Tomkins, Calvin, 1925-....

Calvin Tomkins was born December 17, 1925, in Orange, NJ. He received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in 1948 and entered into a career in journalism, working first with Radio Free Europe from 1953 to 1957 and then, as a writer and editor, for Newsweek from 1957 to 1961. His first contributions to The New Yorker were published in 1958 and in 1961 he became a regular staff writer while only occasionally writing for other outlets. In 1980, in addition to continuing his longer pieces for the magazine, Tomkins was appointed the official art critic and wrote art reviews and other content on an almost weekly basis. That position terminated in 1986 but Tomkins continued as a staff writer at The New Yorker until the present.

Tomkins' initial contributions to The New Yorker were short humor pieces (now known under the rubric Shouts and Murmurs.) He contributed six of these pieces between 1958 and 1960 before publishing his first Profile, on Jean Tinguely, in 1962. Tomkins' career at the magazine coincided with a new burgeoning of talent in the New York art world and his first two decades of writing traced the origins and rise to establishment of Pop Art, Earth Art, Minimalism, Video Art, Happenings and Installation Art; as well as profiling the curators, collectors, and gallery owners who helped popularize those artists and movements. Tomkins continued publishing longer articles two or three times a year interspersed with light humor pieces, The Talk of the Town articles and other shorter pieces, through 1980, when he became official art critic for the magazine.

For more than five years Tomkins published art reviews on an almost weekly basis. The frequency of his major articles dropped during this time but did not cease. During his time as critic Tomkins was able to witness and chronicle the astonishing growth of the art market, the development of SoHo as a center of art and commerce, the revitalization of painting, and a host of new art movements. After this position ended, he resumed his former production of larger articles. During this time, The New Yorker itself changed, including more photographs and pictures, often as full- or double-page spreads. Tomkins often wrote paragraphs and captions to accompany these images; in many cases the writings were unattributed in the publication.

In recent years, Tomkins' pace of article publication may have slowed, but he continues to regularly contribute to The New Yorker; his most recent articles appeared in 2007.

Tomkins' first published book was Intermission: A Novel (New York: Viking Press, 1951), but his ensuing books flowed directly from his work at The New Yorker. The Lewis and Clark Trail (New York: Harper & Row, 1965) was written at the same time that Tomkins participated in an NBC documentary on the subject; an article concerning Lewis and Clark appeared in The New Yorker in 1966. Also in 1966, Time-Life published a volume by Tomkins in its series Time-Life Library of Art; The World of Marcel Duchamp (Time, Inc.: New York, 1966) drew on interviews and materials gathered for Tomkins' 1965 Profile. Eric Hoffer: An American Odyssey (New York: Dutton, 1969) was likewise an expansion of a 1967 Profile on the famed autodidact and philosopher. In 1968, Tomkins was contracted by The Metropolitan Museum of Art to write a history of that institution coincident with its centennial. Merchants and Masterpieces: The Story of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1970) to this day remains a key reference work for the museum. Finally, Living Well is the Best Revenge (New York: Viking Press, 1971), a book on Gerald and Sara Murphy and the American Expatriate community in France between the world wars, was enlarged from a Profile of the same name published in 1962. It has proven to be Tomkins' most popular and enduring work, reprinted numerous times and published in a Modern Library edition in 1998.

During this same period, the first book that reprinted and collected Tomkins' articles from The New Yorker appeared. The Bride and the Bachelors: The Heretical Courtship in Modern Art (New York: Viking, 1965) reprinted Profiles on Marcel Duchamp, Jean Tinguely, John Cage and Robert Rauschenberg; later editions also included a fifth Profile on Merce Cunningham. In 1976, The Scene: Reports on Post-Modern Art, (New York: Viking Press, 1976) reprinted articles on Andy Warhol, E.A.T., Henry Geldzahler, Tatyana Grossman, Earth Art, Jonas Mekas, Nam Jun Paik, and Robert Wilson. In 1980, Tomkins published Off the Wall: Robert Rauschenberg and the Art World of Our Time (New York: Doubleday, 1980). While the book centered on the career of Rauschenberg, it also depicted the activities of the New York art community in the 1960s and 1970s and drew heavily on all of Tomkins' research, interviews, and writings of the preceding twenty years. In 1988, Post- to Neo-: The Art World of the 1980's (New York, Henry Holt, 1988) included reprints of twenty-seven Art World reviews and one Profile originally published between 1980 and 1986.

Aside from major books and collections of articles, Tomkins also contributed original or reprinted essays to artists' monographs and co-wrote books with his spouses. Monographs include Andy Warhol by John Coplans, (Greenwich, CT: New York Graphic Society,1970); Christo: Running Fence, with David Bourdon (New York: Abrams, 1979); Jennifer Bartlett, with Marge Goldwater and Roberta Smith (Minneapolis, MN: Walker Art Center, 1985); and Roy Lichtenstein: Mural with Blue Brushstroke, with Bob Adelman (New York: Abrams, 1987). With Judy Tomkins, he wrote The Other Hampton (New York: Viking-Grossman, 1974) and with Dodie Kazanjian, Alex: The Life of Alexander Liberman (New York: Knopf, 1993). In 2001, Tomkins contributed an original essay on R. Buckminster Fuller to Buckminster Fuller: Anthology for the New Millennium, Thomas T.K. Zung ed., (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2001).

Tomkins had developed a long friendship with R. Buckminster Fuller beginning when Tomkins wrote his 1966 Profile on the scientist and inventor. For years, plans were discussed for Tomkins to write a biography of Fuller and in 1980 a contract for the book was signed with Doubleday. In 1984, after numerous extensions, the project was abandoned. Three years later, Tomkins chose as his next project a biography of Marcel Duchamp and Duchamp: A Biography was published in 1996 by Henry Holt. It is his most recent major work and a capstone to a decades-long fascination with the artist.

Calvin Tomkins has been married four times: to Grace Lloyd Tomkins, to Judy Tomkins, to Susan Cheever, and finally to Dodie Kazanjian. Tomkins has three children by his first wife: Anne, Susan, and Spencer; and a daughter, Sarah, by Susan Cheever. Calvin Tomkins currently resides in New York and continues writing.

From the description of Calvin Tomkins papers, 1860-2006 (bulk 1962-2006). (Museum of Modern Art (MOMA)). WorldCat record id: 758665517