Quentin Crisp (1908-1999) was an artist’s model, a writer and an actor who garnered fame in 1975 following a television adaptation of his 1968 autobiography The Naked Civil Servant, which aired in both the UK and the United States. In 1960, Crisp and Hockney met while Crisp was working as a life model for the Royal College of Art’s life drawing class. In this early drawing by Hockney, a nude Crisp sits with his arms folded, while Hockney sketches the outlines of his body. Speaking over 50 years later, Hockney remembered the flamboyant Crisp as “one of the first obviously gay people who was proud of himself” and credited the bohemia of the London art scene in the early 1960s as an environment which enabled him to celebrate his own sexuality.
In 1981, Crisp moved permanently from London to New York, and continued a successful career as a performer and humourist. Although he often proved a controversial figure, Crisp moved in circles with the likes of Andy Warhol and Sting. The latter dedicated his song Englishman in New York (1987) to Crisp, who also featured in the music video. The song includes the line, “it takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile, be yourself no matter what they say”, referencing the bravery it took for Crisp to be openly gay in England prior to the decriminalisation of homosexuality in 1967.
