90
PARTISAN REVIEW
Lichtenstein:
I don 't know. I just went LO art school. Since the age of
fifteen or so
I
thought
I
was going to be a painter.
Diamonstein:
And you're also something of a coll ector.
Lichtenstein:
Well, I've co ll ected things , probabl y artists you wouldn't
know , a ll my life. But
I
do have certain things. Dorothy and
I
like
drawings and we have some Warhols and Olden burgs, a Rosenqui st,
a Rauschenberg.
Diamonstein:
Some coll ecLOrs become dealers. Here you are, Leo, a
Trieste-born businessman. But in 195 1, before you became a dea ler,
you put together what is now considered a celebra ted show on 9th
Street. Can you tell us abo ut tha t?
Castelli:
Well , just
to
go back a littl e bit,
I
had a gallery in Pari s before
I
came
to
America. So when
I
got here, well,
I
got interes ted in what
was go ing on here, and
I
knew quite a few peop le, like Julian Levi,
fOl instance, who had a ga ll ery a t that time, and
I
knew quite a few
artists who came over soon a fter the outbreak of the war, like
Duchamp. So
I
was ri ght in the midst of that environment , right
from the beg inning when
I
got here to America. After
I
got out of the
army in
'46,
I began to go around and got to know a rtists like de
Kooning and so on. I was sort of a priva te dea ler and did what I
could with paintings tha t my associates in Paris, who still had the
gallery go ing, were sending over h ere. That made my livelihood for
me. At one time we had a club that was formed back in '48, I beli eve,
and a ll the a rti sts of the group and other people, used
to
come and
discuss various matlers . And then the idea came up of doing a show
of a ll these peopl e tha t the museums really didn't want
to
touch back
then . Yo u know, Pollock and Dav id Smith. And we set up this 9th
Street show in an empty store. It was in a house tha t was going LO be
demo lished . We got it for very littl e. For a period of two months, I
think we pa id one hundred fift y do ll ars for the whole thing. And
then , with the help of the artists, we painted the walls. I was the onl y
one who had
a
little money, and beli eve me, it wasn 't much.
I
contributed something like five o r six hundred doll ars to the enter–
pnse.
Diamonst ein:
Was thi s the counterpa rt of the Salon des Refusees?
Caste lli:
It
was the counterpart as we saw it to the Salon des Refusees.
It
was reall y a grea t success. Unfortunately , Roy wasn't around yet,
hut Rauschenberg was part of it. There were, o f course, all the major
painters-Kline, Pollock, David Smith, de Kooning-they a ll had
worked very ha rd to put that show together.
Diamonstezn:
I'd like each of you to tell us wha t, regardl ess of price or
a\ailability, your favorit e painting, sculpture, or work of art is-an y
period, any location .
