The usually tedious one-man morality crusade Bill "Catholic League" Donohue sends along a genuinely valuable tip: On May 15, this Thursday, Sotheby's will be auctioning off a copy of Andres Serrano's Piss Christ, the maximum icon of the old Culture Wars of 25 years ago. Ask your middle-aged uncles and aunts about it.
Your favorite art-collecting, Greenwich-living, publicity-shunning hedge fund billionaire, Steve Cohen (left), turns 53 today. New York's most famous drag queen, Lady Bunny (right), is turning 47. Marcia Gay Harden is 50. Photographer Terry Richardson is turning 44. Halle Berry turns 43. Steve Martin is 64. Oscar-winning composer James Horner is turning 56. Tony-winning playwright Thomas Meehan turns 80. Magic Johnson is 50. Actress Mila Kunis is 26. Susan Saint James, the actress and wife of NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol, is turning 63. Musician David Crosby is 68. E! host and Top Model regular Jay Manuel is turning 37. And romance novelist Danielle Steel is celebrating her 62nd birthday today. Weekend birthdays are below.
Valentino and Vogue co-hosted a cocktail party to benefit New Yorkers For Children at Valentino's Madison Avenue store last night. Guests included Fabiola Beracasa and Erin Fetherston (left), Fern Mallis, Tinsley Mortimer, Valesca Guerrand-Hermès, Maggie Betts, Paul Sevigny, Bebe Neuwirth, Jennifer Creel, Selita Ebanks, Alina Cho, Kate Schelter, Antony Todd, Tatiana Platt, Kevin Liles, Denise Wohl, Di Petroff, Felicia Taylor, Erica and Geraldo Rivera, Sylvester and Gillian Miniter, Dori Cooperman, Maggie Rizer, Allison Sarofim, Lydia Fenet, Vanessa von Bismarck, Dayssi Olarte de Kanavos, Susan Shin, Tracy Stern, Melissa Berkelhammer, Stephanie LaCava, and, yes, "Real Housewife" Alex McCord and her husband Simon van Kempen. [PMc, Wireimage, VF, SF]
Louis Vuitton celebrated Marc Jacobs' new collection in honor of Stephen Sprouse last night with an exhibition preview, cocktail event, and after-party. Marc and boyfriend Lorenzo Martone (left) were joined by a long list of fashion, art, and society types, including Donna Karan, Leigh Lezark, Nicole Miller, Jeffrey Deitch, Anna Sui, Patricia Field, Patrick McDonald, Erin Fetherston, Russell Simmons, Rachel Roy, Linda Fargo, Nina Garcia, Anne Slowey, Agyness Deyn, Molly Sims, Bettina Zilkha, Andrew Saffir, Jane Holzer, Tim and Helen Lee Schifter, Lisa Falcone, Terence Koh, Adi, Coco and Ice-T, Casey Spooner, David Hershkovits, Kim Hastreiter, Rogan Gregory, Chanel Iman, Eva Amurri, Fabiola Beracasa, Chuck and Candy Pratts Price, Brooke Shields, Amalia Dayan and Adam Lindemann, Mickey Boardman, Serena Bass and son Sam Shaffer, Glenda Bailey, Robert Burke, Peter Marino, Andres and Lauren Santo Domingo, Marjorie Gubelmann, Paul Sevigny, Andre Harrell, Andres Serrano, Stephen Knoll, Andrea Rosen, Maurizio Cattelan, Kipton Cronkite, Kehinde Wiley, Debbie Harry, Jackie Astier, Tatum O'Neal, Marcus Schenkenberg, Veronica Webb, Waris Ahluwalia, Kelly Killoren Bensimon, Dr. Frederic Brandt, Monet Mazur, Peter Davis, Dori Cooperman, Mary Alice Stephenson, Melissa Berkelhammer, Luigi Tadini, and, of course, Patrick McMullan and son Liam McMullan. [PMc, Wireimage, NYO]
"Anyone who picked up the Village Voice this morning and turned to Lynn Yaeger's cover story on page 14 was met with a stomach-churning surprise that may have ruined their already unpleasant subway commute to work—a vivid, closeup pile of human excrement belonging to the artist Andres Serrano," writes Joe Pompeo in the Observer. Maybe this was just the Voice's way of being ironic, since no one actually reads the paper any more unless they're using it to clean up after their dog? [NYO]
Top Chef's Tom Colicchio turns 46 today. Also celebrating: Marquee co-owner Noah Tepperberg is turning 33. Dealmaker (and Bill Clinton golf partner) Vernon Jordan is 73. Artist Andres Serrano is 58. Ben Affleck is 36. Times style editor Trip Gabriel is 53. And producer Linda Ellerbee is 64. Saturday is the big day for Madonna: The material girl will officially be 50. She shares her birthday with Kathie Lee Gifford, who is turning 55, and Steve Carell, who's turning 45. On Sunday, Robert De Niro will be 65, the same day Jorge Posada will be 37, Jonathan Franzen celebrates his 49th, and Sean Penn turns 48.
Andres Serrano's show, titled "SHIT," will open in September at the Yvon Lambert Gallery. It'll feature five-foot photos of poo, including the artist's own! But it also has animal poo—"Bullshit" is the image on your left. The Post has already reacted predictably: "Controversial photographer Andres Serrano is again using his bodily excreta in his sickening 'art.'" (He's already used urine. What's next?) After the jump, Serrano's most famous work, 1987's Piss Christ. It's probably supposed to make us think, but mostly it just screams, "I want to get famous! OK?!!!"
A specialist in what is known as "shock art" the half-Honduran, half-Cuban, all-Latino lovin', Serrano was born in 1950 in New York City. He studied at the Brooklyn Museum and Art School, and spent time slaving for the man as an advertising art director in the 70's before creating his first original pieces.
Congratulations to photographer Andres Serrano! On Friday, a gang of neo-Nazi hoods swept through his show in Sweden with axes and crowbars and destroyed $200K worth of (overvalued) prints. Not since a million years ago, when Jesse Helms went postal over the photographer's "Piss Christ," has Serrano had such an important moment for his market (and his "artistic relevance")! We hereby issue a STRONG BUY. Call up dealer Paula Cooper right now and get in on this action! Apparently there is video of this on the YouTube, but we sure can't find it—if you can, do send it our way.
