Anaïs Nin in Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954, Kenneth Anger)
A masquerade party for which guests were encouraged to “Come as your madness,” inspired one of the guests—avant-garde filmmaker Kenneth Anger—to create Inauguration of the Pleasuredome (now considered a key work in experimental film) in which famed diarist Nin and other notable figures appeared. One of the most iconic scenes is an abstraction of the costume Nin wore at the party, which she describes below.
I wore a skin-colored leotard, leopard-fur earrings glued to my breasts, and a leopard-fur belt around my waist. Gil Henderson painted on my bare back a vivid jungle scene. I wore eyelashes two inches long. My hair was dusted with gold powder. My head was inside of a birdcage. From within the cage, through the open gate, I pulled out an endless roll of paper on which I had written lines from my books. The ticker tape of the unconscious. I unwound this and handed everyone a strip with a message. (Diary 5 133) (Read more and see the original costume.)
