Ny Social Diary: The Art Set

David Patrick Columbia's NY Social Diary is expanding. A new section called The Art Set, helmed by one Charlie Sheips is interesting, serving up the left coast artistic-intellectuals (and their patrons) as gossip boldfacers that we don't usually hear about -- people like Cornelia Guest and Virgil Thompson) and sometimes Sheips is unintentionally funny as when he namedrops and pricedrops(but that's all good with us). Overall The Corsair likes the column. Sheips writes, for instance:

"I spent last week in Los Angeles staying with David Hockney at his lush compound in the Hollywood Hills. I lived in LA from the mid-1980s to 1991 � first as David�s assistant and later as the organizer of the Los Angeles International Contemporary Art Fair. By the time I left I thought I had my fill of LA but since then every trip back has rekindled my love for the place. It can be heaven. "On Sunday, we drove out to Sandy Gallin�s newly built $22 million 'cottage' on a cliff just above the Malibu Colony. It�s unusual to have so much rain in October but whenever it rains in LA, nature quickly responds with a palette of lush greens and cascading multi-colored bougainvillea making for a lovely drive from the Hills to the beach."

Oh no he didn't -- he didn't just use the word "bougainvillea," did he?

He's tripping!

Other artistic boldfacers mentioned are: David Geffen and Connie Wald. Cornelia Guest, artist/designer Martin Saar, Vanity Fair�s Wendy Stark, Betsy Bloomingdale, film director Brian Singer, Bianca Jagger, Christopher Isherwood, composer Virgil Thomson, Stephen Spender, Richard Buckle, Jim Bridges and Jack Larson. Check it out here.