A blog reader writes: "Just re-watched the BBC 1981 “Chelsea Hotel”, and was simultaneously searching as to the life stories of the main characters, some familiar, some not. One that I can find absolutely no trace of is the dancer Bernard Lyce. Anyone know his story during and after his Chelsea years? Even the IMDB…

From the Press Release: Slag Gallery  announces Stella Waitzkin: These Books Are Paintings, a solo exhibition of work by the sculptor Stella Waitzkin (1920-2003). The show features a selection of significant pieces dating from the late 1970s to the early 1990s. In these works, we see a range of compositional approaches the artist applied to her…

If you’re looking for something fun to do over the holidays, look no further than the Irish Rep, our favorite neighborhood theatre, right around the corner on 22nd St. They’re staging a delightful production of former Chelsea Hotel resident Dylan Thomas’s “A Child’s Christmas in Wales.” The play is based on Thomas’s famous 1954 poem…

Featuring some images shot in the former room 822 at the Chelsea Hotel SEX makes a reappearance at this year’s Art Basel.  Artnet wonders if the world is ready? “Sealed in a condom-like Mylar sheath, Sex sold over 150,000 copies on the day of its release. The New York Times dubbed it “deliberately degenerate hoopla.” It featured not…

It took one punch to start a gay revolution. It took a gender-bending lesbian to throw that punch.This is her story!   A play with music based on a true story and real events, STORMÉ recounts the life and times of Stormé DeLarverie, a Big Band singer (aka Stormy Dale) during the ‘40s and a…

Readers in France still have time to make it to The Recontres d'Arles Bettina exhibit. Her work is on display until August 28. The Rencontres d'Arles presents the first monographic exhibition of American artist Bettina Grossman, better known as Bettina. Bettina spent the first years of her career in Europe before returning to the United States…

Rick Librizzi, who died last year at 82, grew up in a house by the railroad tracks, and while he didn’t ride the rails during the depression like his roustabout father, it’s to the railroad that he attributes his subsequent career in art: My friend said, “That’s abstract expressionism.” I [that is, Rick] said, “What?!…

In case you’ve never been, Opus 40 is a 60-acre sculpture garden outside of Woodstock, NY. Its centerpiece is a spectacular 6.5-acre bluestone earthwork that looks like a cross between Stonehenge and a Mayan pyramid. We went there over the weekend for, of all things, a poetry reading by Chelsea Hotel friend and fellow traveler…

All of us still living at the Chelsea remember Rene Ricard—because who could forget him? And we all have our share of more or less scandalous anecdotes to relate concerning the famously brilliant wild man, who lived here for (approximately) the last two decades of his life. But for those of you who don’t know,…