~WALTER ROBINSON & SIMON CERIGO: & the Chimp Reporter Painting, 1986
SIMON CERIGO, with WALTER ROBINSON’s very funny . . ‘Chimp Reporter’ painting.
in his short-lived . . Simon Cerigo Gallery – 212 Ave A in the East Village, circa 1986.
that’s a box of Huggie diapers for baby Kate, on the floor beside him . . that’s how I can date it.
Simon probably purchased well over 10 paintings, if not more – of Walter’s work in the 80s and early 90s. as soon as he had a couple of grand, he’d buy another. the first few were bought straight from Metro Pictures, the rest directly from Walter himself. Walter’s gig at Metro sort of fell apart – almost as soon as it started. we were never quite sure if Walter sabotaged himself, there were rumors he was contrarian in terms of what the gallery wanted. or, if it was because ELI BROAD, who was buying up the Pictures generation, like Cindy Sherman and Gregory Crewdson, from the same Metro Pictures gallery, like they were dime store candy . . just totally, TOTALLY . . missed the boat on Walter ?
I’ll spare you my usual rant on ELI BROAD, that he’s nowhere close to what he’s chalked himself up to be . . but, hey: what do I know ????? lol !!!!!
SIMON CERIGO over . . ELI BROAD – any day !!
we had over the years, just to name a few, that ELI does not !! the original ‘LOVE HOTEL’ large color photo by MARIKO MORI, JACK GOLDSTEIN’S largest ‘lightning’ painting, the first VANESSA BEESCROFT paintings of Amish-looking women, and . . plenty of DAN ASHER works, another sleeper . . . no doubt.
and then of course, from 2002 onwards, ELI has nothing on . . art lovers !!
game over, dude.
anyways . . they, Walter’s paintings . . became a really hard sell, except for his sister, Helene the doctor !! this painting could not be sold for love or . . money. even Helene didn’t want it. I didn’t get why it didn’t fly out the window – it was a riot . . . and, neither did Simon. he desperately tried to sell it many many times over, for at least 15 years !! I think at one point Walter even began to think that Simon’s relentless flogging of his work – was a liability !!
so: too bad Simon didn’t live to see his instincts . . slam a home run / thanks in good part to BARRY BLINDERMAN, also an early die-hard, hard-core fan of Walter’s from back in the day, the early Lower East Side days – who put together that fab huge traveling retrospective, that got the ball rolling. and also produced that wonderful catalog – which just keeps on snowballing & Walter’s work . . is finally selling – like pancakes.
finally, my ole artnet ‘boss’ is getting his true blue dues – after spending way too long talking about . . other people’s art.
and in part, being dismissed, because of that.
don’t even get me . . started.
I wonder what Walter is going to be like – as a millionaire ?
and, just in case you weren’t aware of it: it was Walter himself, who bestowed that mortifying handle: artloversnewyork – on me !!
so . . . watch out !!
Revenge of the Under-Rated . . has just begun !!
life ‘Under the Volcano’ of the Lower East Side, in the 80s & 90s is about . .
to . . . e-r-u-p-t !!
PHOTO: NANCY SMITH