Richard Vogel began working for Annie Lebovitz in the Fall and was assisting her at the Dakota on December 8th for a Rolling Stone cover shoot with John Lennon and Yoko Ono.  John Lennon was murdered 5 hours later.  Annie and Richard took the last pictures ever taken of John Lennon. 

Although I decided to walk away from modeling, I never lost my love of the excitement of a photo shoot - the white seamless, the whirring motor drives, the cameras, the big strobes popping, the Polaroids, the make up & hair transformation, being spontaneous and inventive in front of the camera, walking down a catwalk in sable furs, waiting for the film at the lab.  The urgency, the energy, the pursuit of a great photo was the shared goal and it was fun to be part of a creative team.  There is really nothing like it.  I developed a great appreciation for photography and for the great photographers like Irving Penn, Guy Bourdin, Richard Avedon, Arthur Elgort, Alex Chatelain, Patrick Demarchelier, Bill King and Mike Reinhardt to name a few.  During the next 10 years, I would work at 3 secretarial jobs and by 1990 I started shooting - not fashion, but art. 

I met Andy Warhol twice while working in Julian's studio- and later Andy made fun of the way I told time in his diaries.  I wore a digital watch and told time by the minute instead of saying "it was quarter of, or half past, or something thirty."  Andy chided me for that.  Here you are meeting your big idol, and he makes fun of you in his diaries.  I met Jean-Michel Basquiat at the nightclub, Area in 1986.  Julian made a large painting in Jean-Michel's honor on the day he died, August 12, 1988.  It was a sparse painting on an olive brown tarp featuring his initials JMB in capital letters with the date of his death painted in white.  Julian also made a painting for Joseph Beuys on the day he died as well, January 23rd, 1986.  Five days later was another somber day at the office; the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster occurred on January 28, 1986.  I met and worked with Nick Serota, a famous curator at the Tate Gallery in Britain who was instrumental in organizing a traveling retrospective of Julian's work.  Julian's third child with his first wife Jacqueline- a son named Vito Maria, was born during the summer of 1986.  Andy Warhol died on February 22nd 1987. Julian painted my portrait on his signature background of broken plates in 1987.  The painting was exhibited at the Whitney Museum in 1987 and is now in the collection of movie director Oliver Stone.  CVJ Nicknames of Maitre D's- which I helped type and organize, was published by Random House in 1987.  I left my job working for Schnabel in June of 1989.  The movie Born on the 4th of July was released in December of 1989 and actor Tom Cruise received his first nomination for best actor for his role of Viet Nam veteran Ron Kovic but the oscar went to Daniel Day Lewis.