Intimate Companions: A Triography of George Platt Lynes, Paul Cadmus, Lincoln Kirstein, and Their Circle

by David Leddick

Photographer George Platt Lynes, painter Paul Cadmus, and critic Lincoln Kirstein played a major role in creating the institutions of the American art world from the late 1920s to the early 1950s. The three created a remarkable world of gay aesthetics and desire in art with the help of their overlapping circle of friends, lovers, and collaborators.

Through hours of conversation with surviving members with their circle and unprecedented access to papers, journals, and previously unreleased photos, David Leddick has resurrected the influences of this now-vanished art world along with the lives and loves of all three artists in this groundbreaking biography.

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, LGBT

336 pages, Paperback

First published April 22, 2000

About the author

David Leddick is the author of several novels as well as several highly-regarded art photography books. His novels include "My Worst Date," "Never Eat In," "The Sex Squad," "The Handsomest Man in the World," and his art compilations include "The Male Nude", "Secrets of the Chorus" which was mounted in a concert production in 2003 and is at work on two other musicals. Leddick was formerly worldwide creative director for L'Oreal and Revlon. He divides his time among homes in Miami Beach, Paris and Montevideo.

Reviews

[Sketchbook · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wanna slip between the fact-fiction sheets and poke into sexual whatchims about American arts (forget a serious study) and who did what behind (mostly) closed doors?

A socio-sexual bio, covering dance, music, photography of
always horny George Platt Lynes, Lincoln Kirstein, Paul
Cadmus and how they interacted w Glenway Westcott, Monroe Wheeler, Katherine Anne Porter, Virgil Thomson, heiress Barbara Harrison, thespian Ruth Ford and her brud's lover, Pavel Tchelitchev, fashion model Laurie Douglas, Isherwood & childe Bachardy -- they're doing their (usually) queer performance art, plus others you've only wondered about. This is according to author Leddick and deserves an ambitious examination about connected lives from an intelligent writer who wants to play cultural doctor--.

Author Leddick, who has posted sex tips on YT, strokes
several decades of artistic evolution and sexual dithers
w unzipped humor and (unintentional) campy asides. There's a story here (or TV series), but this unduly carefree book delivers a gossipy French bedroom farce minus one exception: no one's hiding in the closet.

[Jesse · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's almost fail-proof material: the fascinating criss-crossing connections—both professionally and personally—of the queer* men whose art and dedication to artistic ideals not only helped establish, in the words of cover synopsis, "a world of gay aesthetics and desire in art that was groundbreaking at the time and remarkable even today," but left an indelible mark on 20th century American art and culture in general. Though the (loooong) title indicates the three figures Leddick specifically focuses upon in his study, it quickly becomes apparent that the life work of these three men intersect with so many others that whole sections, if not entire chapters, become devoted to other individuals, including Glenway Wescott, Monroe Wheeler, Pavel Tchelitchev, Chick Austin, Jared French, Charles Henri Ford, and countless others. Leddick is particularly adept at evoking the vibrancy of the era and all of its various social, artistic, and sexual layers and nuances, and I appreciated the way that he attempts to analyze the vast set of interconnections between an artist's persona life and their artistic output, and a certain painting or photograph often serves as a kaleidoscopic prism through which to explore a wide array of topics historical, personal and otherwise. It certainly makes for an engaging and quick read.

This all said, I still have significant issues with this study. Leddick is also a fiction writer, and there were a number of times I wish that he let the material speak for itself instead of embroidering it with fiction-inspired literary techniques, as sometimes the tones becomes rather annoyingly gossipy, and I skipped all of the fictionalized chapters written in the second person ("you've worked with Miss Dietrich a couple of times and she can be quite a bitch," etc). These section, thankfully, are helpfully printed in italics and easy to spot and skim. It's not that I was looking for a sober, ponderous academic analysis of these figures—that would almost certainly be to miss the spirit of this particular milieu—but sometimes Leddick's approach undercuts his subject matter in a way I'm assuming he did not intend.

And really, it must, be said: if this book implicitly suggests some kind of a gay aesthetic sensibility, the tacky hideousness of this cover stands as a direct affront to it. The elegant Platt Lynes and Kirstein in particular would be horrified. For shame.

___________

*I'm hesitant to categorically lump all of the individuals detailed here simply as "gay" in the same way that the book does, as many of these individuals did not have sexual relationships exclusively with men, and would resist categorizing their sexuality in such a rigid manner. As such, I fall back on the pedantically academic, equally anachronistic "queer," as it allows for a certain fluidity of sexuality and sexual expression that more accurately reflects historical realities.

[R E · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the end, Intimate Companions by David Leddick is worth reading. It constructs a group portrait of a circle of gay and bisexual men across the 20th century, each of whom made noteworthy and at times pivotal contributions to America’s cultural life. The book has substantial flaws but provides an important contribution to both LGBTQ history and also to arts history by tracing the interconnections between photographer George Platt Lynes, painter Paul Cadmus, and ballet impresario Lincoln Kirstein, whose influence spanned the visual and performing arts and established international cultural connections that continue to resonate.

One of the book’s strong points is that it pays as much attention, if not more, to the models used by Lynes, Cadmus, fellow painters Pavel Tchelitchew, Jared French and George Tooker, and others as it does to the artists themselves. Many of these male models were dancers, and many became friends and lovers to the circle of men at the heart of this triography. Some of these models were given guidance and encouragement to pursue their own careers while some secured jobs as assistants. Some, such as Jonathan Tichenor, had same sex affairs with the artists and later settled into traditional marriages, and others, such as Jensen Yow, remained loyal friends throughout their lives. Still other models, such as Richard Sisson and Peter Hanson, became romantically involved with each other, even establishing long-term relationships.

Other times, the young men who came into this group’s orbit had multiple lovers within the circle, made possible by relationships that were frequently open, such as that between Monroe Wheeler and Glenway Wescott. In fact, George Platt Lynes was involved with both Wheeler and Wescott for many years. In the 50’s, some of these beautiful young men became the object of the work and outright voyeurism of Alfred Kinsey. Both Platt Lynes and Wescott arranged orgies that Kinsey would observe, Platt Lynes was commissioned to make over 100 prints for the Kinsey Institute, and Wescott may have been Kinsey’s lover for a time.

At the same time, other relationships in the circle were exclusive and long term, as that between George Tooker and Bill Christopher. Although, early on, Paul Cadmus was in a long relationship with Jared French, he finally left French when it became clear French wouldn’t refrain from seeing other men. Cadmus spent the rest of his long life with singer Jon Andersson.

While Intimate Companions will be of interest to those already intrigued by the men and women in this circle, I’m not sure if it serves as a good introduction for the general reader. I found it fascinating that English painter Michael Leonard was close friends with Kirstein, and that it was Kirstein who urged Leonard to draw the young dancer Joseph Duell. But how many general readers have heard of any of these people? Some, certainly. But it seems to me that the book is a heavy lift for casual readers.

The book appears stronger in retrospect than it does while reading it, mostly because it’s flaws become less prominent while surveying Leddick’s writing as a whole. That doesn’t mean it’s flaws should be overlooked.

Author David Leddick isn’t the strongest writer, and my ongoing impression is that he’s a writer too often playing with concepts that are too big for him. I’m grateful for his work in excavating the milieu around the Magic Realist painters, artists whose work influenced my own art. But his grasp of 20th century art, for instance, of Abstract Expressionism as being only about “how paint went on canvas,” is cringingly superficial. Many of his interpretations of artworks are adequate, but don’t look for particularly insightful commentaries. Especially for someone whose aesthetic stance towards art is grounded in phenomenology, his surface level glosses on understanding imagery are grating.

What I found worse was his authorial stance toward human subjects, specifically that “sexuality or the lack of it dominates and directs almost all of life’s proceedings.” This is buffoonishly Freudian, demonstrating a disturbingly backward and ignorant disconnect with a broad, contemporary consensus of understanding what makes people tick, including what cognitive science and affective neuroscience have told us about the complexity of the human condition. Even more damning, this buffoonery belies a pruned and withered understanding of artistic processes, of what transpires as artists navigate the interconnections between the material, conceptual, and formal organization of their art as it unfolds in time. I don’t know what Leddick’s background is, but he’s not up to snuff on either count.

The inadequacy of the author as a historian is at times breathtaking. When George Platt Lynes has a “severe illness” when he was 19, Leddick decides that the sickness was at least partially “psychosomatic” because George was…wait for…a “beautiful young person” still finding out who he was in the world. No evidence is proffered, just the author’s Freudian-fueled speculations. Leddick repeatedly and unrelentingly confuses history with gossipy fabrications. As George fits into a New York artistic circle, we can imagine Leddick winking with exaggerated innuendo when he writes that George’s “beauty and charm had to have played their part.” Leddick eschews evidence and the hard work of the historian in favor of indulging his fetish for beautiful young men.

The titillations of flesh go on and on in Leddick’s writing. Later in the book, when Lynes’ is an established photographer and moves into a larger studio, the author reminds readers that there wasn’t any air conditioning available and that the studio spotlights made the interior space sweltering. “Studio photographs,” writes Leddick, “show Lynes and the retoucher Bob Bishop naked from the waist up. They must have enjoyed showing off their excellent bodies.” At some point, I began feeling embarrassment on Leddick’s behalf as the author’s default stance seems more like the thrill teenagers experience during their sexual awakening.

Later, in a section on young Lincoln Kirstein and that continues this strange “beauty-fetish as historical lens” approach, he makes a jaw-dropping comment about the famous art patron, Isabella Stewart-Gardner. “How a rather plain lady came to have such a sure taste for beauty is inexplicable,” he writes. Apparently to appreciate beauty, one must be beautiful oneself? The implications of this statement, both theoretically and practically, are disturbing. How is it that St. Martin’s Press/Macmillan allowed such drivel to go to press as biography? Why didn’t an editor talk Leddick through his numerous, ill-considered statements?

It’s clear before reading 15% of the book that Leddick isn’t up to working as serious historian. He lacks the skills. A fetish for male beauty is no substitute for clear-headed analysis; it can cast a shadow on the important historical connections Leddick makes in other places. By proclaiming sex and beauty as his historical lens, he narrows the historical terrain to topics about which any drunk, titillated bar queen can gossip. Examining the section on George Platt Lynes as a young man, not a page goes by without Leddick calling Lynes beautiful or a “young faun.” There are even sections where such comments are made every other paragraph. Such redundancy is unneeded, indicating an author who simply doesn’t have much to report.

As to other scholarly failures in the book, Leddick alludes to a portrait of Paul Cadmus, wearing a green tie, made by one of Cadmus’ fellow students in 1926. Although I haven’t conducted a thorough investigation - there might be another portrait of Cadmus with a green tie - it’s likely that the portrait wasn’t from 1926, but rather from 1928, painted by a fellow graduate of the National Academy of Design, Luigi Lucioni. That said, dating works can be tricky if only because artists might tweak them over time. Regardless, it’s a gorgeous work. Of course, Leddick isn’t able to pass up mentioning how sexy Cadmus is in this painting and that he must have had admirers of both sexes.

Leddick’s writing also needs a strong editorial hand at times. Paragraphs ramble to and fro, without shape or clear direction and often enough include non sequiturs. For instance, following along with Kirstein’s diary entries for the summer of 1933, Leddick devotes a short paragraph to Kirstein’s meeting the poet e. e. cummings and his wife. There’s no reason for this paragraph - cummings is never mentioned again in the book, and there’s no attempt to show how time spent with the poet might have affected Kirstein. The primary reason for including this disconnected paragraph seems to be filler - Leddick needs enough words to fill out a book. The author does include, parenthetically, a catty comment about the poor fashion taste of cummings’ wife, but, again, this is disconnected, even spurious trivia. In the last half of the book, the writing is more focused and cohesive.

Leddick’s (often snide) speculations are a serious flaw and an ongoing irritant. Over and over, Leddick ends paragraphs with unwarranted conclusions offered with the mystique of a writer who is in the know but unwilling to report their sources: “they were undoubtedly true,” about rumors surrounding Jared French, or “undoubtedly the painter must have felt some pangs” about Cadmus’ supposed feelings for a former lover.

There are times Leddick attempts to provide evidence for his claims. “There is a kind of emptiness and practiced cruelty in the way George Platt Lynes maintained so many romantic and sexual relationships,” Leddick writes. As evidence, just before making this statement, he provides 12 snippets from letters Lynes wrote between early 1952 and late 1954. Most of these quotes are 1-2 sentences, though some are longer. Nevertheless, it’s difficult to see how the excerpts support Leddick’s conclusion. For the reader to come to their own conclusion, more context is required for each quote. Once again Leddick plays the role of the informed authority relieving his readers from the burden of weighing the evidence on their own. Rather than assuming the mystique of the aloof expert, Leddick comes across as manipulative.

If you weren’t already interested in these three men and their milieu beforehand, this book isn’t going to convince you to spend more of your limited time and attention after you start reading. If Leddick had been one of my students and submitted the book, in its current shape, for my consideration, I would have handed it back saying “You’re at least three iterations away from a final draft.” The various parts of the book need greater integration, although the book is still a significant contribution.

[Keller Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very enjoyable and informative book. I am fascinated bout the life and art of George Platt Lynes and this book did not disappoint.

[R.J. Gilmour · Rating 3 out of 5]

While the subject is fascinating, Leddick's style, structure and overall approach makes the book a difficult read. He builds each chapter around his own encounters with this intimate circle and indeed most of the book is filled with salacious details about the sexual activities of mid-20th-century gay men and their coterie. This is an important part of gay, lesbian and queer history, made more important by the impact of these artists and their works on modern gay and queer culture. But Leddick's approach makes the material seem gossipy and devoid of any value. This book would have been better served by an analysis of the community created by these intoxicating, sexy and beautiful gay men. They succeeded in creating a culture of aestheticism based on desire and sexuality and a biography of the community rather than a loose collection of chapters about each individual would have made the book more enjoyable. Leddick spends too much time aggrandizing himself and his own imagined connousieur of painting, photography and art. While a disappointing read, I was nonetheless transported to the world of these "intimate companions".