Ladies and Gentlemen (Warhol series)

In May 1974, Pop artist Andy Warhol was approached by Italian dealer Luciano Anselmino in Torino about commissioning a series of large-edition prints and maybe paintings.^[1] Anselmino recommended that Warhol paint portraits of drag queens.^[1] According to Bob Colacello, who was the editor Interview magazine, Warhol said, "'Drag queens were out,' but Anselmino persisted, suggesting portraits of Candy, Jackie, and Holly. Andy said Candy was dead, and Jackie and Holly would drive him crazy, asking for more money every time they heard one had sold."^[1] Anselmino was asked by Warhol to come up with another idea, but later that day he brought up drag queens once more and said, "They shouldn't be beautiful transvestites who could pass for women, but funny-looking ones, with beards, who were obviously men trying to pass."^[1] Warhol reluctantly agreed and suggested that he could photograph Colacello. Even though Warhol offered to give him a portrait, Colacello insisted that he didn't want to be immortalized in drag.^[2]

During another trip to Europe in July 1974, Warhol's manager Fred Hughes brought Anselmino along.^[3] Anselmino informed Warhol that he had secured funding for the Drag Queen series, several hundred thousand dollars, as well as a museum in Ferrera, the Palazzo dei Diamanti, to display it. Upson returning to New York later that month, Colacello posed in drag for Warhol at the Factory, but Warhol decided the photos were "unusable."^[4][5]

Colacello, along with Warhol's assistant Ronnie Cutrone, and Vincent Fremont, manager of the Factory, and makeup artist Corey Tippin, found models for the series at the Gilded Grape, which was a popular nightclub in the queer community, near Times Square in New York.^[5][6] They would ask potential models to pose for "a friend" for $50 per half-hour. The following day, they would show up at the Factory, where Warhol, whom they never named, would take their Polaroids. Some of the models would say, "Tell your friend I do a lot more for fifty bucks" the following time they saw them at the Gilded Grape.^[5] While most of the sitters had no idea who they were posing for, Wilhelmina Ross and Marsha P. Johnson were exceptions, as both had performed with the drag troupe Hot Peaches.^[6] Founder and director Jimmy Camicia recalled staging the group's first shows in the loft of Warhol superstar Jackie Curtis.^[6]

Warhol began creating the silkscreens for the Ladies and Gentlemen series toward the end of the year. On December 28, 1974, he was captured on videotape painting a portrait at the Factory.^[7] Shortly after, it was reported that Warhol was working on a series of portraits of transvestites.^[8]

He produced 268 vibrantly colored silkscreen paintings.^[9][6] He also created a portfolio of ten screenprints, each a different image, published in 1975 in an edition of 250.^[10]

Warhol took over 500 photographs of 14 models. An official list of the Ladies and Gentlemen artworks was released by the Warhol Foundation in 2014. This included 13 names that they could identify:^[11]

• Marsha P. Johnson
• Alphanso Panell
• Iris
• Wilhelmina Ross
• Broadway
• Easha McCleary
• Helen/Harry Morales
• Ivette
• Kim
• Lurdes
• Michele Long
• Monique and Vicki Peters