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Victor Hugo (artist and window dresser)

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Victor Hugo
A polaroid photograph of the model, artist, and window dresser Victor Hugo
Victor Hugo photographed by Andy Warhol in 1977
Born
Victor Rojas

1948 (1948)
Caracas, Venezuela
Died1994 (aged 45–46)
Manhattan, New York City, New York, U.S.

Victor Hugo, born Victor Rojas,[1] (1948–1994)[2][3] was a Venezuelan-born American artist and window dresser best known as the partner of fashion designer Halston.[4][5][6][7]

Early life

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Hugo was born at the time of a military coup d'état in Caracas, in 1948.[8] He emigrated with his mother to New York City in the early 1970s.[8]

Halston and Andy Warhol

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Hugo first encountered Halston while working as an escort to make ends meet in 1972.[9][10] Upon their relationship progressing from transactional to romantic, Hugo began doing displays for Halston's Madison Avenue store and later became one of Andy Warhol's assistants at The Factory where among other things he worked on the painter's oxidation paintings.[11][12] He is said to have been the first window dresser to have incorporated Pop art into his designs.[13] He was also a model for Warhol's "Torso" and "Sex Parts" series.[14][15] In keeping with his energetic persona, Hugo was quoted in Interview Magazine (April 1975): “Perhaps you would describe me as jaded, darling, but I prefer to say that in living there is absolutely nothing that is bad. I can only say that I live fully 24 hours a day—and I regret nothing".[16]

When Studio 54 opened in 1977, Halston and Hugo immersed themselves in a hedonistic and partying lifestyle. Cocaine-infused orgies were held at Halston's Upper East Side townhome with Warhol photographing the happenings from the sidelines.[9] In his memoir, Bob Colacello described how Warhol often used Hugo to antagonize Halston: “Andy loved it when Victor showed up at [Studio] 54 in a jockstrap or at a Halston party in a Halston dress, in both cases much to Halston’s embarrassment...Victor later told me that Andy actually paid him to do these things”.[17] He further stated that "Andy saw Victor as the perfect source for ideas: someone with a fertile imagination who didn't know what to do with it...The Venezuelan's own art was going nowhere: He signed rat traps and handed them out at parties; he dipped chickens' feet in red paint and called their footprints drawings".[18] In 1978, the artist and videographer Anton Perich made a short film of Hugo destroying a Warhol painting as "a sacrifice".[19]

Hugo's friendship with Warhol caused a rift in Warhol's relationship with his longtime boyfriend Jed Johnson.[20] "When Studio 54 opened, New York was at the height of its decadence, and things changed with Andy," Johnson told Warhol's biographer Victor Bockris.[21] "I never liked that scene, and I felt that Andy was just wasting his time. It was really upsetting. He spent his time with the most ridiculous people."[21]

His intermittent relationship with Halston dissipated after more than a decade.[22] Hugo's ever-increasing drug addiction and tempestuous nature was a contributing factor to the couple's breakup.[9] By 1988, Halston had been diagnosed with HIV and relocated soon after to San Francisco to be closer to his family. Despite their relationship having ended, Halston still continued to pay for Hugo's housing and other expenses.[9] Hugo reportedly stole Warhol's works and Elsa Peretti's belongings to feed his drug habit.[9]

In 1989, Hugo had expressed dissatisfaction with how he was portrayed in The Andy Warhol Diaries—threatening to auction off any Warhol piece in his possession: "I feel like the Central Park jogger...I've been gang-raped and beaten by a dead person and bunch of thugs that work for him. It is the most vile, disgusting piece of pulp literature I have ever read..."[23]

Shortly before Halston's death in 1990, Halton's brother Bob Halston locked Hugo out of Halston's New York property after learning that Hugo had moved back in and was stealing Halston's personal property.[17] A contract was drawn up requiring that Hugo would not contest Halston's will nor cause any embarrassment to the estate.[22][24] Hugo had previously signed a nondisclosure agreement in 1985 to not speak publicly about his relationship with Halston in exchange for a large monetary sum, but he broke it.[10]

Later life

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In 1993, it was reported that Hugo was working on an autobiography, though the project never came to fruition.[25] In his 1997 book The Last Party: Studio 54, Disco and the Culture of the Night, Anthony Haden-Guest wrote how the artist Scott Covert encountered a homeless Hugo in December 1993 sleeping in a park after running out of money to stay at the Hotel Chelsea.[10] Covert and fellow Hotel Chelsea resident Colleen Weinstein helped a cancer-stricken Hugo such as taking him to his hospital visits. When Hugo died in 1994 from AIDS-related complications, Covert and Weinstein did not have the funds to bury him and it took them two weeks to save up enough money. They buried him on Halston's birthday at an East Hampton cemetery.[26][27]

Legacy

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In September 2007, an exhibition of mannequins dressed by Hugo (from Warhol's collection) was held at the Milk Gallery in New York City.[28]

In 2010, Juliana Cairone used Hugo as an inspiration when creating a display to showcase her Halston clothing for sale.[29] Hugo was featured in archive footage about his relationship with the designer in the 2019 documentary film Halston. Among the interviewees was Sassy Johnson, and she gave the following assessment about Halston's relationship with Hugo: "My theory has always been that Halston came from an alcoholic family, that his father had a problem...[and] that Halston recreated his family life with Victor as the dysfunctional person who is constantly going to keep everything off balance".

Gian Franco Rodríguez portrayed Hugo in the 2021 Ryan Murphy produced Netflix television miniseries Halston.[30] To prepare for the role, Rodriguez conducted extensive research that included consulting with one of Hugo's friends.[31]

References

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  1. ^ "Who's who in the cast of 'Halston' and what the characters look like in real life". Newsweek. 2021-05-13. Retrieved 2021-06-07.
  2. ^ "Warhol And Hugo".
  3. ^ Brown, Craig (2018-08-07). Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 978-0-374-71968-5.
  4. ^ Feitelberg, Rosemary (9 March 2017). "Halston Retrospective to Debut at the Nassau County Museum of Art".
  5. ^ Gaines, Steven (26 June 2014). "How Halston Became Halston". The Hive. Retrieved 2018-01-19.
  6. ^ Kent, Rosemary (1976-05-24). Drama Department: Comedy, Sex, and Violence in Store Windows. New York Magazine.
  7. ^ Talley, Andre Leon (2003-04-08). A.L.T.: A Memoir. Random House Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-375-50828-8.
  8. ^ a b Hernández, Robb (2019-11-19). Archiving an Epidemic: Art, AIDS, and the Queer Chicanx Avant-Garde. NYU Press. ISBN 978-1-4798-4530-9.
  9. ^ a b c d e Miller, Julie (2021-05-14). "Inside Halston's Destructive Real-Life Relationship With Victor Hugo". Vanity Fair. Retrieved 2022-06-23.
  10. ^ a b c Spencer, Samuel (May 14, 2021). "'Halston' on Netflix: The True Story of Halston's Boyfriends and What Happened to Them". Newsweek.
  11. ^ Cleveland, Pat (14 June 2016). Walking with the Muses: A Memoir. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-5011-0824-2 – via Google Books.
  12. ^ "Celebrity history- Halston". Fire Island Pines Historical Society. Retrieved 2022-06-24.
  13. ^ LLC, New York Media (24 May 1976). "New York Magazine". New York Media, LLC – via Google Books.
  14. ^ "Sunny Side Up Egg by Victor Hugo – Paddle8". paddle8.com. Archived from the original on 2018-12-02. Retrieved 2018-01-18.
  15. ^ Bockris, Victor (2009-04-29). Warhol: The Biography. Hachette Books. ISBN 978-0-7867-3028-5.
  16. ^ "After Hours: Dangerous Liaisons with Halston's Lover Victor Hugo". Interview Magazine. 2021-05-13. Retrieved 2022-06-24.
  17. ^ a b Stein, Ellin (2021-05-14). "What's Fact and What's Fiction in Netflix's Halston". Slate Magazine. Retrieved 2022-06-24.
  18. ^ Colacello, Bob (2014). Holy Terror: Andy Warhol Close Up. Vintage Books. ISBN 978-0-8041-6986-8.
  19. ^ Anton Perich (11 July 2013). "VICTOR HUGO ROJAS" – via YouTube.
  20. ^ Gopnik, Blake (2020). Warhol. New York: Ecco. p. 835. ISBN 978-0-06-229839-3.
  21. ^ a b Bockris, Victor (1989). The Life and Death of Andy Warhol. Internet Archive. New York : Bantam Books. p. 303. ISBN 978-0-553-05708-9.
  22. ^ a b Mair, George (1996). Under the Rainbow: The Real Liza Minnelli. Carol Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1-55972-312-1.
  23. ^ Gross, Michael (1989-05-29). The Satanic Diaries. New York Magazine.
  24. ^ Gaines, Steven S. (1991). Simply Halston: The Untold Story. Putnam. ISBN 978-0-399-13612-2.
  25. ^ Book Notes and Notes From All Over. New York Media, LLC. 1993-02-08.
  26. ^ Haden-Guest, Anthony (2015-02-17). The Last Party: Studio 54, Disco, and the Culture of the Night. Open Road Media. ISBN 978-1-4976-9555-9.
  27. ^ Talley, André Leon (April 2021). The Chiffon Trenches: A Memoir. Random House Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-593-12927-2.
  28. ^ "Artnet News - artnet Magazine". www.artnet.com.
  29. ^ Wilson, Eric (2010-07-26). "Not Just Window Dressing". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2022-06-24.
  30. ^ Donohue, Meg (14 May 2021). "How Does the Cast of Halston Compare to Their Real Life Inspirations?". Town & Country. Retrieved 17 May 2021.
  31. ^ "'Halston' Star Gian Franco Rodriguez Unpacks the Complex Victor Hugo". Observer. 2021-05-22. Retrieved 2022-06-24.
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