On Wednesday night, Jonathan Becker endeavored to arrive at the Waverly Inn well before AIR MAIL’s party in celebration of his new book, Lost Time. But he was beaten there by not a few early attendees, all eager to get a picture with the cigar-puffing photographer before the crush of guests and the fading fall light made it nearly impossible.
Broken glass was a theme of the night. No fewer than five highball and wine glasses shattered at the feet of the well-lubricated crowd, which seemed like a fitting way to toast the puckish photographer, who cut his teeth snapping photos of Chevy Chase, Lorne Michaels, Paul Simon, and Andy Warhol in the steamy kitchen of Elaine’s, the now shuttered Upper East Side watering hole for New York’s literary elite.
Images from Becker’s sojourns to Paris, London, New York, and Buenos Aires over the last half-century fill the pages of his new monograph and trace his evolution from protégé of Hungarian-French photographer Brassaï to social portraitist and longtime Vanity Fair contributing photographer.
At Oscar parties, galas, and debutante balls, and in gilded drawing rooms around the world, Becker has snapped timeless photos of everyone from François Truffaut to Martha Graham, Jackie O to Calvin Klein, and Jeff Koons to Jack Kevorkian. He also made friends with other photographers, such as Slim Aarons and Douglas Kirkland, not to mention the writers whose stories his photos accompanied, like Bob Colacello and James Reginato, both of whom were in attendance Wednesday night.
Rather than dodge shards of glass in the garden of the Waverly, most guests chose to take their revelry to the sidewalk: New York Times writers Jeremy Peters and Shawn McCreesh, Robert Mapplethorpe biographer Patricia Morrisroe, and AIR MAIL contributors Mark Rozzo, Michael Hainey, George Kalogerakis, and James Kirchick. Editors Susan Morrison, Aimée Bell, Ash Carter, David Friend, Alexandra Kotur, and Thomas Beller were all there.
Also seen huddling around Becker were Tom Freston; Succession actress Juliana Canfield; sugar king Pepe Fanjul and his wife, Emilia; Grove Atlantic president Morgan Entrekin; filmmaker Maiken Baird; director Andrew Jarecki; Joseph and Sabine Getty; costume designer William Ivey Long; and Museum of Latin American Art of Buenos Aires C.E.O. Eduardo Costantini. Publicist Nadine Johnson arrived puffing a cigarette and left the same way.
It’s safe to say that an artist of Becker’s caliber has put in the 10,000 hours necessary to achieve mastery of his craft. However, that fact wasn’t enough to catch the attention of Revenge of the Tipping Point author Malcolm Gladwell, who lives a few doors up. He shuffled right past the soirée, disinterestedly clutching a sandwich wrapped in brown paper.
It’s a shame, because had Gladwell stuck around, he might have observed an interesting social phenomenon: Becker, who has long been the man behind the camera—studiously directing the focus away from himself—was suddenly posing for photos with admirers, the center of attention.
Jack Sullivan is an Associate Editor at AIR MAIL
