Lot Details
Lot 1137
JACKIE CURTIS Questionnaire responses.
A manuscript on the back panel of a manila envelope, circa 1971, offering Jackie Curtis' answers to a questionnaire of some kind. 11 x 9 inches (28 x 23 cm); the text likely in Brigid Berlin's hand, with a stapled guard sheet and a small notebook sheet attached offering a few of Berlin's own responses. Toned and with irregular edges, fine overall.
Jackie Curtis' responses to a questionnaire and while not all the questions are present, the answers quite amusing. The first answer, to an unknown question, is: "1. Everybody has seen my legs." Number 7 asks for fictional heroes to which Curtis' has responded "Horatio Alger, A. Warhol, J. Curtis." Number 13 asks for the "best traits of your character - when my nipples get hard." At the end heroines are listed as "Julia Warhola [and] Jackie Curtis." Heroes are listed as "J. Deen (sic); A. Warhol; Gary Cooper; J. Curtis; Taylor Mead."
Questionnaires were popular around Warhol's Factory and they were frequently used to get the juices flowing for Interview. Jackie Curtis (1947-1985) is one of the best known Warhol Superstars having been featured in Flesh, 1968, and with Holly Woodlawn in Women in Revolt, 1971. Curtis was also the playwright of Vain Victory: Vicissitudes of the Damned, 1971, mentioned in this questionnaire as the response to question 12. Jackie Curtis performed both as a man and a woman, the combination of ripped stocking and glitter makeup an inspiration to the glam rock movement that followed. Andy Warhol said "Jackie Curtis is not a drag queen. Jackie is an artist. A pioneer without a frontier." Curtis was memorialized in Lou Reed's 1972 classic Walk on the Wild Side and the present questionnaire, listing "J. Deen" as a hero, further cements Reed's lyrics: "Jackie is just speeding away/Thought she was James Dean for a day..."
C Estate of Brigid Berlin
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