A Sojourn in Paradise: Jack Robinson in 1950s New Orleans

By Howard Philips Smith and Emily Oppenheimer

Jack Robinson made his name as a much-sought-after fashion and celebrity photographer during the 1960s and early 1970s, and his work is well documented in hundreds of pages of Vogue, the New York Times, and Life, as well as other publications. However, his personal life remains virtually unknown.

In this study of Robinson and his photography, Howard Philips Smith takes an in-depth look at Robinson’s early life in New Orleans, where he discovered his passion for painting, photography, and the Dixie Bohemian life of the French Quarter. A Sojourn in Paradise: Jack Robinson in 1950s New Orleans features more than one hundred photographs taken by the artist, accompanied by detailed commentary about Robinson’s life in New Orleans and excerpts from interviews with the people who knew him when he lived there.

Robinson’s photographs of New Orleans reveal the genesis of two unique and fascinating facets of the city’s history and culture: the creation of the first gay Carnival krewes who would make their own unique contribution to the rich cultural history of the city and the formation of the Orleans Gallery, one of the earliest centers of the contemporary art movement blossoming in 1950s America. This detailed study of Jack Robinson’s early life and photography illustrates the contributions of a gifted, gay artist whose quiet spirit and constant interior struggle found refuge in New Orleans, the city where he was able to find himself, for a time, free from society’s grip and open to exploring life on his own terms.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
• Release date: Jun 29, 2020
• ISBN: 9781496827531

Howard Philips Smith

Howard Philips Smith is a writer, novelist, and photographer, known primarily for his historical works, which focus on expanding the scope of gay history, especially in New Orleans. He is author of Unveiling the Muse: The Lost History of Gay Carnival in New Orleans and A Sojourn in Paradise: Jack Robinson in 1950s New Orleans, both published by University Press of Mississippi. His first novel, which is a work of historical fiction about the gay community in 1980s New Orleans, is The Cult of the Mask: The Strange and Delectable Tale of Life Among the Sybarites. His photography was included in Louisiana Lens: Photographs from The Historic New Orleans Collection by John H. Lawrence.

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A SOJOURN IN PARADISE

A SOJOURN IN PARADISE

Jack Robinson

in 1950s

New Orleans

HOWARD PHILIPS SMITH | FOREWORD BY EMILY OPPENHEIMER

UNIVERSITY PRESS OF MISSISSIPPI / JACKSON

The University Press of Mississippi is the scholarly publishing agency of the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning: Alcorn State University, Delta State University, Jackson State University, Mississippi State University, Mississippi University for Women, Mississippi Valley State University, University of Mississippi, and University of Southern Mississippi.

www.upress.state.ms.us

The University Press of Mississippi is a member of the Association of University Presses.

All photographs included in this volume are by Jack Robinson and are contained in the Jack Robinson Archive in Memphis, Tennessee, unless otherwise specified.

Text copyright © 2020 by University Press of Mississippi

All rights reserved

Manufactured in China

First printing 2020

∞

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

LCCN 2019957528

Hardback ISBN 978-1-4968-2752-4

Epub single ISBN 978-1-4968-2753-1

Epub institutional ISBN 978-1-4968-2751-7

PDF single ISBN 978-1-4968-2754-8

PDF institutional ISBN 978-1-4968-2755-5

British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

As with any professional undertaking, it is important to strive for the highest quality in publication production and, in this case in particular, photographic reproduction. The following is a list of donors who have given their generous support to A Sojourn in Paradise: Jack Robinson in 1950s New Orleans. It is with immense gratitude that we acknowledge their contributions.

MICHAEL JOSEPH BONNET

KENNETH COMBS

WILLIAM FAGALY

KARIN KIEFABER

HELEN KIM

PEGGY SCOTT LABORDE

BROBSON LUTZ

LYNN F. SIPE

DOROTHY WEISLER

For Dan Oppenheimer

CONTENTS

Foreword

Introduction

A SOJOURN IN PARADISE

Twilight in Memphis

The Bright Lights of Manhattan

A New Orleans Wonderland

Plates

◆ ◆ ◆

Afterword

Acknowledgments

APPENDICES

The Jack Robinson Archive

Interview: Dan Oppenheimer

A Brief History of Photography in New Orleans

Notes

Sources

FOREWORD

An Intimate Look at Jack Robinson

Jack Robinson has always been something of an enigma. Quiet, shy, and particular, the lingering mysteries of his life have only rippled and magnified in death. By all accounts, he was not an easy person—not easy to understand, get to know, or get along with. Even my father, his boss and friend, was close enough to be entrusted with his body of work but not close enough to know the details of his private life. Even Susie Reuter, his counterpart stained-glass designer at Rainbow Studio, shared a workspace with him but not a work schedule; peace was best kept if a separation was maintained. They seldom saw each other. I personally knew Jack as a child but from a reverent distance. I was eight years old when he suddenly passed away of cancer in 1997. Before that, I watched him work with a quiet fascination. While he was always kind to me, he was one of those adults whose focused presence made me naturally keep my voice low and my hands still.

Despite his shyness and distance, Jack had a remarkable ability to capture personality and spirit on film. This is especially true with the familiar faces in his celebrity photographs, taken for Vogue between 1965 and 1972. I find myself dying to know what Jack Nicholson was telling him or what made Joni Mitchell laugh behind her hands. Perhaps the best example of his ability to extract the essence of a person is seen in a series of photographs of The Who: what begins as a relatively uptight-looking group seated around a table concludes in the final shots with a shredded backdrop and a pile of boys laughing on the floor. It’s impossible not to match their smiles as you flip through the photo shoot’s progression.

We who knew Jack have always known him as a spectator, not a participant. He seemed always to be taking impressions of others instead of leaving impressions of his own. At a party, he was the figure hiding behind a camera, never the center of attention. In my favorite self-portrait of Jack, he stands with his equipment in dim lighting, masking his face with his hand. Simply put, he preferred an anonymous life for himself, but he wanted his work to be appreciated and treated with the respect it deserves. He wished for his work to be seen, but he did not feel comfortable being the presenter.

Jack Nicholson. Late 1960s/early 1970s.

Joni Mitchell. Late 1960s/early 1970s.

The Who. Late 1960s/early 1970s.

Jack Robinson. Early 1950s.

He told my father at one point that he would like a book published after his death, a statement that made little sense until he passed. Overnight, my father was transformed from friend to executor of his estate and, even more important, custodian of a life’s work: a collection of negatives that had been organized and labeled and then quietly tucked away in a closet to await their posthumous discovery. Here was a quiet man who lived a quiet life and quietly arranged for his legacy. He chose a friend he knew he could trust—an artist, a businessman, and a storyteller, and then, wordlessly, he let the dominoes fall where they may. My dad, Dan Oppenheimer, along with his wife, Susan, formed the Jack Robinson Archive in 2003. I joined the archive after graduating from college in 2012. Our mission was always clear: catalog, digitize, and promote the legacy of Jack Robinson. We exist so that the work can be seen, so that those who see the worth of Jack’s work for the world can have access to it. We were able to fulfill Jack’s request with a book of his celebrity portraits released in 2011, Jack Robinson on Show, and now we look on with excitement as authors and historians like Howard Philips Smith pick up the torch and continue telling his story. It is, we hope, exactly what Jack wanted.

I first met Howard Philips Smith in 2014 through a series of email exchanges when he was working on an article that was a precursor to his book Unveiling the Muse: The Lost History of Gay Carnival in New Orleans. He was effusive, engaging, and excited that Jack had documented the vibrant, creative, daring gay community in the French Quarter in the years immediately prior to the formation of the first gay krewes. I could feel Howard’s enthusiasm radiating through every email. Still, I never imagined that just four years later, I would be preparing not for an article or a Carnival history, but for a book all about Jack! Howard and I finally met in person during his book launch at the Historic New Orleans Collection, and never has an electronic friendship melded in person so seamlessly. Howard, ever the industrious scholar, put the cherry on top of twenty years of research by immediately forming a new vision: a series of photography books on New Orleans artists with Jack as the first in line. It is so rewarding for us as an archive when someone expresses genuine interest in Jack’s work, and even more so when that interest is coupled with a collaborative spirit and an indomitable work ethic. I feel immense gratitude for being invited on this journey. To meet Jack’s friends and colleagues in person, to learn about the environment in which these artists lived and worked, and to put names to familiar faces has been incredibly rewarding. Through Howard’s work, I feel as though I have pulled my chair up a little closer to Jack’s.

Still, I must confess I have been frustrated. I have met and talked to many who liked Jack and respected his work, but with so much time gone by, there are few who can give Jack more depth. Even those who knew him and spent significant time with him claim that they felt they never knew him well. I have spoken and written to people who worked with him, visited with him, were friends, colleagues, and even partners, and each of them has said what a private, guarded person he was. From talking with my father, I know that Jack was deeply bothered by the opinions regarding homosexuality in his time, and it caused him great pain. I wonder if some of his reserved nature was born from an early realization that society would require him to hide parts of himself, that not everyone could be trusted and not everyone believed he deserved the freedom to be himself. Perhaps that gentle, private soul hardened over time, that what was once shy and focused eventually turned particular and difficult to please. I have kept hoping for the key to unlock this closed door, but the fact remains that the best way most of us will ever know him is through his work.

Tina Turner. Late 1960s/early 1970s.

The New Orleans photographs are a tender, wonderful collection. New Orleans is the place where Jack honed his craft and fine-tuned his eye. These are photographs of friends, of daily life, of the places and people that were meaningful to him. They comprise the most intimate look we have into the life of the artist who has become quite literally my life’s work. Once Jack moved to New York City—and his hobby became a glorious career—he did not seem to take as much time to explore and document or to create art for art’s sake. The street scenes we have of New York are few; the ones of Memphis were likely taken in a single afternoon. New Orleans offers us the best glimpse of what attracted his eye in a simpler time when the camera was just for him. It is, for me, the only era in which I feel I know Jack at all.

Canal Street newspaper vendor in New Orleans. Early 1950s.

French Quarter street scene with Captured Mermaid. Mardi Gras, 1954.

Fortunately for us all, his work is larger than life. Not to fall on clichés, but I think Jack understood more deeply than most that a picture is, indeed, worth a thousand words, and he let his photographs speak loudly for themselves. Whether the subject is a celebrity dancing, a lady going about her errands, or a Carnival queen dressed to kill, Jack’s photographs offer little slices of humanity across the spectrum. From the powerhouses to the homemakers, Jack was able to capture the dignity and beauty of human life. I think he reveals his subjects with a respect and understanding that was not always offered to him, and, for that, we should all be grateful. I know I am. His photography keeps giving to me in my work every day, and I hope, as you turn these pages, Jack’s photographs will be a gift to you as well.

But before you turn the page, I must ask you a favor. I ask that you be an active observer. Linger on the photographs and the real people within them, look into their eyes, admire their creativity and costumes, sit and wonder about them, as Jack surely did. And if you see someone you recognize, reach out and tell us! These images grow richer with each added layer of story and name, and something tells me we are just getting started.

—Emily Oppenheimer, Memphis 2018

A SOJOURN IN PARADISE

INTRODUCTION

Within the Vortices of History

One morning—it was December, I think, a cold Sunday with a sad gray sun—I went up through the Quarter to the old market where, at that time of year, there are exquisite winter fruits, sweet satsumas, twenty cents a dozen, and winter flowers, Christmas poinsettia and snow japonica.

—TRUMAN CAPOTE, Notes on N. O. (1946)

Jack Robinson photographed perhaps by Gabriel in the French Quarter. Early 1950s.

Jack Robinson and pet dachshund. Gabriel and Jack’s puppy, Imogene, appears in many of his photographs. Early 1950s.

The Greyhound bus pulled into the station near downtown New Orleans as dawn broke across the old city. The trip from Clarksdale, Mississippi, had taken most of the night, crawling through Indianola, Yazoo City, Jackson, Crystal Springs, McComb, and Hammond before treading through the swamplands of lower Louisiana along Lake Pontchartrain. In 1946, Jack Robinson had graduated from high school in Clarksdale and was looking forward to studying at Tulane University in the fall. Now that World War II had ended, there was an excitement in the air, a palpable anticipation of a brave new world where anything seemed possible. Arriving in a fantastical city steeped in both legend and history, he boarded the St. Charles streetcar and made his way uptown toward Audubon Park near the university.¹

Born near Meridian, Mississippi, on September 18, 1928, Jack Uther Robinson Jr.’s family soon moved further north to Clarksdale, where he grew up. A small Mississippi Delta town near the Arkansas border, Clarksdale was to claim many luminaries of literature and music, if only for a short while, such as Tennessee Williams, W. C. Handy, and Muddy Waters. Among these stands the artist and photographer Jack Robinson. Eager to experience a large city and university life, Robinson had already become fascinated with New Orleans subsequent to several family trips. However, as the enthusiasm for his studies at the university diminished perhaps because of financial constraints,² he became more and more caught up in the allure of the Old Quarter and the life he found there with artists like himself. By the time winter had set in, the budding artists’ colony—within time-worn streets surrounded by old ironwork balconies from another era, the exotic French Market near the river with its winter fruits and flowers, and local bars and restaurants—beckoned him to abandon these aspirations and pursue a career as a Dixie Bohemian. The shy, budding artist from the backwoods of Mississippi found the French Quarter a revelation in all its rundown splendor, but a couple of years would go by before its siren call had taken firm hold as Robinson eventually abandoned his studies at Tulane altogether.³ He would make several trips to see his family, who had moved to Memphis where other members of the family lived. But his love of New Orleans and the life he found there kept him from a permanent move, for the moment.

Gabriel Jureidini in the Carrollton Avenue apartment. Above the bed is one of Robinson’s paintings from his class at the Chartres Street Art School and to the side a portrait of Gabriel. Early 1950s.

A CHANGE IN DIRECTION

By the early 1950s, Robinson landed a job as a graphic designer, working with the prestigious Dolce Advertising on Canal Street.⁴ In addition, he had begun painting classes at the French Quarter art school opened by George Dunbar and Robert Helmer on Chartres Street. Here it became obvious rather quickly that he had real talent, far surpassing that of the other students in his ability to draw and capture the world on canvas. Dunbar summed up Robinson’s innate artistic ability in no uncertain terms: Jack was an absolute natural. Everything he touched came out wonderful. He had the gift.⁵

A sensual portrait of Gabriel, perhaps taken in the privacy of their Carrollton Avenue apartment. This photograph shows Robinson already experimenting with lighting and mood to produce special effects. Early 1950s.

A gay couple in their apartment, possibly in the French Quarter. This particularly intimate scene reveals a gay community at ease being photographed by one of its own members. Early 1950s.

One of the earliest photographs of Dixie’s Bar of Music on Bourbon Street. This photograph by Walter Cook Keenan was taken in 1949, the year Miss Dixie and her sister, Irma, moved the bar to the French Quarter.

For the next few years, he would become part of this group of artists, writers, designers, musicians, preservationists, illustrators, restaurateurs, travel agents, and antiquarians, whose ranks included not only Dunbar and Helmer but also Dusti Bongé, Jean Seidenberg, Katherine Choy, Lee Bailey, Leonard Parrish, Tilden Landry, Clay Shaw, Yvonne Fasnacht, Ella Brennan, Jack Beech, Bruce Butterworth, Claire Evangelista, and Elmo Delacroix Avet. Echoing another vibrant artistic community during the 1920s led by Lyle Saxon, this group of artists also included homosexuals.⁶ Robinson had found his milieu and now lived openly with his paramour, Gabriel Jureidini,⁷ and proudly displayed his paintings and drawings. Other gay couples also defied the national homophobic trend stoked by the witch-hunts of Senator Joseph McCarthy and his heinous Lavender Scare. Urged on by his contemporaries—especially his close friend Lee Bailey, who had professional connections with the old Uptown families—Robinson also began to explore photography.⁸

Jack Robinson took this photograph of Miss Dixie’s at the intersection of Bourbon and St. Peter Streets. Robinson briefly worked with Richard Koch, and this photograph may have been part of a larger series of architectural documentation. Early 1950s.

DIXIE’S BAR OF MUSIC

In 1949, Yvonne Fasnacht, known affectionately as Miss Dixie, and her sister Irma had installed Dixie’s Bar of Music on Bourbon Street, and it quickly became the place to see and be seen, a nexus for this growing community of artists. Yvonne had toured the country during the war with an all-girl jazz band, the Southland Rhythm Girls, and since she came from New Orleans, her fellow bandmates christened her Dixie.⁹ The name stuck, and her bar would epitomize the growing community of subterraneans in the Old Quarter. Long recognized as an important location for gay men to congregate in the 1950s, Dixie’s Bar of Music was shameless in welcoming and protecting them from the police.¹⁰ This vortex of history must be expanded to encompass the growing bohemian troupe of artists, which included straight and gay, men and women. In fact, it should be argued that Dixie’s aided and abetted this artistic colony throughout the decade that followed. In addition, pioneering photographer Frances Benjamin Johnston, who had worked with architect and preservationist Richard Koch¹¹ and the Historic American Building Survey (HABS) during the Depression, had retired to New Orleans in 1940 and continued to work from her Bourbon Street townhouse. In her lifetime, she was known as unconventional, preferring to wear men’s clothing and smoking.¹² Her documentary-style photographs of French Quarter architecture and river plantations were to influence Robinson as well. Both Miss Dixie and Frances Johnston were lesbians and only added to the diverse mix of artists who had found a real haven within the Vieux Carré (French Quarter).¹³

Frances Benjamin Johnston’s self-portrait as the New Woman, in her Washington, DC, studio, 1895. She often wore men’s clothing.

The all-girl jazz band Southland Rhythm Girls, featuring Yvonne Miss Dixie Fasnacht. L-R: Yvonne Fasnacht, Maxine Phinney, Judy Ertle, and Dorothy Sloop, of Hang on Sloopy fame, in front. The band played often at the St. Charles Hotel. Circa 1940s. Photo: Bruno of Hollywood, NYC.

Dixie’s Bar of Music, Fat Tuesday, early 1950s. On the balcony are Yvonne Fasnacht (Miss Dixie), her sister Irma, with her back to the camera, and Elmo Avet. Photo: Arthur Tong.

THE POSTWAR WORLD

Excitement and energy permeated postwar America, as the world recovered from the impact of another global war. As veterans took advantage of advancing their education at universities across the nation, the outlook for the future was bright, and the economy was booming. While women and African Americans enjoyed more equality during the uncertainty of war, the postwar world tried to rein them back into their former roles. Women, who had worked in munitions factories and assumed male-only jobs, especially found themselves back at home in the rigid capacity of housewife and mother and were seldom seen working outside this stereotype.¹⁴ And as the Cold War began in earnest, the Red Scare became a national obsession. Senator Joseph McCarthy led witch-hunts in Congress to ferret out Communists in general and homosexuals, who were seen as a threat in the government.¹⁵

This trend came to a head during the repressive 1950s, and as the decade drew to a close, societal roles were only then beginning to loosen up somewhat to allow limited forms of personal freedom. Yet the French Quarter in