The group became the centerpiece of Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable, a multimedia performance featuring music, lighting, film and dance. Warhol began managing the Velvet Underground, a New York City rock band and he proposed that the group take on Nico as a " chanteuse", an idea to which they consented, reluctantly for both personal and musical reasons. Nico as a member of the Velvet Underground in 1966Īfter being introduced by Brian Jones, she began working in New York with Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey on their experimental films, including Chelsea Girls, The Closet, Sunset and Imitation of Christ. She was the first artist to release the song, in 1965. According to Judy Collins, in her own liner notes from the 1993 Geffen Records album, Judy Sings Dylan.Just Like A Woman, Dylan had written the tune for her. In 1967, Nico recorded his song " I'll Keep It with Mine" for her first album, Chelsea Girl. Actor Ben Carruthers introduced her to Bob Dylan in Paris that summer. In 1965, Nico met the Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones and recorded her first single, " I'm Not Sayin'", with the B-side "The Last Mile", produced by Jimmy Page for Andrew Loog Oldham's Immediate label. Nico's first performances as a singer were in December 1963 at New York's Blue Angel nightclub, where she sang standards such as " My Funny Valentine". She recorded the title track, which was written by Serge Gainsbourg but not released until 2001, when it was included in the compilation Le Cinéma de Serge Gainsbourg. After splitting her time between New York and Paris, she got the lead role in Jacques Poitrenaud's Strip-Tease (1963). Īfter a role in the 1961 Jean Paul Belmondo film A Man Named Rocca, she appeared as the cover model on jazz pianist Bill Evans' 1962 album, Moon Beams. By that time, she was living in New York and taking acting classes with Lee Strasberg. In 1959, she was invited to the set of Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita, where she attracted the attention of the acclaimed director, who gave her a minor role in the film as herself. Later that year, she also appeared in an uncredited role in Rudolph Maté's For the First Time, with Mario Lanza. Through her travels, she learned to speak English, Spanish, and French.Īfter appearing in several television advertisements, Nico got a small role in Alberto Lattuada's film La Tempesta (1958). At age 17, she was contracted by Coco Chanel to promote their products, but she fled to New York City and abandoned the job. Around this time, she dyed her brown hair blonde, later claiming she was inspired to do so by Ernest Hemingway. She moved to Paris and began working for Vogue, Tempo, Vie Nuove, Mascotte Spettacolo, Camera, Elle, and other fashion magazines. He gave her the name "Nico" after a man he had fallen in love with, filmmaker Nikos Papatakis, and she used it for the rest of her life. Nico was discovered at 16 by the photographer Herbert Tobias while both were working at a KaDeWe fashion show in Berlin. At 5 ft 10 in (178 cm), and with chiseled features and pale skin, Nico rose to prominence as a fashion model when still a teenager. She attended school until the age of 13, and began selling lingerie in the exclusive department store KaDeWe, eventually getting modelling jobs in Berlin. In 1946, Nico and her mother relocated to downtown Berlin, where Nico worked as a seamstress. According to unproven rumours, he was variously said to have died in a concentration camp, or to have faded away as a result of shell shock. Another story is that he sustained head injuries that caused severe brain damage and ended his life in a psychiatric institution. With no certainty that he would survive, his commanding officer, following standing orders, ended his life by gunshot. His precise cause of death is unknown, because Nico gave several contradictory accounts later in life.Īccording to biographer Richard Witts in his 1995 book, Nico: The Life and Lies of an Icon, Wilhelm Päffgen was gravely wounded when he was shot in the head by a French sniper while serving in the Wehrmacht. Her father enlisted as a soldier at the onset of the war and died in 1942. When Nico was two years old, she moved with her mother and grandfather to the Spreewald forest outside Berlin to escape the World War II bombardments of Cologne. Wilhelm was born into the wealthy Päffgen Kölsch master brewer family dynasty in Cologne and was Catholic, while Grete came from a lower-class background and was Protestant. Nico was born Christa Päffgen in Cologne to Wilhelm and Margarete "Grete" Päffgen (née Schulze, born 1910).
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