Page 30 - ARUBA TODAY

A30 PEOPLE & ARTS
Friday 11 May 2018
Music mural displayed for 1st time since Hurricane Katrina

By JANET McCONNAUGHEY everybody out,” Phillips
Associated Press said.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A Fasnacht didn’t advertise
mural that covered the Dixie’s as a gay bar but
wall of a pioneering New it was known to be gay-
Orleans bar is back on dis- friendly, her friend Peter
play for the first time since Patout told NOLA.com ‘
Hurricane Katrina. The Times-Picayune in an
The 29-foot-long (9-meter- interview for her obituary in
long) painting, which cari- 2011.
catures more than 60 musi- “It was more a social center
cal celebrities of the 1940s, than it was a pickup bar,”
once covered a wall at Di- patron and former Times-
xie’s Bar of Music , an early Picayune critic Frank Gag-
haven for gay patrons in nard told the newspaper.
the city. It’s by Xavier Gon- “It was where gay people
zalez , whose work has went to meet friends.”
been collected by major Fasnacht sold the bar in
art museums including the 1964 and donated the
Metropolitan Museum of painting to the museum in
Art in New York. 1978.
Curators are celebrating The jazz museum was dam-
with music Friday evening aged by Hurricane Katrina
in the New Orleans Jazz A detail of the oil on canvas painting Dixie’s Bar of Music is seen at the New Orleans Jazz Museum in 2005, and reopened
Museum , where the paint- in New Orleans, Thursday, May 10, 2018. about a year ago. The
ing is being shown along Cole trio, trumpeter Louis jazz museum. Painted just parently commissioned painting, undamaged
with the clarinet played by Armstrong and bandlead- as large is movie star Doro- the painting soon after by the storm, was quickly
bar owner and bandleader er Xavier Cugat. thy Lamour, wearing a sa- she opened the bar on St. moved from a second-floor
Yvonne “Dixie” Fasnacht, Among the largest likeness- rong and standing hipshot Charles Ave. in 1939, since lobby wall to storage and
who lived to be 101, and es is jazz pianist Dorothy near singer Paul Robeson, an October 1940 newspa- rolled onto a cylinder.
other mementos of the Sloop, whose nickname is who is shown in the epau- per ad for the bar touted Once unrolled, it had to
club. said to have inspired Ohio’s letted uniform he wore for Gonzalez’ “clever mu- re-stretched, retouched to
In the painting, Fasnacht state rock song — the 1960s the movie “The Emperor ral caricatures.” The bar fix cracks and flaking, and
is shown as a small blue hit “Hang on, Sloopy,” said Jones.” moved to Bourbon Street a varnished — a $10,000 job.
cherub hovering in front David Kunian, music cura- The painting was auto- decade later. A museum patron donated
of Frank Sinatra. Gonzalez tor for the Louisiana State graphed by some of its sub- Police never raided Dixie’s, the money.
also depicted the Nat King Museum and curator of the jects, including members of but when the city’s first gay Although museum records
the Andrews Sisters group Carnival ball was raided in describe the painting as
and singer Johnnie Ray. 1962, “the story is that Miss 35 feet (nearly 11 meters)
Wayne Phillips, another Dixie just grabbed handfuls long, it turned out to be 29
Louisiana State Museum of cash from the cash reg- feet when measured, Ku-
curator, said Fasnacht ap- ister and went and bailed nian said.q

Watches, wardrobe of comedian

Jerry Lewis to be auctioned

and props from the 1963
film “The Nutty Professor”
are among the items that
will be auctioned.
The auction house says the
watch is engraved with
the phrase “Jerry My Bud-
dy/ and Pal/ I Love You/
Dino.” It is expected to sell
for between $4,000 and
$6,000.A custom-made
tweed burgundy suit that
Lewis wore in the film is ex-
pected to fetch between
$2,000 and $4,000.
In this May 23, 2013, photo, comedian Jerry Lewis poses for Lewis, whose fundrais-
photographers during a photo call for the film Max Rose at the ing telethons became as
66th international film festival, in Cannes, southern France. famous as his hit movies,
Associated Press in Las Vegas. died Aug. 20.
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Proper- Julien’s Auctions says some The estate auction will
ty that belonged to famed of his watches, including take place June 22 at
comedian Jerry Lewis will one given to him by Dean Planet Hollywood casino-
be auctioned next month Martin, and his wardrobe resort.q