Carl Van Vechten
Though you may well have never heard of him, longtime Midtown resident Carl Van Vechten was one of the early 20th century's most trailblazing American writers, culture mavens, celebrity photographers, and shameless homosexuals.
Born in 1880 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the tall, blond, and Midwestern Van Vechten moved to New York in 1906 after a brief stint in Chicago, where he'd fallen in love with African American culture, and especially ragtime music.
In 1909 he became the first American critic of modern dance for the New York Times. During the 1920s he became one of the most visible non-black figures in the Harlem Renaissance, singing the movement's myriad praises to contemporary white culture via a series of often controversial essays and novels. He befriended many of the era's most gifted artists, including Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen.
Meanwhile, Van Vechten became easily the hippest gay in the New York City of his day, his home at 150 West 55th Street (between Sixth and Seventh Avenues) playing host to a steady stream of sensational soirees throughout the '20s and '30s, attended by the likes of George Gershwin, Bessie Smith, and Paul Robeson. Though he was married to Russian actress Fania Marinoff, Van Vechten did little to hide his real sexual proclivities, famously naming a character in his second novel the Duke of {ahem} Middlebottom, whose stationery was inscribed with the telling phrase "A thing of beauty is a boy forever." Van Vechten also maintained a long friendship with Gertrude Stein, who named him the executor of her literary estate.
Van Vechten died in his beloved New York City on December 21, 1964.
For a wonderful online collection of Van Vechten's photographs of women, see Yale University's Extravagant Crowd: Carl Van Vechten's Portraits of Women; for another of his early color images of African Americans, see Living Portraits: Carl Van Vechten's Color Photographs Of African Americans, 1939-1964.
Born in 1880 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the tall, blond, and Midwestern Van Vechten moved to New York in 1906 after a brief stint in Chicago, where he'd fallen in love with African American culture, and especially ragtime music.
In 1909 he became the first American critic of modern dance for the New York Times. During the 1920s he became one of the most visible non-black figures in the Harlem Renaissance, singing the movement's myriad praises to contemporary white culture via a series of often controversial essays and novels. He befriended many of the era's most gifted artists, including Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen.
Meanwhile, Van Vechten became easily the hippest gay in the New York City of his day, his home at 150 West 55th Street (between Sixth and Seventh Avenues) playing host to a steady stream of sensational soirees throughout the '20s and '30s, attended by the likes of George Gershwin, Bessie Smith, and Paul Robeson. Though he was married to Russian actress Fania Marinoff, Van Vechten did little to hide his real sexual proclivities, famously naming a character in his second novel the Duke of {ahem} Middlebottom, whose stationery was inscribed with the telling phrase "A thing of beauty is a boy forever." Van Vechten also maintained a long friendship with Gertrude Stein, who named him the executor of her literary estate.
Van Vechten died in his beloved New York City on December 21, 1964.
For a wonderful online collection of Van Vechten's photographs of women, see Yale University's Extravagant Crowd: Carl Van Vechten's Portraits of Women; for another of his early color images of African Americans, see Living Portraits: Carl Van Vechten's Color Photographs Of African Americans, 1939-1964.
