Chuck Connelly Rediscovered

Charming, disarming, with a tendency to profanity and cynicism, Chuck Connelly strolled around the National Arts Club last Tuesday delighted so many showed up to see his art, and celebrate a new HBO documentary about him. He invited well-wishers like Mark Kostabi to a show at DFN Gallery in Chelsea on the weekend, and then he waited for the bubble to burst. Who is Chuck Connelly, you ask. Connelly was a darling of the '80's art scene, compared to Van Gogh, collected at the MetropolitanMuseum, emerging alongside Basquiat and Schnabel. In the first of the film trilogy Love Stories, scripted by Richard Price, who is now enjoying acclaim for his recent novel “Lush Life,” and directed by Martin Scorsese, Nick Nolte plays a Connelly type painting in his downtown loft. The much-admired oils were Connelly's. Clearly on a path toward major superstardom, Connelly nevertheless could not curb his dark side. Drunk, he trashed Scorsese famously in Page Six, as reported by George Rush. The rest is history in opposition: obscurity and exile to Philadelphia. The documentary, “The Art of Failure: Chuck Connelly Not for Sale,” directed by Jeff Stimmel to air on July 7, attempts to explain the artist's contempt for the art market and consequent demise. A belligerent alcoholic, he is one of a dying breed, modeled on the image of the rebellious artist. Yet he also considers the highly sellable Warhol his hero, and in a contrary mood rails against commercialism. While it hurts him to see “crappy” art emerging, to see his peers Basquiat and Schnabel get the attention, he exclaims, “Now it's my turn,” and then, “I'd like to see this film make people get tired of the bullshit.”?

Regina Weinreich 

Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura

Comments

[jessica walsh]

if he would just die, the art would matter.

[shakaron]

what the fuck was the name of his alter ego?

[rob]

Lionel Dobie.