The Scene: A benefit art auction, “The...

The Scene: A benefit art auction, “The Fine Art of Helping,” sponsored Thursday night by Galerie Michael of Beverly Hills and the Spare Change Project. The Spare Change Project is a fund-raising arm of the Family Assistance Program, which helps Los Angeles’ homeless families. More than 150 pieces, from Chagall and Picasso etchings to Patrick Nagel posters, were auctioned at the new Loew’s Santa Monica Beach Hotel.

The Buzz: Frequent party-goers got their first chance to check out the atrium-style hotel, which undoubtedly will be the site of many parties, especially in the summer. “It looks like a cross between the West Side Pavilion and the Westin Bonaventure,” said one guest, and, indeed, it does, if one can imagine the pavilion filled with hotel rooms instead of Waldenbooks and Mrs. Fields stands.

Who Was There: Honorary co-chair and celebrity painter Elke Sommer; Family Assistance Program Executive Director Patricia Shelhamer; Galerie Michael’s eponymous Michael Schwartz; Batman creator Bob Kane; and actors-at-large Deidre Hall, Robert Culp, Shelley Long, and Khrystyne Haje.

Fashion Statement: Fashion arbiter Mr. Blackwell’s Batman lapel pin. Holy Worst Dressed List!

Chow: Tandoori chicken, eggplant and tons of pasta, provided by Authentic Cafe, Jacopo’s, Il Giardino, Pane Caldo, the East India Grille, Fino, Angeli, 1000 Wilshire and Manhattan West. The hotel set out a massive confectionary buffet but those on diets gravitated to the tofu cheese cakes served by Sugar Free Desserts. Guests raved about the garlic tortilla soup prepared by Yanks.

Money Matters: Tickets were a low $25 and the Family Assistance program netted 20% of the take from the auction. As at all large art auctions, those who stayed to the end--midnight--picked up some real steals. One price disparity: A pen-and-ink Batman sketch by Kane fetched $1,750, while a Toulouse-Lautrec lithograph auctioned minutes later went for a mere $1,200.

Trend Watch: More than a dozen of those nylon fanny packs could be seen around bidders’ waists. They looked about as appropriate as a tuxedo on a jogger.

Triumphs: Patrick Nagel prints aside, there was a good amount of collector-quality art at modest prices available, unlike so many recent benefit art auctions where the work is either undesirable or unaffordable.

Glitches: It was warm and humid in the auction room, keeping people drifting out to the cash bar all night.

Quoted: Kane, auctioning off his sketch in its black lacquer bat-shaped frame: “It took me an hour-and-a-half to draw that. Do I hear $10,000? Do I hear $1?”