Lot 83: WHITE, MICHAEL.

WHITE, MICHAEL. EXTENSIVE COLLECTION OF EXCLUSIVE INVITATIONS TO PREMIERES, OPENINGS, AND RELATED EPHEMERA, HOUSED IN TEN BOXES AND ONE OUTSIZE ALBUM, AND COMPRISING: tickets and invitations to film premieres including Superman (1978), Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back , Evita (with a letter by Lady Lloyd Webber), The Lord of the Rings (parts I and III), Octopussy , Frankenstein (dir. Branagh), Ghostbusters , Toy Story 2 , The Wall , The Postman Always Rings Twice (dir. Rafelson), The English Patient , The Horse Whisperer , Shakespeare in Love , and Armageddon '; tickets and invitations to theatrical premieres including Saturday Night Fever , Hair , Chicago , Riverdance (New York, 1996), La Cage aux Folles , My Fair Lady (2001) as well as programmes and playbills for Beauty and the Beast: the Musical , Fame: The Musical , and others; invitations, tickets, programmes and backstage passes to concerts, including Andy Warhol's The Exploding Plastic Inevitable with the Velvet Underground and Nico (Ohio, 1966), David Bowie (1973), Pink Floyd (The Wall tour), Madonna: The Girlie Show (1993), U2 (Elevation tour, 2001), Oasis (1995), Meat Loaf (Bat Out of Hell II tour), and Ricky Martin (Livin' la Vida Loca tour); invitations to openings and exhibitons by Julian Opie (Lisson Gallery, 1983 and 1985), Piero Manzoni (Serpentine Gallery, 1998, with a personal note from Kay Saatchi), Tracy Emin 'My Major Retrospective' (44 Duke Street, 1993), Keith Haring (Tony Shafraz Gallery, NY, 1997), Gilbert and George (Anthony d'Offay Gallery, 1987), David Bailey/Damien Hirst collaboration (Gagosian, 2004), Helmut Newton (de Pury & Luxembourg, Zurich, 2001), Richard Hamilton (Tate, 1992), David Hockney (Knoedler Gallery, 1981), Mario Testino (Timothy Taylor Gallery, 1999), David Lachapelle (Tony Shafrazi Gallery, 1999), Annie Leibovitz (The Hospital, London, 2004), Anish Kapoor (Lisson Gallery, 1989-90), Bridget Riley (Goldsmiths' College Gallery, 1985), and a Damien Hirst 'donor card' ("...I request that after my death my body be preserved in formaldehyde..."); invitations to launches and parties including Kenneth Branagh's Renaissance Theatre Company, Andrew Lloyd Webber and his daughter Imogen's joint birthday (50 and 21), Paul and Linda McCartney's Christmas party, the Michael Jackson HIS tory tour party (1997), 35th London Film Festival, opening of Alexander McQueen's London flagship store (2003), album launch of Puff Daddy Forever (1999), Mick and Jerry Jagger's French Revolution-themed party (1993), party hosted by Victor Lownes for Jim Henson and Frank Oz of The Muppet Show (1977), Eva Herzigova's birthday (2003), Elton John's 50th birthday (1997), Anna Wintour's 21st birthday, memorial service of Robert Graves, memorial service of Sir John Betjeman, launch of Damien Hirst's book I Want to Spend the Rest of My Life... (2006), and the Playboy 1998 Easter party

A remarkable record of popular culture preserved through invitations and related material received by Michael White. A selection of this material was exhibited in the 2004 Liverpool biennial as 'Invitation: a collection of ephemera', curated by Goshka Macuga.