A Look Inside the New York Landmark
The Chelsea Hotel was an institution defined by the extraordinary lives of the countless legendary residents it housed over its colorful 135-year history. The hotel was home to a revolving door of guests—gritty and sophisticated, wealthy and broke—that included musicians, immigrants, poets, heiresses, and artists alike.
The hotel first opened its doors in 1884; as one of New York’s first cooperative apartment buildings, the bohemian establishment felt more like an artists’ community than a typical hotel. Andy Warhol shot parts of Chelsea Girls at the hotel; Jackson Pollock, Larry Rivers, Mark Rothko, and Robert Mapplethorpe were residents.
Musicians including Bob Dylan, Janis Joplin, and Patti Smith all lived in, and wrote about, the hotel. Dylan Thomas, a Chelsea resident, died of pneumonia after a heavy drinking bout nearby; Nancy Spungen, girlfriend of Sid Vicious, was found stabbed to death in the hotel, further establishing its gritty rock-and-roll reputation.
A Community of Chaos
The hotel fostered a unique community of chaos and creativity that continues to fascinate to this day. More than any other individual, Stanley Bard, fifty-year manager of the hotel, can be credited with curating the residents whose diversity defined the now-legendary institution.
Bard fostered a unique attitude of respect, tolerance, and a willingness to accommodate all guests, regardless of their unconventional lives. As the gatekeeper of this creative enclave, his mission was to protect the professional and personal privacy necessary to the creative process; this incredible foresight and determination to create a safe haven for all types of creative genius made him legendary and adored.
In 2017, Freeman’s brought to market the personal collection of Stanley Bard, which included paintings by Tom Wesselmann and Larry Rivers, sculpture by Barry Flanagan, works on paper by Christo and Philip Taaffe, as well as examples by Karel Appel, Sidney Nolan, and many others. Relics of a bygone era at the Chelsea, each of these works speaks to the extraordinary stories of the hotel, as well as to the man who gathered, protected, and nurtured the artists who helped define the art, music, politics, and culture of the 20th century.