 00:44:41,916
without being nervous
around each other.

669
00:44:42,049 --> 00:44:45,819
Or maybe because
the surprise being

670
00:44:45,953 --> 00:44:47,755
that there's a third person
waiting for him

671
00:44:47,888 --> 00:44:50,291
once he does arrive in bed.

672
00:44:50,424 --> 00:44:52,793
And here's the one having
his underwear taken off

673
00:44:52,927 --> 00:44:54,295
by the other,
and he's sort of grimacing,

674
00:44:54,428 --> 00:44:58,633
not knowing
what's going to happen.

675
00:44:58,766 --> 00:45:00,367
-George was charming.

676
00:45:00,501 --> 00:45:01,802
He was able to get men

677
00:45:01,936 --> 00:45:04,205
who sometimes didn't want
to remove their clothes,

678
00:45:04,338 --> 00:45:06,807
to remove their clothes
and to sit for the camera.

679
00:45:06,941 --> 00:45:09,644
-He could charm any model
into doing anything

680
00:45:09,777 --> 00:45:12,179
he wanted them to do.

681
00:45:12,313 --> 00:45:14,448
-George would go
to the YMCA a lot.

682
00:45:14,583 --> 00:45:21,188
Or if the fleet was in,
he would go down and meet
the sailors.

683
00:45:21,322 --> 00:45:23,958
He can photograph
the toughest-looking guy

684
00:45:24,091 --> 00:45:27,261
and make him look like
a million bucks.

685
00:45:28,597 --> 00:45:32,266
He didn't care really so much
what you did in your life.

686
00:45:32,399 --> 00:45:35,537
He cared about
who you really were.

687
00:45:35,670 --> 00:45:38,072
You know, you can feel that.

688
00:45:38,205 --> 00:45:41,676
-George's models
were lovers, friends,

689
00:45:41,809 --> 00:45:43,545
the physically perfect ones.

690
00:45:43,678 --> 00:45:46,046
-Some of the models
did come from ballet.

691
00:45:46,180 --> 00:45:48,449
Some of the models
were hustlers.

692
00:45:48,583 --> 00:45:53,454
Some of them were gymnasts
or athletes.

693
00:45:53,588 --> 00:45:55,356
-There are so many people
in these photographs

694
00:45:55,489 --> 00:45:57,258
that I don't know
and that I can never know.

695
00:45:57,391 --> 00:46:00,528
We don't have much information
about them anymore.

696
00:46:05,466 --> 00:46:07,301
-This is one of
the first photographs

697
00:46:07,434 --> 00:46:09,870
he took of me

698
00:46:10,004 --> 00:46:13,508
when I first met him
in the studio.

699
00:46:20,047 --> 00:46:23,217
Yes, I did do
some modeling for him.

700
00:46:25,252 --> 00:46:27,555
He filmed me
because he liked me.

701
00:46:27,689 --> 00:46:30,291
He wanted to take my picture.

702
00:46:30,424 --> 00:46:33,728
So, he took some nudes of me
and so forth.

703
00:46:39,601 --> 00:46:41,001
-Glenway Wescott

704
00:46:41,135 --> 00:46:43,605
introduced me to George
at a party of George's.

705
00:46:43,738 --> 00:46:48,108
George was famous
for giving a lot of parties.

706
00:46:48,242 --> 00:46:50,811
Glenway asked him
to photograph me.

707
00:46:50,944 --> 00:46:56,150
And George scheduled not one
but three different sessions.

708
00:46:56,283 --> 00:46:58,919
I was very happy with that,
I can tell you.

709
00:46:59,053 --> 00:47:04,325
To be photographed by him
was as though we were
just chatting.

710
00:47:04,458 --> 00:47:06,661
'Cause he always seemed to be
looking the other way

711
00:47:06,795 --> 00:47:08,896
when he was taking a shot.

712
00:47:09,029 --> 00:47:10,964
George wanted to catch you
at a moment

713
00:47:11,098 --> 00:47:14,636
when you were
least expecting it.

714
00:47:14,769 --> 00:47:17,572
I liked it. I loved it.

715
00:49:08,883 --> 00:49:10,618
-George had fallen in love

716
00:49:10,752 --> 00:49:15,255
with a studio assistant
of his, George Tichenor.

717
00:49:17,090 --> 00:49:19,092
Tichenor went off to war

718
00:49:19,226 --> 00:49:22,530
and was, unfortunately,
killed in the war.

719
00:49:35,677 --> 00:49:38,345
George then took up with
Tichenor's younger brother,

720
00:49:38,479 --> 00:49:41,081
Jonathan, famously declaring,

721
00:49:41,215 --> 00:49:43,116
"If I can't have
the Tichenor I want,

722
00:49:43,250 --> 00:49:46,987
I'll take the Tichenor
I can get."

723
00:49:47,120 --> 00:49:50,592
This was circa 1945.

724
00:49:50,725 --> 00:49:55,262
George decided to leave
the domestic arrangement

725
00:49:55,395 --> 00:49:58,633
and move in
with Jonathan Tichenor.

726
00:49:58,766 --> 00:50:02,202
And Glenway Wescott
was so mortified that--

727
00:50:02,336 --> 00:50:05,974
that George would so openly
declare his homosexuality

728
00:50:06,106 --> 00:50:10,143
in this kind of way, as though
all of New York society

729
00:50:10,277 --> 00:50:13,748
didn't already well know
what the three men

730
00:50:13,882 --> 00:50:16,250
had been doing all these years

731
00:50:16,383 --> 00:50:18,686
living in a heap together.

732
00:50:43,678 --> 00:50:47,615
-George had lunch regularly
at the Plaza Hotel.

733
00:50:47,749 --> 00:50:50,050
It was right across the street
from his studio

734
00:50:50,183 --> 00:50:51,686
on Madison and 60th.

735
00:50:51,819 --> 00:50:54,689
And he invited
his sister-in-law, Mildred,

736
00:50:54,822 --> 00:50:57,025
to lunch so that
he could introduce her

737
00:50:57,190 --> 00:50:59,326
to his new boyfriend, Jonathan.

738
00:50:59,459 --> 00:51:01,763
He pulled out a box
with a ring in it,

739
00:51:01,896 --> 00:51:03,330
and he said to Mildred,

740
00:51:03,463 --> 00:51:06,433
"Jonathan and I
are going to be married."

741
00:51:06,568 --> 00:51:11,405
Well, Mildred tells us
that she was flabbergasted.

742
00:51:11,539 --> 00:51:15,142
She said, "The homosexuality
was fine, it was one thing.

743
00:51:15,275 --> 00:51:17,545
But the fantasy of
getting married

744
00:51:17,679 --> 00:51:22,382
was something
completely off the wall."

745
00:51:22,517 --> 00:51:25,485
There was a kind of
visionary quality,

746
00:51:25,620 --> 00:51:30,190
a sort of genius,
to George's fantasies.

747
00:51:53,146 --> 00:51:58,452
-George suddenly declares
that he has accepted a position

748
00:51:58,586 --> 00:52:01,388
running the Vogue Studios
in Hollywood,

749
00:52:01,522 --> 00:52:03,858
which everyone
in the circle thought

750
00:52:03,992 --> 00:52:07,294
was a tremendous mistake.

751
00:52:07,427 --> 00:52:11,733
-I think he rather imagined
that this was going to be

752
00:52:11,866 --> 00:52:15,268
a terrific career boost.

753
00:52:15,402 --> 00:52:17,872
-He goes out there after
going through not one,

754
00:52:18,006 --> 00:52:20,074
but two bankruptcies.

755
00:52:20,207 --> 00:52:22,342
He always lived
beyond his means.

756
00:52:22,476 --> 00:52:24,177
He was always looking for more.

757
00:52:24,311 --> 00:52:27,147
His lifestyle was never
rich enough.

758
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:30,551
-Money was the bane
of his existence.

759
00:52:30,685 --> 00:52:34,756
He simply did not know how to
constrain himself financially.

760
00:52:34,889 --> 00:52:37,224
-You know,
you have to admire people

761
00:52:37,357 --> 00:52:40,762
who don't worry about
how to pay the rent

762
00:52:40,895 --> 00:52:44,666
and just want to make art
and somehow survive.

763
00:52:47,068 --> 00:52:51,973
-George was enamored
of fortune tellers,

764
00:52:52,106 --> 00:52:55,208
astrologists, numerologists,

765
00:52:55,342 --> 00:52:59,681
and often consulted them
throughout his life,

766
00:52:59,814 --> 00:53:03,117
at a moment when he kind of
was looking for

767
00:53:03,250 --> 00:53:06,888
a way to make the next
decision, make the next move.

768
00:53:07,021 --> 00:53:11,793
And I sometimes felt like
he was shopping around
for his future.

769
00:53:13,360 --> 00:53:18,398
-He's trying to start anew
with Condé Nast in Los Angeles.

770
00:53:18,533 --> 00:53:20,802
He does some remarkable
portrait work there.

771
00:53:20,935 --> 00:53:24,772
-Despite photographing some of
the great beauties

772
00:53:24,906 --> 00:53:28,208
and iconic male heartthrobs
of the period,

773
00:53:28,341 --> 00:53:31,679
it was a bit of a shit show.

774
00:53:31,813 --> 00:53:35,149
Life in Hollywood, at the
standard George wanted to live,

775
00:53:35,282 --> 00:53:36,918
was goddamn expensive.

776
00:53:37,051 --> 00:53:40,287
He bought a house.
He had to have it decorated.

777
00:53:40,420 --> 00:53:43,024
It had to be designed
to the nines.

778
00:53:43,157 --> 00:53:45,059
He threw parties there.

779
00:53:45,193 --> 00:53:47,427
It just ate up money.

780
00:53:47,562 --> 00:53:51,331
-He soon finds himself
in financial straits again.

781
00:53:51,465 --> 00:53:55,469
He suffers from living
beyond his means.

782
00:53:55,603 --> 00:53:57,872
-And he kind of knew,
at a certain point,

783
00:53:58,005 --> 00:54:02,543
that he should have
stayed in New York.

784
00:54:02,677 --> 00:54:04,311
-George said this, that,

785
00:54:04,444 --> 00:54:07,115
"It's one of the most
homosexual towns,

786
00:54:07,247 --> 00:54:10,051
but it's so anti-homosexual."

787
00:54:10,184 --> 00:54:14,555
He deeply missed New York,
and he missed his friends.

788
00:54:14,689 --> 00:54:17,525
-He starts to suffer
depression.

789
00:54:17,658 --> 00:54:20,762
He begins to lose interest
in even making photographs.

790
00:54:20,895 --> 00:54:22,563
And if you look
at the correspondence,

791
00:54:22,697 --> 00:54:24,532
especially with Bernard Perlin,
there's a futility,

792
00:54:24,665 --> 00:54:26,801
and there's
a self-destructive...

793
00:54:26,934 --> 00:54:29,269
or almost a, um...

794
00:54:29,402 --> 00:54:32,507
a wanting for it to be over.

795
00:54:32,640 --> 00:54:38,780
So, George comes back
to New York in '48, bankrupt.

796
00:54:38,913 --> 00:54:42,583
He's forced to, you know,
borrow money from friends.

797
00:54:42,717 --> 00:54:47,054
-The studio space that he left
in New York was taken over

798
00:54:47,188 --> 00:54:52,693
by a young fashion photographer
named Richard Avedon.

799
00:54:52,827 --> 00:54:54,595
-Here's a person
who's still relatively young.

800
00:54:54,729 --> 00:54:56,296
He's only in his 40s.

801
00:54:56,429 --> 00:55:00,433
One would think he still has
a lot to give, a lot to do.

802
00:55:00,568 --> 00:55:02,469
But I think he lacked
the discipline

803
00:55:02,603 --> 00:55:03,971
that some of the photographers

804
00:55:04,105 --> 00:55:07,108
who really come to
the forefront in the '40s--

805
00:55:07,241 --> 00:55:10,377
I'm thinking specifically of
Richard Avedon and Irving Penn.

806
00:55:10,511 --> 00:55:12,113
-There was this real shift

807
00:55:12,246 --> 00:55:15,283
in terms of what was
happening in magazines.

808
00:55:18,252 --> 00:55:20,453
-Alright, Marcel!
Lights!

809
00:55:20,588 --> 00:55:23,423
-The movie "Funny Face"
with Fred Astaire

810
00:55:23,558 --> 00:55:25,226
and Audrey Hepburn

811
00:55:25,358 --> 00:55:27,795
is about Dick Avedon.

812
00:55:27,929 --> 00:55:31,265
-Holy-moly!
You look fabulous!

813
00:55:31,398 --> 00:55:33,901
Stop! Stop!

814
00:55:34,035 --> 00:55:36,469
-I can't stop!
Take the picture!

815
00:55:36,604 --> 00:55:38,506
-That famous scene
where Audrey Hepburn's

816
00:55:38,639 --> 00:55:40,575
running down the stairs
of the Louvre

817
00:55:40,708 --> 00:55:43,978
is emblematic
of what fashion photography

818
00:55:44,111 --> 00:55:47,548
had become,
and George Platt Lynes

819
00:55:47,682 --> 00:55:49,482
had never taken pictures
like that.

820
00:55:49,617 --> 00:55:52,286
His pictures were
much more classical.

821
00:55:52,419 --> 00:55:55,089
They were quieter.

822
00:55:55,223 --> 00:55:57,859
They were just more static.

823
00:56:25,887 --> 00:56:30,725
-He was a has-been
by the late '40s.

824
00:56:30,858 --> 00:56:34,195
-The high-living days,
the glory days are over.

825
00:56:34,328 --> 00:56:36,063
He's been supplanted.

826
00:56:36,197 --> 00:56:37,965
-George Platt Lynes,
he was embraced

827
00:56:38,099 --> 00:56:40,601
by the titans
of New York modernism.

828
00:56:40,735 --> 00:56:43,104
He was reaching a level
of success

829
00:56:43,237 --> 00:56:44,672
very early on in his career.

830
00:56:44,805 --> 00:56:46,741
In a way, he just
kind of burns out.

831
00:56:46,874 --> 00:56:50,211
He wanted to show the work
that he considered his best,

832
00:56:50,344 --> 00:56:51,545
which is the male nude,

833
00:56:51,679 --> 00:56:53,381
and there were
no outlets for that.

834
00:56:53,514 --> 00:56:57,151
I'm certain that added to that
futility, to that depression,

835
00:56:57,285 --> 00:56:58,519
and, you know, he was just...

836
00:56:58,653 --> 00:57:01,956
he was, you know,
painted into a corner.

837
00:57:03,456 --> 00:57:08,763
-In the early '50s,
he was assessed for back taxes.

838
00:57:08,896 --> 00:57:12,099
The IRS forced him to sell off

839
00:57:12,233 --> 00:57:15,435
basically all of his
professional life.

840
00:57:15,569 --> 00:57:19,807
-His brother Russell rescued it
by buying it back from IRS

841
00:57:19,941 --> 00:57:22,610
and then lent it
all back to George.

842
00:57:22,743 --> 00:57:26,547
-My father put up with him.

843
00:57:26,681 --> 00:57:29,750
Though we loved him,
he was not easy.

844
00:57:29,884 --> 00:57:32,420
-They had to bail him out
again and again.

845
00:57:32,553 --> 00:57:38,025
They discovered that he had
given his Picasso as collateral

846
00:57:38,159 --> 00:57:41,461
to someone else as well.

847
00:57:41,595 --> 00:57:43,564
-It must have been
extremely demoralizing

848
00:57:43,698 --> 00:57:45,498
to have this happen to him.

849
00:57:53,741 --> 00:57:55,776
-It was a very important
relationship

850
00:57:55,910 --> 00:58:00,815
between Bernard Perlin
and George Platt Lynes.

851
00:58:09,690 --> 00:58:12,159
-From the late '40s
through the early '50s,

852
00:58:12,293 --> 00:58:16,530
Bernard had gone to live
and paint in Rome.

853
00:58:44,925 --> 00:58:47,995
-George's letters
were delicious.

854
00:58:48,129 --> 00:58:51,599
Sharing updates on their lives,

855
00:58:51,732 --> 00:58:54,535
certainly on their
sexual conquests.

856
00:59:59,166 --> 01:00:02,336
-Right away, he arrives
in New York on the 16th.

857
01:00:02,470 --> 01:00:06,040
He calls George instantly
while he's waiting on the docks

858
01:00:06,173 --> 01:00:07,842
for them to unload his Vespa.

859
01:00:07,975 --> 01:00:09,743
Goes right to George's
that evening,

860
01:00:09,877 --> 01:00:12,713
and he's there
for months thereafter.

861
01:00:12,847 --> 01:00:15,716
And you can see the parties.

862
01:00:17,818 --> 01:00:21,722
They were both men
who were avid pursuers

863
01:00:21,856 --> 01:00:24,658
of the sensual
pleasures of life.

864
01:00:24,792 --> 01:00:29,130
Bernard moved into a spare room
at George's apartment

865
01:00:29,263 --> 01:00:34,201
and was involved
in various all-boys soirees.

866
01:00:34,335 --> 01:00:39,508
One story he told was of how
inventive George Lyons
could be,

867
01:00:39,640 --> 01:00:43,777
and there was apparently
an evening alone together,

868
01:00:43,911 --> 01:00:45,580
after one of George's
dinner parties

869
01:00:45,713 --> 01:00:47,681
had broken up for the night,

870
01:00:47,815 --> 01:00:51,352
that George got a fire going
in the fireplace, laid out...

871
01:00:51,485 --> 01:00:54,388
Jared French designed
needlepoint pillows,

872
01:00:54,523 --> 01:00:56,490
and on the pillows,

873
01:00:56,625 --> 01:00:59,393
George produced an ice cube.

874
01:01:29,156 --> 01:01:33,827
-George was incredibly
inventive, incredibly playful,

875
01:01:33,961 --> 01:01:37,666
and highly exploratory
and sensual.

876
01:01:49,678 --> 01:01:53,548
-He must have been very
charming because he got around.

877
01:01:53,682 --> 01:01:56,116
-George was a hungry soul.

878
01:01:56,250 --> 01:01:59,186
-Oh, he was in love
with a lot of people.

879
01:02:03,057 --> 01:02:08,697
-I think everything that George
did was fueled by
sexual energy,

880
01:02:08,829 --> 01:02:15,402
and the boys
were fuel for George.

881
01:02:16,870 --> 01:02:18,806
George loved the attention,

882
01:02:18,939 --> 01:02:22,076
and I think he also
loved the conquest.

883
01:02:22,209 --> 01:02:25,547
-As long as they were young
and good-looking,

884
01:02:25,680 --> 01:02:28,115
he liked to photograph them.

885
01:02:43,998 --> 01:02:46,267
-"Dougie"--
Laurie Douglas--

886
01:02:46,400 --> 01:02:49,604
was a fashion model
in the 1940s,

887
01:02:49,738 --> 01:02:54,141
and in fact, became
George Lynes' favorite model.

888
01:02:54,275 --> 01:02:58,112
He used her frequently in
his work, in his fashion work,

889
01:02:58,245 --> 01:03:05,819
but also in his fine art
photography, to call it that.

890
01:03:05,953 --> 01:03:11,559
They became not only
creatively collaborative

891
01:03:11,693 --> 01:03:13,260
in his-- in his studio,

892
01:03:13,394 --> 01:03:16,397
but they became very,
very close, very close friends.

893
01:03:16,531 --> 01:03:22,903
Interestingly enough, George,
who was a devout homosexual,

894
01:03:23,037 --> 01:03:26,741
fell into a sort of
on-again, off-again

895
01:03:26,874 --> 01:03:30,344
sexual relationship with Dougie.

896
01:03:30,477 --> 01:03:35,816
She was incredibly accepting
of this wild world

897
01:03:35,949 --> 01:03:38,852
of these high-society gay men

898
01:03:38,986 --> 01:03:42,423
and all of their
various exploits.

899
01:03:49,664 --> 01:03:52,701
There was a certain kind of
sadistic element

900
01:03:52,833 --> 01:03:55,436
in certain episodes.

901
01:03:55,570 --> 01:03:59,273
-His behavior,
seen from today's standards,

902
01:03:59,406 --> 01:04:02,811
might look, um... aggressive.

903
01:04:02,943 --> 01:04:04,211
Let's put it that way.

904
01:04:04,345 --> 01:04:05,979
-There was a moment
when Bernard Perlin

905
01:04:06,113 --> 01:04:08,516
was staying with George
in his apartment,

906
01:04:08,650 --> 01:04:10,951
and Dougie was there.

907
01:04:11,085 --> 01:04:12,486
It's nighttime.
They're all asleep.

908
01:04:12,620 --> 01:04:14,154
And all of a sudden,
Bernard says

909
01:04:14,288 --> 01:04:16,090
he was awakened
in the middle of the night.

910
01:04:16,223 --> 01:04:18,058
And it's George Platt Lynes
saying,

911
01:04:18,192 --> 01:04:22,062
"Perlin, get in here.
Fuck Dougie."

912
01:04:22,196 --> 01:04:24,666
And Bernard told me this story
about, you know,

913
01:04:24,799 --> 01:04:26,534
how, you know, he has to get up,

914
01:04:26,668 --> 01:04:29,203
he has to go in the bedroom,
he has to make love to Dougie,

915
01:04:29,336 --> 01:04:30,938
and George is there,
basically, you know,

916
01:04:31,071 --> 01:04:34,208
watching and recording.

917
01:04:34,341 --> 01:04:38,580
The stories are quite bawdy
sometimes, very, very explicit.

918
01:04:38,713 --> 01:04:40,682
On another evening
with a young model

919
01:04:40,815 --> 01:04:42,883
named Gary Garrett,

920
01:04:43,016 --> 01:04:45,986
and George likewise
pounded on the wall

921
01:04:46,120 --> 01:04:48,455
between their bedrooms--
"Perlin, get in here!"

922
01:04:48,590 --> 01:04:55,229
And on entering, the young man
was face-down on the bed.

923
01:04:55,362 --> 01:04:56,997
George was in a chair,

924
01:04:57,131 --> 01:05:01,101
and George instructed Bernard
to mount Gary

925
01:05:01,235 --> 01:05:04,238
because Gary had
just had a hemorrhoidectomy,

926
01:05:04,371 --> 01:05:08,242
and George's philosophy
was that he should

927
01:05:08,375 --> 01:05:10,944
remount the horse
as soon as possible

928
01:05:11,078 --> 01:05:17,217
and that Bernard just proceed
and do this young man
a service.

929
01:05:19,754 --> 01:05:22,189
It seemed to me

930
01:05:22,322 --> 01:05:25,827
somewhat, you know,
manipulative and sadistic.

931
01:05:33,233 --> 01:05:35,870
-♪ It's too darn hot ♪

932
01:05:36,003 --> 01:05:38,472
♪ It's too darn hot ♪

933
01:05:38,606 --> 01:05:40,708
-Kinsey was introduced
to George Platt Lynes

934
01:05:40,842 --> 01:05:43,444
through Glenway Wescott
and Monroe Wheeler.

935
01:05:43,578 --> 01:05:46,548
-There was such admiration
for Dr. Kinsey.

936
01:05:46,681 --> 01:05:49,316
Their literary circle,
they were just all in thrall

937
01:05:49,450 --> 01:05:51,553
to the research that he was
doing, and they were so eager

938
01:05:51,686 --> 01:05:54,021
to participate because
no one had done that

939
01:05:54,154 --> 01:05:56,423
kind of focused study
on homosexuality.

940
01:05:56,558 --> 01:06:01,395
It was a marvelous declaration
of hope and acceptance

941
01:06:01,529 --> 01:06:02,697
for them.

942
01:06:02,831 --> 01:06:05,365
-♪ According to
the Kinsey Report ♪

943
01:06:05,499 --> 01:06:08,736
♪ Every average man you know ♪

944
01:06:08,870 --> 01:06:11,138
-George and Kinsey hit it off.

945
01:06:11,271 --> 01:06:14,943
-He needed an expert
on homosexuality among men.

946
01:06:15,075 --> 01:06:17,177
-Kinsey became fascinated

947
01:06:17,311 --> 01:06:21,181
with the world that George knew.

948
01:06:21,315 --> 01:06:24,117
They got along famously.

949
01:06:24,251 --> 01:06:28,923
-♪ 'Cause it's too, too,
too darn hot ♪

950
01:06:29,056 --> 01:06:31,960
♪ It's too darn hot ♪

951
01:06:32,125 --> 01:06:37,331
♪ It's too, too darn hot ♪

952
01:06:38,465 --> 01:06:40,234
-Dr. Kinsey had just
published

953
01:06:40,367 --> 01:06:42,102
"Sexuality in the Human Male"

954
01:06:42,236 --> 01:06:44,104
and was looking for more
artistic

955
01:06:44,238 --> 01:06:46,306
and photographic representations

956
01:06:46,440 --> 01:06:50,477
of the nude male, of gay men.

957
01:06:50,612 --> 01:06:55,950
-Kinsey immediately started
collecting work from George.

958
01:06:56,083 --> 01:06:59,554
-Kinsey would frequently
come to New York

959
01:06:59,687 --> 01:07:03,758
and would attend some of these
all-male parties

960
01:07:03,892 --> 01:07:05,827
at George Lynes'.

961
01:07:05,960 --> 01:07:07,327
He was there as voyeur.

962
01:07:07,461 --> 01:07:09,396
He would be sitting on the sofa

963
01:07:09,531 --> 01:07:12,667
with his notebook, watching.

964
01:07:12,800 --> 01:07:15,435
-Kinsey is known to have said
that he thought

965
01:07:15,570 --> 01:07:19,072
that Lynes himself was one of
the most tender lovers

966
01:07:19,206 --> 01:07:23,912
he'd ever had the chance
to watch.

967
01:07:24,044 --> 01:07:25,713
-For him, it was taxonomic.

968
01:07:25,847 --> 01:07:29,349
It was-- It was so-called
proof of homosexuality.

969
01:07:29,483 --> 01:07:31,953
-♪ It's too darn hot ♪

970
01:07:32,085 --> 01:07:38,693
♪ It's too darn hot ♪

971
01:07:38,826 --> 01:07:41,228
-The conversations about

972
01:07:41,361 --> 01:07:43,631
just how the hell they were
gonna get the photographs

973
01:07:43,765 --> 01:07:47,535
from New York
to Bloomington, Indiana...

974
01:07:47,669 --> 01:07:51,673
In some ways,
just takes you back.

975
01:08:08,155 --> 01:08:12,359
-George was afraid that
this legacy of the male nudes,

976
01:08:12,492 --> 01:08:15,162
which he considered
his most important work,

977
01:08:15,295 --> 01:08:17,565
would disappear.

978
01:08:17,699 --> 01:08:20,568
Who would want them?
Who would take care of them?

979
01:08:20,702 --> 01:08:25,439
-Lynes is worried that
anyplace that they go,

980
01:08:25,573 --> 01:08:28,042
these really erotic nudes,

981
01:08:28,175 --> 01:08:31,111
something could happen to them.

982
01:08:31,244 --> 01:08:32,880
-Are you a member
of the Communist Party

983
01:08:33,014 --> 01:08:34,949
or have you ever been a member
of the Communist Party?

984
01:08:35,083 --> 01:08:38,418
-This was the McCarthy era,
the Red Scare era,

985
01:08:38,553 --> 01:08:42,422
and it was also
the Lavender Scare era.

986
01:08:45,359 --> 01:08:48,495
-And there were witch hunts
for homosexuals.

987
01:08:51,131 --> 01:08:57,071
-Gay men and lesbians
were also under suspicion.

988
01:09:04,646 --> 01:09:08,116
-Homosexuality was
the biggest taboo.

989
01:09:08,248 --> 01:09:10,084
Everyone was terrified of it.

990
01:09:19,694 --> 01:09:24,197
-It was illegal to put the work
in an envelope

991
01:09:24,331 --> 01:09:28,168
and send it across state lines.

992
01:09:28,301 --> 01:09:29,871
-They could have been arrested

993
01:09:30,004 --> 01:09:34,441
for the transport of these
"filthy" images.

994
01:09:34,575 --> 01:09:37,045
It was hot and dangerous stuff.

995
01:09:42,817 --> 01:09:46,286
-When Lynes started thinking
in a more sort of pointed way

996
01:09:46,420 --> 01:09:49,624
about his legacy, it was really
his relationship with Kinsey

997
01:09:49,757 --> 01:09:51,191
that I think made him realize

998
01:09:51,324 --> 01:09:52,760
that the Institute
for Sex Research,

999
01:09:52,894 --> 01:09:54,529
then to be called
the Kinsey Institute,

1000
01:09:54,662 --> 01:09:56,430
would be a safe space
for his work

1001
01:09:56,564 --> 01:09:59,634
to sort of be protected
and preserved.

1002
01:10:09,577 --> 01:10:12,146
So, that's how we are lucky
enough to have

1003
01:10:12,279 --> 01:10:14,949
this wonderful treasure trove.

1004
01:10:43,711 --> 01:10:47,515
-He was staring down a barrel
without knowing it.

1005
01:10:48,983 --> 01:10:52,120
-I was supposed to meet him
at the Plaza Hotel.

1006
01:10:52,252 --> 01:10:55,388
I saw this old man wandering
around the lobby there,

1007
01:10:55,523 --> 01:10:58,760
and I didn't know it was George.

1008
01:10:58,893 --> 01:11:02,262
And he had on
a black, ragged raincoat

1009
01:11:02,395 --> 01:11:06,834
and long hair,
which he had curled.

1010
01:11:07,001 --> 01:11:12,339
He was obviously not himself,
not like he used to be.

1011
01:11:34,662 --> 01:11:40,400
-He wanted to relive
his youth in Paris.

1012
01:11:40,535 --> 01:11:44,038
He was as excited as could be.

1013
01:11:44,172 --> 01:11:47,307
-His trip to Paris,

1014
01:11:47,440 --> 01:11:50,410
which he hoped
would rejuvenate him,

1015
01:11:50,545 --> 01:11:52,312
but it didn't.

1016
01:11:58,786 --> 01:12:00,254
-By the time he came back,

1017
01:12:00,387 --> 01:12:03,090
he was almost
immediately hospitalized.

1018
01:12:11,431 --> 01:12:16,503
-The devastation of cancer, and
the devastation was monumental.

1019
01:12:16,637 --> 01:12:18,438
I mean, it started in his lungs

1020
01:12:18,573 --> 01:12:20,274
and eventually went
to his brain.

1021
01:12:20,407 --> 01:12:22,176
-What a waste.

1022
01:12:36,657 --> 01:12:38,593
-We went to the ballet
a couple of times

1023
01:12:38,726 --> 01:12:43,396
after he got sick,
even from the hospital.

1024
01:12:43,531 --> 01:12:46,499
He was in bed at the hospital,
of course.

1025
01:12:46,634 --> 01:12:48,135
But he would get dressed,

1026
01:12:48,269 --> 01:12:52,974
we'd take a taxi from the
hospital and go to the theater.

1027
01:12:58,980 --> 01:13:01,115
-He got out of his
hospital gown,

1028
01:13:01,249 --> 01:13:03,351
put on his suit and tie,

1029
01:13:03,483 --> 01:13:06,386
and went AWOL
to go to the ballet.

1030
01:13:12,326 --> 01:13:15,796
-Only Uncle George would have
gotten out of a hospital bed

1031
01:13:15,930 --> 01:13:20,101
and gone AWOL, to the distress
of an entire nursing staff.

1032
01:13:20,234 --> 01:13:24,105
Not too many people would have
the balls to pull that one off.

1033
01:13:27,575 --> 01:13:29,143
Came back, took his clothes
off, and got in--

1034
01:13:29,277 --> 01:13:32,980
back into bed, and died
within the next few days.

1035
01:13:43,490 --> 01:13:46,661
-George was 47 when he died.

1036
01:14:01,375 --> 01:14:07,480
-I think about these things
now that I'm older.

1037
01:14:07,615 --> 01:14:10,851
It seems like
such a long time ago now.

1038
01:14:10,985 --> 01:14:15,022
But George reoccurs
in my dreams occasionally.

1039
01:14:27,702 --> 01:14:29,270
There was a large crowd
of people

1040
01:14:29,403 --> 01:14:34,375
that came to George's funeral
at Saint George's church.

1041
01:14:34,508 --> 01:14:37,945
-The funeral was
extremely well-attended.

1042
01:14:38,079 --> 01:14:41,282
All of his model friends,
all of his friends in fashion.

1043
01:14:41,415 --> 01:14:46,387
-There have been rumors
that there was an all-male orgy

1044
01:14:46,520 --> 01:14:52,460
that happened as a sort of
celebratory send-off to George.

1045
01:14:52,626 --> 01:14:53,761
-I went to the funeral.

1046
01:14:53,894 --> 01:14:55,429
I don't remember
there being any orgy,

1047
01:14:55,563 --> 01:14:58,099
but there could've been.

1048
01:14:58,232 --> 01:15:00,401
He had gang bangs.

1049
01:15:11,412 --> 01:15:14,415
-Near the end of his life,
George destroyed his
early work,

1050
01:15:14,548 --> 01:15:17,018
all of his fashion work.

1051
01:15:23,424 --> 01:15:25,659
-George was destroying so many

1052
01:15:25,793 --> 01:15:30,131
of those absolutely
wonderful portraits.

1053
01:15:34,769 --> 01:15:36,237
It was just George.

1054
01:15:50,951 --> 01:15:52,353
-When George passed away,

1055
01:15:52,486 --> 01:15:56,557
George had entrusted
his photographic negatives

1056
01:15:56,690 --> 01:15:59,693
and many of his prints
to Bernard,

1057
01:15:59,827 --> 01:16:04,198
and named Bernard
his artistic executor.

1058
01:16:19,080 --> 01:16:22,383
Bernard revered George,
he adored George.

1059
01:16:22,517 --> 01:16:26,521
In fact, Bernard passed away
in his bedroom

1060
01:16:26,654 --> 01:16:28,923
with a view of this photo.

1061
01:16:36,430 --> 01:16:37,698
-My name is Rebecca.

1062
01:16:37,832 --> 01:16:39,400
I'm the manager of
traveling exhibitions

1063
01:16:39,534 --> 01:16:42,303
for the Kinsey Institute.

1064
01:16:42,436 --> 01:16:47,708
I have been in the art world
for a long time.

1065
01:16:47,842 --> 01:16:50,244
I'd never heard of
George Platt Lynes.

1066
01:16:50,377 --> 01:16:54,048
And I was actually
really upset by that

1067
01:16:54,181 --> 01:16:59,220
because his work is
so phenomenally beautiful.

1068
01:16:59,353 --> 01:17:01,222
-I guess, somewhere
in your mind, you know about

1069
01:17:01,355 --> 01:17:03,157
that the Kinsey Institute
exists,

1070
01:17:03,290 --> 01:17:07,261
but I don't really think of it
being in the heart of Indiana.

1071
01:17:09,096 --> 01:17:11,732
One day, we went over
and met the folks

1072
01:17:11,866 --> 01:17:13,467
at the Kinsey Institute.

1073
01:17:13,602 --> 01:17:15,669
And because they knew we were
an art museum group, we said,

1074
01:17:15,803 --> 01:17:18,607
"Well, maybe there's a project
we could work on together."

1075
01:17:18,739 --> 01:17:21,208
And they said, "Well, we have
over 4,000 works of art here."

1076
01:17:21,342 --> 01:17:23,644
Which again, I was like,
"Well, that makes total sense,"

1077
01:17:23,777 --> 01:17:26,814
but I never knew
they collected art.

1078
01:17:27,948 --> 01:17:29,518
That's where I first
really learned

1079
01:17:29,650 --> 01:17:31,185
the story of George Platt Lynes,

1080
01:17:31,318 --> 01:17:32,920
his relationship
with Alfred Kinsey

1081
01:17:33,053 --> 01:17:35,456
that in some ways
saved his legacy.

1082
01:17:35,590 --> 01:17:38,225
And the story, to me,
was just so amazing

1083
01:17:38,359 --> 01:17:41,195
that it seemed logical that
we needed to do a show on it.

1084
01:17:48,369 --> 01:17:50,771
-The Kinsey Institute has
the largest collection

1085
01:17:50,905 --> 01:17:53,174
of George Platt Lynes' work.

1086
01:17:53,307 --> 01:17:56,277
This is a chance to elevate
an artist

1087
01:17:56,410 --> 01:17:59,780
who should be in the canon,
but is not.

1088
01:18:04,351 --> 01:18:06,120
-Why there hasn't been
a major exhibition

1089
01:18:06,253 --> 01:18:07,988
of George Platt Lynes' work,

1090
01:18:08,122 --> 01:18:11,792
at least not on this scale,
and to our knowledge, ever--

1091
01:18:11,926 --> 01:18:13,327
I think that's a really
deep question.

1092
01:18:13,460 --> 01:18:15,763
I think it has a lot to do
with his sexuality,

1093
01:18:15,896 --> 01:18:17,698
with his content.

1094
01:18:20,034 --> 01:18:23,904
-We've had some negative
feedback about this show.

1095
01:18:24,038 --> 01:18:25,640
-I did get some hate mail.

1096
01:18:25,773 --> 01:18:29,243
I got one magazine written back
across, it just said "smut."

1097
01:18:29,376 --> 01:18:32,012
But that, to me, makes it
all the more important

1098
01:18:32,146 --> 01:18:34,782
that we would be doing
an exhibition like this

1099
01:18:34,915 --> 01:18:38,219
because it's still
relevant today.

1100
01:18:38,352 --> 01:18:42,089
There's no better time
than absolutely right now

1101
01:18:42,223 --> 01:18:44,158
in a country that frankly
has discriminated

1102
01:18:44,291 --> 01:18:46,060
against a lot of different
groups of people

1103
01:18:46,193 --> 01:18:48,796
over its whole history and
still does today in many ways.

1104
01:18:48,929 --> 01:18:55,803
So, Lynes, even though he's
been dead since 1955,
is so relevant.

1105
01:18:55,936 --> 01:18:58,839
I mean, it would be
an ironic, horrible end

1106
01:18:58,973 --> 01:19:01,375
to his legacy to the world
to have it also

1107
01:19:01,509 --> 01:19:03,944
technically stay,
live in the darkness.

1108
01:19:04,078 --> 01:19:07,414
And we help him live again
and keep his legacy alive.

1109
01:19:21,395 --> 01:19:24,666
-This seems legendary
at this point, but it's real.

1110
01:19:24,798 --> 01:19:30,705
George entrusted a box,
a so-called secret box,

1111
01:19:30,838 --> 01:19:33,675
to the Kinsey Institute.

1112
01:19:33,807 --> 01:19:36,176
-I love trying to
push boundaries,

1113
01:19:36,310 --> 01:19:39,246
and so I think there was, like,
a moment where I was like,

1114
01:19:39,380 --> 01:19:41,949
"So, like,
how can we look in that box?"

1115
01:19:42,082 --> 01:19:44,719
-I know about the box,
and I've never seen the box.

1116
01:19:44,852 --> 01:19:46,453
I don't know what's in the box.

1117
01:19:46,588 --> 01:19:48,188
At one point,
some of the negatives

1118
01:19:48,322 --> 01:19:50,424
that I worked on digitizing,
I kind of thought,

1119
01:19:50,558 --> 01:19:52,527
"Oh, maybe these
are part of it," and no.

1120
01:19:52,661 --> 01:19:56,497
-Oh, gosh, you know,
there it is, languishing away.

1121
01:19:56,631 --> 01:19:58,465
What's in that box?

1122
01:19:58,600 --> 01:20:00,968
It's like the holy grail.

1123
01:20:01,101 --> 01:20:02,604
-There is a box
in the collection

1124
01:20:02,737 --> 01:20:05,540
that George Platt Lynes
had requested to keep private,

1125
01:20:05,674 --> 01:20:07,642
and we have kept it private.

1126
01:20:07,776 --> 01:20:13,581
I don't know that the box
will ever be made public.

1127
01:20:13,715 --> 01:20:16,050
I have not seen the contents
of this box.

1128
01:20:16,183 --> 01:20:17,619
-Oh.
-Yeah.

1129
01:20:23,257 --> 01:20:27,161
-Why did we lose track
of George Platt Lynes?

1130
01:20:27,294 --> 01:20:29,830
How did he manage
to drop out of history?

1131
01:20:29,963 --> 01:20:32,767
-I don't know
why he disappeared.

1132
01:20:32,900 --> 01:20:34,968
-I...
Honestly, I don't know.

1133
01:20:35,102 --> 01:20:38,506
-Why do you think
George Platt Lynes disappeared?

1134
01:20:38,640 --> 01:20:39,973
-Well, I have no idea.

1135
01:20:40,107 --> 01:20:42,242
He was such an incredibly
amazing photographer.

1136
01:20:42,376 --> 01:20:44,713
And, I mean, I never
fully understood

1137
01:20:44,845 --> 01:20:48,248
why he seemed to become
so eclipsed for a certain time

1138
01:20:48,382 --> 01:20:51,485
until, in essence,
his rediscovery.

1139
01:21:03,464 --> 01:21:06,835
-My name is John Olsen,
and I worked for Frederick Koch

1140
01:21:06,967 --> 01:21:09,937
for the last 13 years
of his life.

1141
01:21:10,070 --> 01:21:12,339
He was the son
of Fred Chase Koch.

1142
01:21:12,473 --> 01:21:17,846
He had a tremendous fortune
and collected voraciously--

1143
01:21:17,978 --> 01:21:21,882
houses, art, furniture.

1144
01:21:22,015 --> 01:21:28,021
This is all
the Platt Lynes prints

1145
01:21:28,155 --> 01:21:32,326
that came from
Bernard Perlin's estate.

1146
01:21:32,459 --> 01:21:36,698
In 1985, Fred bought
the enormous estate

1147
01:21:36,831 --> 01:21:38,533
of George Platt Lynes--

1148
01:21:38,666 --> 01:21:42,704
the items that weren't given,
I think, to Kinsey--

1149
01:21:42,837 --> 01:21:45,372
and had it all carefully
catalogued and then boxed

1150
01:21:45,507 --> 01:21:47,842
and placed in shelves
in storage here.

1151
01:21:47,975 --> 01:21:50,545
And I don't...
We never looked at them.

1152
01:21:50,678 --> 01:21:52,079
And he never...

1153
01:21:52,212 --> 01:21:54,314
You know, he didn't really
discuss them much.

1154
01:21:54,448 --> 01:21:56,984
So, this is
the photography library,

1155
01:21:57,117 --> 01:22:01,723
and these are a lot
of the collection albums.

1156
01:22:01,856 --> 01:22:03,457
George Tichenor and Jonathan.

1157
01:22:03,591 --> 01:22:09,062
And these are two albums
of some of his best nudes.

1158
01:22:09,196 --> 01:22:13,200
-Fred Koch amassed
an enormous collection,

1159
01:22:13,333 --> 01:22:17,271
that when he died
last year, in 2020,

1160
01:22:17,404 --> 01:22:20,140
I was asked to go in
and appraise it.

1161
01:22:20,274 --> 01:22:25,312
And really, nobody knew
exactly what was there.

1162
01:22:25,446 --> 01:22:30,484
It was like walking into
King Tut's tomb.

1163
01:22:30,618 --> 01:22:32,319
-At the beginning of
the appraisal process,

1164
01:22:32,453 --> 01:22:34,321
we thought maybe
they were 8,000 items.

1165
01:22:34,455 --> 01:22:36,123
And by the time
she was finished,

1166
01:22:36,256 --> 01:22:38,760
she said it's close to 20,000.

1167
01:22:38,893 --> 01:22:45,733
All of these cases, boxes
are filled with cards,

1168
01:22:45,867 --> 01:22:47,968
each one representing
a different photograph

1169
01:22:48,101 --> 01:22:50,337
or a different album.

1170
01:22:50,471 --> 01:22:52,774
-When we look at archives
like this,

1171
01:22:52,907 --> 01:22:55,242
our worlds open up
and we realize anything

1172
01:22:55,375 --> 01:22:57,478
that has been written
about these photographers,

1173
01:22:57,612 --> 01:23:01,950
where they have been placed
in the course of history,

1174
01:23:02,082 --> 01:23:03,918
is this big.

1175
01:23:04,051 --> 01:23:06,987
-I've been visiting this house
for more than 30 years.

1176
01:23:07,120 --> 01:23:08,523
And today was the first day

1177
01:23:08,656 --> 01:23:11,124
that we really dug into,
you know,

1178
01:23:11,258 --> 01:23:13,026
the archives of what's here.

1179
01:23:13,160 --> 01:23:15,730
It's incredible.

1180
01:23:15,864 --> 01:23:19,868
Maybe Fred-- he didn't
even realize what was here.

1181
01:23:20,000 --> 01:23:22,904
The joy really was in
assembling the collections

1182
01:23:23,036 --> 01:23:27,040
more than, you know,
sharing them.

1183
01:23:36,049 --> 01:23:40,955
-George never entered
the official photographic
canon.

1184
01:23:41,088 --> 01:23:42,757
He's not the kind of figure

1185
01:23:42,891 --> 01:23:47,094
that most photography
histories include,

1186
01:23:47,227 --> 01:23:49,096
and when they include him,

1187
01:23:49,229 --> 01:23:52,165
he's really considered
a secondary figure.

1188
01:23:52,299 --> 01:23:53,535
-It's really hard to know

1189
01:23:53,668 --> 01:23:55,435
the extent
of George Platt Lynes' work

1190
01:23:55,570 --> 01:23:59,039
because it was distributed
in such weird ways

1191
01:23:59,172 --> 01:24:01,241
and sold piecemeal.

1192
01:24:01,375 --> 01:24:06,614
-His legacy was sleeping
in storage boxes,

1193
01:24:06,748 --> 01:24:08,448
in file cabinets.

1194
01:24:08,583 --> 01:24:11,553
-If the works essentially
stayed in the closet,

1195
01:24:11,686 --> 01:24:16,390
that's where his legacy
is going to reside.

1196
01:24:18,860 --> 01:24:24,498
-Male nudes have never been
acceptable at the museum level.

1197
01:24:24,632 --> 01:24:30,672
-There is undeniably
a double standard

1198
01:24:30,805 --> 01:24:37,177
in the representation of
female nudes versus male nudes.

1199
01:24:37,311 --> 01:24:40,247
-With the female nude,
we're able to separate--

1200
01:24:40,380 --> 01:24:43,651
"this is art,
this is the naughty."

1201
01:24:43,785 --> 01:24:47,789
With the male nude,
I think it gets very confusing.

1202
01:24:47,922 --> 01:24:51,091
What did the male have?
A lot of dangly parts.

1203
01:24:51,224 --> 01:24:54,227
And what do you do with that?

1204
01:24:54,361 --> 01:24:58,231
-It is frustrating for me
as a woman to walk around

1205
01:24:58,365 --> 01:25:02,870
and see naked women
everywhere in art museums,

1206
01:25:03,004 --> 01:25:08,141
and, like, there's one penis
and everyone is freaking out.

1207
01:25:10,444 --> 01:25:15,115
The male body is much more
threatening to people.

1208
01:25:18,886 --> 01:25:22,222
-I think that there is
renewed interest

1209
01:25:22,356 --> 01:25:24,792
in George Platt Lynes now

1210
01:25:24,926 --> 01:25:27,762
because he's extremely relevant
to the kind of art that people

1211
01:25:27,895 --> 01:25:30,665
are making and the kind of
lives that people are leading.

1212
01:25:30,798 --> 01:25:34,102
-I think there's a way for him
to be appreciated now

1213
01:25:34,234 --> 01:25:38,573
that didn't exist
10 or 20 years ago,

1214
01:25:38,706 --> 01:25:40,775
certainly not
when he was living.

1215
01:25:40,908 --> 01:25:44,344
-George Platt Lynes perhaps now
is on the radar more than ever.

1216
01:25:44,478 --> 01:25:47,615
There's a kind of resurgence
of interest in his work.

1217
01:25:47,749 --> 01:25:50,918
-George Platt Lynes had
a tremendous influence,

1218
01:25:51,052 --> 01:25:53,453
both directly and indirectly,

1219
01:25:53,588 --> 01:25:58,960
on subsequent generations
of photographers.

1220
01:25:59,093 --> 01:26:00,828
-You sense his work

1221
01:26:00,962 --> 01:26:04,398
in the work of artists
of the '70s and '80s.

1222
01:26:04,532 --> 01:26:09,771
Shows that it still circulated
and had a lot of power.

1223
01:26:09,904 --> 01:26:13,975
-Lynes basically gave
the subsequent photographers

1224
01:26:14,108 --> 01:26:19,647
the freedom to explore
making work with the male nude.

1225
01:26:19,781 --> 01:26:21,616
-Peter Hujar and Mapplethorpe,

1226
01:26:21,749 --> 01:26:23,851
and there's a series
of photographs

1227
01:26:23,985 --> 01:26:27,722
that George Platt Lynes took
just of men's heads at climax,

1228
01:26:27,855 --> 01:26:30,958
which seemed to me
to prefigure Warhol.

1229
01:26:31,092 --> 01:26:34,662
-So, this is a great example
of a very obvious,

1230
01:26:34,796 --> 01:26:37,565
clear photograph

1231
01:26:37,699 --> 01:26:41,201
that Robert Mapplethorpe
would have been inspired by.

1232
01:26:41,334 --> 01:26:44,371
-I don't know why George
hasn't risen

1233
01:26:44,504 --> 01:26:49,877
to the mythological plane
of Robert Mapplethorpe.

1234
01:26:50,011 --> 01:26:54,615
I think it's only because
George produced his body
of work

1235
01:26:54,749 --> 01:26:59,654
at a moment in time
that is often overlooked.

1236
01:27:01,556 --> 01:27:05,560
-It would be fantastic to have
a major institution

1237
01:27:05,693 --> 01:27:10,064
launch a one-man-- a show
devoted to George Platt Lynes.

1238
01:27:10,198 --> 01:27:11,799
-It's crucial that there be

1239
01:27:11,933 --> 01:27:14,836
a major museum exhibition
of this work

1240
01:27:14,969 --> 01:27:19,907
because it really requires
sort of significant analysis.

1241
01:27:21,743 --> 01:27:24,112
-Why a major museum
has never shown

1242
01:27:24,244 --> 01:27:26,714
his nudes, I don't understand.

1243
01:27:26,848 --> 01:27:28,116
So, you know,

1244
01:27:28,248 --> 01:27:30,618
it's something to do with
American puritanism, I think.

1245
01:27:30,752 --> 01:27:33,187
For years and years, it was
impossible to show anything

1246
01:27:33,320 --> 01:27:35,388
that even hinted
at homosexuality

1247
01:27:35,523 --> 01:27:37,457
in American museums.

1248
01:27:37,592 --> 01:27:39,594
My museum would be delighted
to show his work

1249
01:27:39,727 --> 01:27:42,429
if we could access enough of it.

1250
01:27:42,563 --> 01:27:43,831
It fits perfectly
into our collection.

1251
01:27:43,965 --> 01:27:45,733
I mean, look around you.
What do I have here?

1252
01:27:45,867 --> 01:27:49,971
I have a pretty,
pretty targeted collection.

1253
01:27:51,773 --> 01:27:54,441
-We have to find a way
to make this collection,

1254
01:27:54,575 --> 01:27:56,778
his other collections,
accessible to the public.

1255
01:27:56,911 --> 01:28:00,615
Fred's will directed the
establishment of a foundation,

1256
01:28:00,748 --> 01:28:02,650
and it's in its infancy
right now.

1257
01:28:02,784 --> 01:28:08,556
It's a huge opportunity to be
able to share Lynes' work.

1258
01:28:10,091 --> 01:28:16,197
-What we'd like to do
is allow him to be seen

1259
01:28:16,329 --> 01:28:18,800
as he was seen

1260
01:28:18,933 --> 01:28:22,435
during the days in which he was
a successful photographer.

1261
01:28:22,570 --> 01:28:25,106
-We need to have that
overall contextualization

1262
01:28:25,239 --> 01:28:29,610
and get him back into the canon
of photographic art history.

1263
01:28:29,744 --> 01:28:33,181
-There are so many pictures
that we've never seen before

1264
01:28:33,313 --> 01:28:34,549
or have never been published.

1265
01:28:34,682 --> 01:28:36,449
So, that's kind of intriguing.

1266
01:28:36,584 --> 01:28:41,022
There's always more
of a mystery about
Mr. George Platt Lynes.

1267
01:28:44,792 --> 01:28:49,797
-His is a story that was
extinguished way too soon.

1268
01:28:49,931 --> 01:28:52,567
He was a man who was so driven,

1269
01:28:52,700 --> 01:28:58,639
not only as a liver of life,
but as a creator.

1270
01:28:58,773 --> 01:29:00,842
-With George Platt Lynes,

1271
01:29:00,975 --> 01:29:03,778
we have to realize that we're
almost doing
an archeology here,

1272
01:29:03,911 --> 01:29:08,816
that we're looking at fragments
of an enormous person.

1273
01:29:08,950 --> 01:29:12,620
I think to understand George
is to see him, not only his art

1274
01:29:12,753 --> 01:29:16,489
but his life,
in the context of his time.

1275
01:29:18,025 --> 01:29:20,895
So, step back and look and say,
well, where did he fit in

1276
01:29:21,028 --> 01:29:23,130
with Gertrude
and Alice, and why?

1277
01:29:23,264 --> 01:29:26,934
And who was this famous young
writer who was
fascinated by him

1278
01:29:27,068 --> 01:29:28,836
and ended up with giving him
to his boyfriend,

1279
01:29:28,970 --> 01:29:31,939
and they had to live together
for 30 years?

1280
01:29:32,073 --> 01:29:33,641
And who were the people
that they knew

1281
01:29:33,774 --> 01:29:35,475
and that they collaborated with

1282
01:29:35,610 --> 01:29:38,813
and who influenced them
and who they influenced,

1283
01:29:38,946 --> 01:29:41,849
this community
that moved through history?

1284
01:29:41,983 --> 01:29:45,452
And that's what is waiting
to be reassembled.

1285
01:29:45,586 --> 01:29:47,321
The bits that are here,
the bits that are there,

1286
01:29:47,454 --> 01:29:50,825
the museum that has this,
the collection that has that.

1287
01:29:50,958 --> 01:29:55,495
Put the puzzle back together
and be amazed at what you see.

1288
01:29:59,166 --> 01:30:03,871
It's more than he was
a wonderful photographer.

1289
01:30:04,005 --> 01:30:08,643
It's more than that he was
a gay hero.

1290
01:30:08,776 --> 01:30:12,179
It's more than he was
a fascinating person.

1291
01:30:12,313 --> 01:30:14,548
It's more than he was beloved.

1292
01:30:14,682 --> 01:30:16,817
It's all of those things.

1293
01:30:21,756 --> 01:30:23,925
It's the story of his life.

1294
01:31:40,101 --> 01:31:41,335
-Oh, my gosh.

1295
01:31:41,469 --> 01:31:43,004
I would have loved to have met
George Platt Lynes.

1296
01:31:43,137 --> 01:31:45,139
-We would have gotten on
famously.

1297
01:31:46,774 --> 01:31:48,809
-Oh, I never met him, no,
but I wish I had met--

1298
01:31:48,943 --> 01:31:51,145
Oh, he's probably-- Yes, we
could have met, my dear.

1299
01:31:51,278 --> 01:31:53,714
-I would have loved
to have met him, of course.

1300
01:31:53,848 --> 01:31:56,217
-I don't know if I would have
been cool enough for him.

1301
01:31:57,918 --> 01:31:59,720
He would have liked the hat.
You know?

1302
01:31:59,854 --> 01:32:01,288
-I'd like to take a walk
with him.

1303
01:32:01,422 --> 01:32:04,392
-I would have loved
to have been given a cocktail

1304
01:32:04,525 --> 01:32:06,027
by George Platt Lynes.

1305
01:32:06,160 --> 01:32:07,895
-I would've liked
to go to his parties.

1306
01:32:08,029 --> 01:32:11,298
-Wonderful, delicious stories
and gossip.

1307
01:32:11,432 --> 01:32:13,834
-I was always curious about
what he might've sounded like.

1308
01:32:13,968 --> 01:32:15,503
It's through the photographs

1309
01:32:15,636 --> 01:32:18,139
that we must reconstruct
this personality.

1310
01:32:18,272 --> 01:32:21,142
-I would have loved to have met
George Platt Lynes.

1311
01:32:21,275 --> 01:32:24,779
And I think that probably
within a matter of 10 minutes,

1312
01:32:24,912 --> 01:32:27,048
we would probably have
some kind of argument.

1313
01:32:28,682 --> 01:32:35,156
-But I don't know if we would
be diehard friends for life.

1314
01:32:35,289 --> 01:32:38,392
-What would I ask him?
You know, "How did you do it?"

1315
01:32:38,527 --> 01:32:40,194
"How did you talk
all these people

1316
01:32:40,327 --> 01:32:43,998
into taking off their clothes,
including your relatives?"

1317
01:32:44,131 --> 01:32:45,766
-I think we would talk
about the things

1318
01:32:45,900 --> 01:32:47,835
that gay guys talk about now,
which is, like, hot guys

1319
01:32:47,968 --> 01:32:50,337
that you fucked, movie stars
that you think are pretty,

1320
01:32:50,471 --> 01:32:54,909
and, like, the books that
you read that are really good.

1321
01:32:55,042 --> 01:32:57,445
-I think it would have been
interesting to meet George.