D AV I D PAT R I C K C O L U M B I A Fleischman Gallery in memory of her husband). At the Frick Collection, Fleischman has served as a trustee since 2009, during which time she has been a stalwart champion of all aspects of the institution. Fleischman’s contributions include support for the special exhibitions, “Masterpieces of European Painting from Dulwich Picture Gallery” and “Vermeer, Rembrandt, and Hals: Masterpieces of Dutch Painting from the Mauritshuis,” as well as the programs at the Center for the History of Collecting. In 2011, she gave an important Renaissance drawing by Domenico Beccafumi (1486–1551) to the Frick Collection in honor of then deputy director and Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator,
Colin B. Bailey. Proceeds from the Frick Collection Autumn Dinner help to support the full range of programs, including educational and curatorial initiatives and the Frick Art Reference Library. This year, it raised $1.2 million. The benefit committee: John and Constance Birkelund, Peter and Sofia Blanchard, Mr. and Mrs. John J. Burns, Jr., Champagne Louis Roederer, Citigroup, Tom Flexner, Domaines Ott, Martin and Kate Feldstein, Guillaume Fouilleron, Elise D. Frick and John A. Garraty, Michael and Mary Gellert, Gail and Peter Goltra, Elizabeth Marsteller Gordon, Michael Graziano, Bruce Greenwald, Agnes Gund, Peter N. Heydon, Bob and Sheila
Hoerle, Thomas L. Kempner, Jr. and Katheryn C. Patterson, Lillian E. Kraemer and Maurice G. Eldridge, Margo M. Langenberg, Terry and Bob Lindsay, Nancy Abeles Marks, Joyce F. Menschel, Arnold and Hilda Neis, Mr. and Mrs. Howard Phipps, Jr., Dr. and Mrs. James S. Reibel, Mr. and Mrs. John R. Robinson, Rouse Properties, Inc., Mr. and Mrs. Charles M. Royce, Mrs. Julio Santo Domingo, Roberta Schneiderman, Mr. and Mrs. Stanley DeForest Scott, the Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, Phyllis and Nathan Shmalo, Judith and Randy Smith, and Mr. and Mrs. A. Alfred Taubman. Speaking of parties, cutaboves, and society, my friend Charlie Scheips has just published a special biography of
Elsie de Wolfe, a.k.a. Lady Mendl, called Elsie De Wolfe’s Paris: Frivolity Before the Storm. (The storm, of course, being World War II and the Nazi invasion of France.) The lady was born before the Civil War and died after World War II. A New York girl, daughter of a doctor, Elsie started out professional life as an “actress” to earn a living and help her widowed mother. In her early 20s, she began a 40-year domestic relationship with Elizabeth Marbury, or Bessy, a literary agent and stage producer of her day with clients such as Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw. In the last quarter of the 19th century, the two women presided over a salon-type atmosphere at their house on Irving Place. Their wit and charm, and their
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