In September 2020, I received Words & Drawings by Frank O’Hara (1926-1966) and the Italian artist Mario Schifano (1934-1998) in the mail. I had ordered this book from Italy because it documented a largely forgotten collaboration, resulting in 17 poem-drawings that the two men had made while Schifano was living briefly in New York (1963-64). During this time he had a studio at 791 Broadway, which he had gotten through Elaine de Kooning. O’Hara had moved into the building earlier, in 1963.

As the work was in a private collection in Italy, I figured my only chance to get a sense of the collaboration was to obtain this book. I did not realize that Words & Drawings contained far more — it is 368 pages long, and includes texts by Anita Pallenberg, Raphael Rubinstein, Furio Colombo, Paolo Buggiani, and Achille Bonito Oliva, as well as a poem by Gerard Malanga and many photographs that Schifano took while he was in New York, along with reproductions of the entire collaboration.