9.23.11: High marks | New York Social Diary

High marks

Astor Hall during dinner, Fifth Avenue through windows.

This past Tuesday night at the New York Public Library at 42nd and Fifth, Louise Grunwald, Gayfryd Steinberg and Alice Tisch as Co-Chairs of the President’s Council, hosted "An Evening with Anthony W. Marx."

The President’s Council organizes opportunities for individuals who share interests in libraries and education, and in the NYPL particularly. It is a fund-raising entity also, having raised more than $35 million for the Library.

Dr. Marx is the new President and CEO of the New York Public Library as of last July 1st. The evening began with cocktails, then a “conversation” with Jon Meacham of Random House. This was followed by dinner.

Jon Meacham and Anthony W. Marx in conversation

Before his position at the NYPL, Mr. Marx was president of Amherst College where he earned high recognition for his passionate promotion of socioeconomic diversity and accessibility to higher education for lower-income students. Before that he was a professor and director of undergrad studies of political science at Columbia.

Mr. Marx has had a starstudded proactive career as a scholar and writer of books. You read his CV he was the deadly serious kid at the top of class. He grew up in the city, attended PS 8 and the Bronx High School of Science. Read: smart kid, also knew the streets. He went to Wesleyan and graduated from Yale in ’81, which was followed by an MPA from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Affairs at Princeton, followed by an MA and PhD from Princeton.

A dinner table in Astor Hall

Astor Hall during dinner

Darren Walker with Susan and Robert P. Morgenthau

Neil L. Rudenstine (NYPL’s new Chairman of the Board) and Khalil Muhammad (Schomburg Center Director)

Alice Tisch, Anthony W. Marx, Gayfryd Steinberg, Louise Grunwald, and Jon Meacham

Anthony W. Marx and Elyse Newhouse (Library Council Member)

Marjorie B. Tiven with Karl and Mary Ellen von der Heyden

Leigh M. Miller, Samuel C. Butler (NYPL Trustee), and Lynden Miller

Princess Firyal of Jordan (NYPL Trustee) and Anthony W. Marx

Jean Tatge and Helen S. Tucker

Mary J. Wallach and Sue Wachenheim

Anthony W. Marx

Jean Strouse (Director, Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers) and Angelica Rudenstine

Angelica Rudenstine and Sandra P. Rose (NYPL Trustee), Adam Bartos

Mahnaz Ispahani Bartos (NYPL Trustee) and Louise Grunwald (NYPL Trustee and President's Council Co-Chair)

Vicky and Tom Reynolds from Tiffany & Company

Wyndham Robertson and Philip Buckner

My friend Leila Heller, the gallerist, formerly most recently of the Upper East Side, has moved down to Chelsea on a ground floor space at 568 West 25th Street, with an inaugural exhibition of 40 photographs: “Firooz Zahedi: Elizabeth Taylor in Iran.” This happened in 1976 just three years before the fall of the Shah and the emergence of the mullahs. Those were the halcyon days of modern Iran and because of the Shah and the oil business, the world was going to Iran.

Among those visitors was Ms. Taylor, and in the company of Mr. Zahedi, now a Los Angeleno who has worked for several of the leading fashion and lifestyle magazines for years. He started his career in the mid-70s with Andy Warhol’s Interview.

Leila Heller’s debut has included a luncheon hosted by her old friend Beth DeWoody, and then a cocktail reception followed by a private dinner for the photographer. Of these Party Pictures of Patrick McMullan, the most interesting to me was seeing Liza Todd-Tivey, the only child of Elizabeth and Michael Todd who came to an untimely death in a plane crash. I don’t know Ms. Todd-Tivey and have seen her only once before – in 1975 at the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Tennis Tournament in Forest Hills. She was just a kid then but stunning with her father’s countenance and her mother’s coloring and bright eyes. So it is 36 years later and we see that the lady remains as stunning, touched with streams of maturity. Don’t you always wonder what it was really like to be a child Elizabeth Taylor? Ms. Todd-Tivey knows.

Liza Todd-Tivey

Shirin Neshat and Anahita von Plotho

Josh Lehrer and Firooz Zahedi

Rachel Lee Hovnanian and Anahita von Plotho

Dana Hammond Stubgen and Nahid Taghinia

Leila Heller, Firooz Zahedi, and Liza Todd-Tivey

Asher Edelman and Lisa Dennison

Dana Faraouki and Lisa Dennison

YZ Kami, Nahid Taghinia, and Ameneh Youssefzadeh

Prince Dimitri of Yugoslavia and Bettina Zilkha

Reza Golsorkhi and Maryam Arjomand

Josh Lehrer and Susan White

Leyla Alaton and Gisue Hariri

Firooz Zahedi, Christiane Amanpour, and Jamie Rubin

Jim Finkelstein and Roddy Klotz

Lauren Pollock and Carol Kino

Jane Soudavar and Annabelle Caufman Soudavar

Reza Golsorkhi and Kambiz Atabai

Shoja Azari, Till Fellrath, Will Wair, and Sam Bardaouil

Pamela and Michael Glazebrook

Darian Zahedi and Nicole Simone

Feri Dascari and YZ Kami

Tooraj Zahedi, Christiane Amanpour, and Nassrin Zahedi

Dan and Deborah Heimowitz

Margery Newman

Firooz Zahedi and Leila Heller

Michele Oka Doner

Nazy Nazhand

Nazjol Alizadeh and Blair Husain

Johnny I and Alyssa Barbagallo

Shahin Safavi and Maryam Filsoof

Shoja Azari and Behdad Alizadeh

Will Wair and Till Fellrath

Henry Heller, Anahita von Plotho, and Christoph von Plotho

Shiva Farouki and Tarek Farouki

Angelo Paredes, Ally Mintz, and Amy Poliakoff

Thursday a week ago at the Mary Boone Gallery, Mary Boone and Suzanne Slesin celebrated the publication of Eleanor Lambert: Still Here, by John Tiffany.