Nude photo of Jackie O 'skinny-dipping' found among Andy Warhol's junk

By Mail Foreign Service
Updated:

Nude photograph: Jackie Onassis in 1968. She is believed to have sent the signed print to Warhol as a joke

Nude photograph: Jackie Onassis in 1968. She is believed to have sent the signed print to Warhol as a joke

A nude photograph of Jackie Kennedy Onassis has been found among hundreds of boxes of Andy Warhol's possessions.

The image, which is signed: 'For Andy, with enduring affection, Jackie Montauk', has been confirmed as genuine by researchers using handwriting comparisons. 

The Montauk name is believed to have been a reference to Warhol's holiday home in Long Island, where she had been a regular visitor.

The photograph was discovered by archivists sorting through 610 boxes, filing cabinets and even a shipping container filled with possessions hoarded by the famous pop artist.

Matt Wrbican, who is leading the team of archivists, said: 'I really doubted it was her signature at first,' he says. 'But it really matches her writing.'

A signed print, the photograph was taken after her second husband, Aristotle Socrates Onassis, asked a paparazzi photographer to take pictures of her skinny-dipping.

The image landed in the hands of Larry Flynt, who turned it into a poster for his porn magazine, Hustler. The image was most likely sent to Warhol by Mrs Onassis as a joke, said Mr Wrbican.

He told how a piece of cake from Caroline Kennedy's wedding in 1986, an ancient Egyptian  mummified human foot and $17,000 in cash were also found among the boxes.

The six-year archive project in association with the Andy Warhol Foundation will see the team meticulously catalogue the artist's belongings, including everything from taxi receipts to fan mail.

'He really didn't like organisation and there would be several boxes going at a time,' added Mr Wrbican, who hopes to play host to the spouses of 19 European Union heads of state due to visit Pittsburgh for the G20 summit in September.

The group, expected to include Sarah Brown and Carla Bruni, will be joined for lunch by Thomas Sokolowski, director of The Andy Warhol Museum, before visiting the archivists to see them at work.

Hoarder: Archivists are searching through 610 boxes of possessions kept in a storage facility by Andy Warhol

Hoarder: Archivists are searching through 610 boxes of possessions kept in a storage facility by Andy Warhol

'I would like to give them a Warhol experience,' said Mr Sokolowski. The idea, he says, is to give them white smocks and gloves, just as the archivists wear, and a box to sift through.

The White House has not yet confirmed the itinerary however, and any boxes would be vetted in advance to ensure nothing crops up that is offensive, said Wrbican, in reverence to the porn and decades-old soup cans found among Warhol's belongings.

He told how Warhol never threw things away, and when he died in 1987 at the age of 58, his four-story Manhattan townhouse was packed with antiques, clothes, books and other artefacts from his daily expeditions. He even discovered a drawer full of gems worth $1million.

'The only rooms that looked like a normal house were the bathroom and the kitchen,' said Wrbican, who has been sorting through the artist's possessions since 1991.

He told how there was little method to the artist's collecting until around 1973, when an assistant suggested Warhol carry a box in which to dump his finds.

Once each box was filled, it was taped shut, dated and sent to a New Jersey storage facility.

In the 18 months since the project began, the archivists have opened 177 boxes - each with an average of 400 items, some with as many as 1,200.

Other finds have included a Ramones' 45 record signed by the band's lead singer Joey Ramone, and a slice of orange nutbread cake sent to Warhol by one of his cousins with a note telling him to enjoy it with a cup of coffee.

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