Materials documenting the life and career of writer and artist Eve Babitz. Collection includes writings, personal and biographical items, photographs, and artwork.

Eve Babitz was born in Los Angeles in 1943. Her parents were Sol Babitz, a classical violinist, and Mae Laviolette Babitz, an artist. She grew up in Hollywood with her sister Mirandi Babitz and attended Hollywood High School. After high school Babitz spent time in Rome and New York City, then returned to Los Angeles where she began to write, make art, and take photographs, inspired and influenced by her artist friends and the environment of 1960s-1970s Los Angeles. First recognized as Marcel Duchamp's nude chess opponent in the iconic photograph by Julian Wasser, Babitz distinguished herself as a working artist when Ahmet Ertegun hired her at Atlantic Records, where her photography and collages were incorporated as album artwork for Black Oak Arkansas, Buffalo Springfield, the Byrds, Linda Ronstadt, and others. In the early 1970s she focused on writing, publishing articles and short stories in Rolling Stone, the Village Voice, Esquire, and Coast magazine. In 1976 she created Manifesto LAX, an underground publication featuring the work of many of her friends at the time, including Ronee Blakley, Carrie Fisher, Steve Martin, and Ed Ruscha. Babitz published several semi-autobiographical books chronicling her life in Los Angeles, including Slow Days, Fast Company; Sex and Rage; L.A. Woman; and Eve's Hollywood. She continued to write during the 1980s and 1990s, publishing the books Black Swans and Two by Two, in addition to articles for Esquire, Cosmopolitan, and others. In 1997 she suffered severe burns over half her body when her clothing caught fire as she lit a cigar. Babitz wrote about this event, as well as her long hospital stay and subsequent recovery, versions of which were later published in I Used to Be Charming: the Rest of Eve Babitz (2019). Eve Babitz died in Los Angeles in 2021, at the age of 78.

37.67 Linear Feet (38 boxes,1 oversize folder)

The literary copyright of materials by Eve Babitz is held by the Estate of Eve Babitz. Anyone wishing to quote from or publish any photographs or manuscript material by Eve Babitz must contact: Erica Spellman Silverman, Trident Media Group, LLC, 355 Lexington Ave, Floor 12, New York, NY 10017.

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