The Artist Who Had Sex With A Chair - who was it?

July 25, 2024 10:29 AM

I read an artists' autobiography sometime in the late 90s in which he talks about repeatedly having sex with an overstuffed chair in his parent's New Jersey living room as a teenager. Who is the artist and what is the book?

I am deeply embarrassed to be asking this, but it's 2024 and here we all are: for obvious reasons this has resurfaced in my brain. Sometime in the late 90s I read an autobiography by a famous / semi famous New York abstract artist who was mostly active in the 1950s / 60s / 70s. He was not any of the household names - not Pollack or DeKooning or Rauschenburg or Johns or Newman or Reinhardt - you get the idea. But, he hung out with them and he was a painter that if you are an art history buff like me, you have heard of. He has work in major museums. The book was a mass market paperback that could have come out any time in the past 30 years, so no real help there. I think he died in the early 2000s but I could be wrong.

What I think I remember from the book: he was Jewish? Maybe?; he seemed super ADD - the book bounces all over the place; he grew up in New Jersey; I can't remember if he was ever in the army but I kind of think he was; there were a lot of parties and drinking and occasional drug use; he was friendly with the abstract expressionists and hung out in Greenwich village with them; I think he was gay or possibly bi. It was a fun book to read but when I finished it, despite all the descriptions of legendary parties, I was not overcome with a desire to hang out with him - he seemed like kind of an asshole.

posted by mygothlaundry to Writing & Language (7 answers total)

Was it David Wojnarowicz? I can’t remember which of his books I read, but that was my initial reaction.
posted by Rube R. Nekker at 12:06 PM on July 25

Response by poster: I remembered! It was Larry Rivers and this is the book. I got a lot of details wrong but it seems like I forgot some of the worst parts too, which is . . . actually for the best. You may not wish to read it; here's an article with some spoilers.
posted by mygothlaundry at 1:13 PM on July 25 [3 favorites]

mods feel free to delete because this is in no way an answer but I GOTTA know what the obvious reasons are
posted by cabbage raccoon at 1:38 PM on July 25 [7 favorites]

Cabbage Racoon, google JD Vance Hillbilly Elegy couch (BTW, it's an internet joke, not a true thing)
posted by mmf at 1:54 PM on July 25 [4 favorites]

Best answer: incredible thank you for this dumb, dumb information
posted by cabbage raccoon at 1:57 PM on July 25 [19 favorites]

mmf, to be fair - it has NOT been proven untrue.
posted by bashos_frog at 2:50 PM on July 25 [6 favorites]

Have you watched Big Mouth? Because one of the characters does this a lot!
posted by billsaysthis at 10:38 PM on July 26