Duncan Hannah Punk’d
A 20th Century Painter's Rock 'n' Roll Story
Painter, diarist, and dandy-about-town Duncan Hannah has released Twentieth Century Boy, a memoir of his days—or more importantly, his nights—gliding through the 70s punk-rock scene in downtown Manhattan. Based on journals he kept between 1970 and 1981, Hannah’s book takes us deep inside the debauched avant-garde crowd that included Andy Warhol, Patti Smith, Blondie, and Richard Hell.
Hannah moved to New York from Minneapolis to study art in 1971 and soon found himself spending his nights at the various rock clubs downtown. Warhol took a liking to the handsomely boyish artist and introduced him to musical heroes like David Bowie and Mick Jagger. Later, Hannah would return the favor and introduce Warhol to a new band called the Talking Heads.
Of course, such a glamorous lifestyle requires lots of sex, alcohol, and drugs, which Hannah happily ingested. In fact, muany of the vodka-fueled adventures in his diaries are reviewed through the bloodshot eyes of a morning hangover, but still Hannah survived the decade. By 1980, however, he was seeing not just the end of a decadent decade, but the end of an era as well. He quit the booze and drugs, got serious about his art, and had his first solo show in 1981. Which is where the books ends.
A visual artist whose figurative paintings are in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Hannah filled his diaries with photos, drawings, and poetic recollections of those heady days. Twentieth Century Boy is more than just memoir, however. Hannah also includes his recommendations, at the time, of books to read, music to discover, and movies to watch, making this remarkable book a bit of a time capsule as well.
Today, at 65, Hannah’s a successful artist living in Brooklyn, and now a successful author. Remarking on those ramshackle days, Hannah admits to being surprised at how well things turned out for him, despite his best efforts to self-destruct. “Everything I wanted,” he says, “did come true.”
Twentieth Century Boy is available now.
