Elaine Kaufman (Ron Galella)
Photographer Jessica Burstein, a close friend of Elaine Kaufman who snapped her famous patrons since 1992, said she was “ambushed” by British GQ to share her pictures for a story branding the late restaurateur “grotesque.”
Burstein told us, “I received a barrage of telephone calls today chewing me out for ostensibly having participated in Michael Wolff’s ugly profile. I’m furious because I was ambushed — i.e., led to believe the story would be an homage to her. Elaine . . . was nothing less than a surrogate mother to me. I would never do anything to stain her memory. I spent days culling through images to e-mail to the magazine, because I believed the story was meant to honor her.” Burstein said GQ art director Warren Jackson even thanked her by email: “I regret despite so many trips to NYC . . . [I] never have met . . . such an amazing woman as Elaine clearly was to all these people.”