Around the Block on the Upper East Side

Happy New Year Chalice...

2009-12-31T11:08:00.012-05:00

There's light snow falling and some people already partying in the New Year. 2010? It seems like just yesterday we were bringing in the Millennium, now we're already bringing in the second decade of the Millennium and probably tomorrow we'll be bringing in the year 3000 but we first have to get by Dec. 21, 2012, the infamous end of the Mayan calendar and supposed end of the world, two years and counting so as my first resolution it is my determination to live the next 720 days of my life with an abandon of realizing you only have so much time left. There's something to having a deadline on life. I thought about that as I ate an onion and olive slice at Delizio's on 2nd Avenue. Yes, that is what I said onion and olive, I have never eaten an onion and olive slice, I've stood by pepperoni through out my life, but change, that's how I roll with 720 days left. By the way, it's delicious, onion and olive, who would have thought? As I stepped out noticing that the Second Avenue subway construction has moved south and now is annoying people and storefronts from 89th to 85th. It leaves you wondering when the great construction project will hit midtown but then again why worry we only have 720 days and in that time this subway won't be close to midtown. My second resolution is very simple, just enjoy, there are many things that create an intellect to not enjoy or rather be damned pissed off about almost everything but those are worthless actions. I'm walking home, I'm going to fill my chalice with champagne and drink the whole thing in one gulp and then there is only 719 days left...

Louis Nevelson Revelry...

2009-12-17T12:17:00.010-05:00

There are many great sculptures on display on the Upper East Side. They sort of jump out in front of you when you aren't looking. There's the Venus and Manhattan between 76th Street and 77th Street on Madison Avenue, it floats above and is a graceful depiction of half nude god and goddess. I could look at that for a long time. There's The Castle created by Priscilla Kapel on 79th Street and Fifth Avenue, the Unidentified Object by Noguchi on 80th and Fifth Avenue, there's my all time favorite Peter Pan in Carl Schurz Park but the sculpture that makes my day and purposely walk by when I can is, Presence IV by Louise Nevelson. It stands in the middle of the mall on Park Avenue. It's twenty feet and some change high, its lines and curves change and undulate creating a different image at every point from where you view it. From one angle it's a bird's head, another a door complete with gigantic door knobs, an ocean scene, a curvy woman and a linear man, a throne, a castle, a very modern totem pole. It is like all great sculptures, something to meditate on, to not judge but let it present itself to the viewer and change what you are seeing by just moving around it. On this brisk, cold day it makes me forget the chill. It's diabolical, it's calm, it stands guard silently as traffic running north and sound pass it by without a second look but I'm sure it has caused an accident or two from some more attentive drivers. Sitting under it makes you feel safe. When Louise presented the sculpture she said, "New York represents the whole of my conscious life and I thought it fitting that I should give it something of myself." I walk on remembering this epitaph and this encounter and wonder when my next one will be....

Drugstore Cure-All...

2009-12-02T16:27:00.021-05:00

The media...It's quite obvious the media is not only the message it is Satan incarnate. It does no good, it is a riotous virus that infects and destroys and everybody who works in it is a criminal.
Hold on a minute, I guess I work in the media....And with this self loathing I decided to do my favorite thing to get my mind off of things I would rather not think about like Tiger Woods'
transgressions, the health care debacle, the lack of job growth, the build up of troops in Afghanistan, the Audi car ad that suggests just by turning on the headlights of an Audi it is more spectacular than a whole neighborhood of Christmas lighting jocularity or EBay's ad with the really catchy catch phrase, Come To Think Of It, the absurdity of Micheal Bloomberg saying he has a mandate after he captured 51% of a measly turnout against a guy who I already don't remember his name. Yeah, the media is the message alright it is the meandering, retching mind disorienting jetsam that is making it hard to have a good time in this day and age and I'm a part of this charade; so I decided to take a walk to my great personal diversion, going to the drug store of my choice and meandering down aisles looking for sales and taking in the scents and scenery of goods that not by any coincidence is a place that a lot of women go to supplement their supplies. Yes, Duane Reade, the pharmacy of my choosing on this day, is a great place to cruise the babes. Anyway, as I filled my basket with shampoo, razors and saline solution and lined up to pay for my fodder, a woman, seemingly homeless from the rarefied smell that she spread and her duct taped slippers scuffled in directly to the register in front of the five of us that waited in line. There was no protest from the line just a yawning of curiosity as the woman demanded an exchange of a penny she was holding. "I want another one!" she demanded. The cashier took it in stride, motioned to her to hold a minute while she rang up another shoppers goods. "I want another penny, not this one." The cashier took the credit card of the paying customer opened the register and with a courteous smile took out a penny and exchanged it with the one the woman held. She scuffled out examining the copper coin. The cashier feeling all eyes on her , smiled and when the woman had left the store said, "She comes in everyday to exchange a penny." And then shrugged . We all looked at each other and group shrugged. As for me all thoughts of media wickedness were gone. My drugstore cure-all had done it again...

Thanksgiving...

2009-11-22T17:07:00.009-05:00

On the Upper East Side there are many ways to enjoy Thanksgiving one being that you don't live on the Upper West Side with huge crowds and even bigger balloons being blown up and then floating down Central Park West. Maybe most people think that isn't such a bad thing, it's an exciting tradition but it's a nightmare of gigantic balloon proportions. Don't get me wrong I've gone over to view the balloons being blowing up with my flask of Irish whiskey and I've gone to the parade and enjoyed the whole gigantic cartoon character floating down the Avenue thing. But none the less, I'd rather live on the Upper East Side on this my favorite of holidays because of the sense of calm that goes along with it. Instead of dodging crowd control nightmares and out-of-towners that seem to think they are entitled, instead on the Upper East Side, you can go for a jog along the East River or a walk down any Avenue or you can go to one of the great markets and enjoy the aromas of the feast that is about to take place whether it be Agatha Valentina, Dean & Deluca, Butterfield Market, Grace's Market Place, Citarella, The Vinegar Factory to name a few. It's a miraculous thing, no angst, no high emotions, they're both watered down by that chemical in turkeys that I can't remember the name of but I know it sedates you into a mind numbing sleep or nap that transcends all other sleep. My mouth is watering thinking about the alchemical mixture of turkey, mash potatoes and gravy, yams, stuffing, gravy, cranberries galore, pies, pies and more pies with the ala-mode attached. Not to forget the egg nog, wine, beer and any other libations that tickles your fancy. Oh, what a beautiful thing it is, oh, how I sit in anxious anticipation, oh I'm already full of what the feast will present. Enjoy Thanksgiving, it's a gobble-gobble moment that we are given every year. Thanksgiving...

O'Keeffe's Abstract Relief...

2009-11-11T18:08:00.021-05:00

I have a love\ hate relationship with Georgia O'Keeffe, I love her feminist realization, I love that she was married to one of the greatest photographers of the modern age, I love that she went to the Southwest and owned it with her imagery. My hate problem with her is that some of her paintings can be loosely described as having as much interest to me as a chick-flick, in fact, they may be the still version of a chick-flick with their vaginal and labiatic verve. But when I read that The Whitney Museum was having a show of O'Keeffe's abstract work, well I asked myself, O'Keeffe did abstraction? So I went to the show, wondering if it further my love or my hate relationship with Ms. O'Keeffe. When I got to the show it was quite obvious Georgia did abstract, in fact she did it before every one else did it. In 1914 at the grand old age of 17, she created extraordinary abstract imagery with charcoal and paper. It was so far out there I'm sure some of the art crowd at the time must have thought Georgia had come from anther planet. There are over 100 paintings, drawings, sculptures that each delight with their self sufficient individualism. After her early abstractions she discovered her imagery that included flowers, landscapes, object and still life's but in the 1940's she returned to abstract and that's when the sexually suggestive abstractions were first assigned in her tableau. The show is like a slow wave that covers you in warm ablutions. And to put a cherry on the cake there are photographs by Alfred Stieglitz of Georgia throughout her life. She lived to the grand old age of 99. I left the museum feeling grateful for what Georgia had given us all in the last century. She was a great relief even in the abstract...

All Is Gold...

2009-10-24T16:09:00.012-04:00

The goblins of the world wide web or the bogey man of blogger played a trick on me by making my last week's blog disappear into the ether of 'where did it go?'. I thought I had posted a little ditty about Halloween but when I tuned in this week it wasn't there, lost in the deep dark hole of cyberspace. I kind of think of it as a kind of Hades with the River Styx flowing through it and the river is a flowing garble and babble of words floating into a fiery lake. Oh well enough of my cyber-mythology, fall is here on the Upper East Side, gold, orange, yellow, brown all in autumnal bliss with smells that hearken deep seeded memories from past lives. One of my own is of playing high school football, the smells bring me back to the gridiron where aches and pains still vibrate in my body from all sorts of violent collisions, hamstring pulls, sprained ankles and concussions. Ah those were the days. What was I talking about? Oh yeah, fall on the Upper East Side and what a fall this has been, lingering on with a mellow inspiration and visual deciduous fireworks and with the Yankees winning the World Series it makes things glow even brighter. Walking down Fifth Avenue the psychedelic Central Park streams in my periphery. I sip on my green tea and take in the rapid fire international voices that flow from the lips of the tourists that are visiting all the cultural heavy weights that hold down the Avenue. A waft of sunny wind blows golden leaves down the sidewalk, making it look like a golden byway, gleaming and seeming to levitate all the pedestrians in its way. It is fall on the Upper East Side and all is gold...

Kandinsky Inspires The Guggenheim...

2009-10-13T13:34:00.010-04:00

As part of it's 50th Anniversary the Guggenheim has a retrospective of Vasily Kandinsky the painter who inspired the building and has been a favorite of the Guggenheim family since the beginning, Solomon was inspired by Hilla Rebay to purchase large swaths of the painters aesthetic creations that he made famous by writing the creative treatise, On The Spiritual In Art, a must read for those that never understood, will never understand and don't want to understand abstract art. The show is voluminous, so voluminous that I'm surprised the building hasn't floated away. One hundred paintings and sixty drawings line the spiral of the museum in an overpowering transfusion of mind addling images that left me sucking air from my dizziness after looking at them all. But I digress. First thing is the always questionable way of setting up a retrospective at the Guggenheim, it starts at the bottom and you climb up the spiral to the last days of the master but I don't roll like that, I roll down hill so I headed up the elevator to watch Kandinsky devolve from his airy images of spiraling and musical motifs to his youthful landscapes that fill the canvases to the brim. I actually feel that Kandinsky got better as he got younger. This is not to denigrate any of Kandinsky's work, I like it, I really like it, it's just that I feel that looking at one Kandinsky gives me as much inspiration as looking one hundred sixty, in fact, looking at one hundred sixty Kandinsky's was like eating two or three meals in one sitting, it made my head light and my body heavy and my spirit, the real thing that Kandinsky was trying to reach, well I guess it was nourished...

New Gallery On The Block...

2009-09-30T16:12:00.010-04:00

I was going to go out and tour some of the Upper East Side Galleries when I was called by my friend, Werner Hoeflich, who said he had a piece up at a gallery on 79th Street. So I stuffed my buds in my ears to listen to some Cats Stevens; I don't know why but Peace Train and Moonshadow make me feel happy these days. On the way I stopped at Viand and bought a hot tea to-go. I burned my tongue on first sip, (there must be a McDonald's like lawsuit I could get some litigious lawyer to support), then I took the top off to cool off the molten Darjeeling and was immediately bumped by a nanny chasing an escaped toddler and spilled the acid hot tea on my left hand, I tossed the tea into the street bin and began caressing my paw. I shook it and blew on it and I thought there were blisters but realized it was the spilled milk from the tea. I almost turned around and walked back, feeling the walk could be cursed, but not to be deterred by innocuous thoughts of doom looming I doubled my efforts and turned up the music. I arrived at the DFN gallery at 74 East 79 Street and was surprised and a bit saddened that it had replaced one of my favorite galleries for years the Adam Baumgold gallery. Fortunately, I found out from the new director, Rick Davidman, that Adam had moved down to 66th Street so he was still officially on the Upper East Side (hooray). The show at DFN was an eclectic collection of portraits by the gallery's artists. It was amusing, entertaining, serious and well displayed and though it might sound like I was less than enthused, I was actually paying more attention to my still hot hand, burned tongue and a catalogue and card of the upcoming show that opens, Wednesday October 7, New Drawings of Susan Grossman. The card soothed my burns; the drawing was hypnotic and looked more painterly than any drawing I had seen before. I grabbed the catalogue and flipped through it with my scalded hand and my burnt tongue licked my lips. These were large delicious charcoal and pastel on paper that riveted my attention and these weren't even the real things I was looking at. After I stopped drooling I took out my camera to take a picture of a painting on the wall of a cowboy on a horse with a lasso but unfortunately my camera was out of batteries. I groaned and left the gallery realizing that bad things happen in threes and maybe my bad luck had passed with the burned tongue, burned hand and burned camera. I looked down at the Susan Grossman card and knew it was so...

Shameless Self Promotion...

2009-09-21T08:32:00.005-04:00

Gallery On The Green, Pawling, New York

This exhibit is a collection of studies and paintings of real and imaginary flowers inspired by the gardens, garden stores and countryside of Duchess County.

The studies are all painted on found paper and cardboard and the paintings on canvas and board. This eclectic grouping of paintings created with mixed media and collage, bursting colors and unusual found objects come together to express the personality of each flower in a flamboyant, captivating way.

"I was immediately struck by the intense physical nature of Charles’ painting," said gallery owner Michelle Farnum, "they are dynamic, full of life and color."

Long is a self-taught painter, who has painted for 25 years and been in over 50 one man and group shows worldwide. His mercurial work begins with the creating of an abstract background using mixed media, collage and found accoutrement creating a chaos, from this chaos he works outward slowly drawing out an image until it is fully expressed. He has worked with images ranging from Stonehenge, fish, seahorses, cups, butterflies, still life’s and angels. He was described in Time Out magazine in London as "cunningly expressive". He is represented by Art Movement in London where he lived for six years and has been represented by Project Room 88 in New York City and now is showing at the Rogue Gallery in Chelsea. He has had a home in Pawling for fifteen years.

Walk Don't Drive...

2009-09-10T09:04:00.007-04:00

I like to walk as anybody who reads this knows, but I got the big idea to drive out to the country so I got a car and drove to my apartment and parked in a space so I could transfer my dog, some boxes and other things to the car, I put my warning blinkers on and ran into my apartment so I could get the transfer of those things done without being ticketed, when I got into the apartment the phone rang and like an idiot I answered it. I never answer my phone because of fear of advertisers, politicians, bill collectors, the IRS, enemies of all kinds and the dreaded recorded win a million dollar scam. But I answered anyway quelling the fear of the unknown and lucky or unlucky for me it was friend from far away who wanted to talk. So I talked and talked and talked and when I was finished I put the leash on my dog and threw my things over my shoulder and headed out the door. There I stood squinting at the place where my car was parked, trying to imagine it still being there, trying to will it back, questioning if I had parked there at all, walking up the street to see if perhaps it was somewhere else and finally ending up in the same place and looking up at the, No Parking Anytime, sign that somehow I had not seen. Had I been towed or had it been stolen? In reality stolen would have been a lot better than towed. I went back to the apartment. I called 311 and was informed that my car had been towed to the pier at 38th Street. When I heard this I was amazed at the quickness and black-ops precision that the New York City traffic department had towed me and informed the communications department of the towing in less than an hour. I wondered why the rest of the city's services could not perform with such efficiency. I headed to the pier and I cannot go into the bleakness of the place, it's like going to prison for two hours but on-top of being held hostage you are forced to pay 185.00 dollars for the tow and another 95.00 for the ticket; so basically I could have flown to Vegas played Black Jack and stayed the night for what I payed because I wanted to drive out to the country. The prison that you arrive at has about twenty chairs and about fifty pissed off people. The people who work behind the bullet proof glass are nicer than I would be dealing with a legion of people who had their automobiles disappear off the streets of New York City. Of course,everyone of them have an excuse for why they parked where they parked and those alibis are usually given in outrageous rants to the people behind the bullet proof glass. After my two hour sentence ended and I showed all the proof of ownership and paid my pound of flesh I walked through the mammoth space crammed with every kind of car imaginable to my car. I drove the car to the garage and headed home deciding to walk in the city rather than drive to the country...

RIP Summer...

2009-08-26T15:27:00.008-04:00

It makes me sad, makes me mad; it's been a strange summer with rain and death soaking us with it's misery. Maybe all the notable deaths this summer is why it has rained so much or maybe its global warming, but that wouldn't explain why there was not one day over 90 degrees in June and July. But what of all the deaths; last count it was over 20 distinguished citizens that had been put to rest so far this summer including amongst others, Dom Deluise, Micheal Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, Walter Cronkite, Billy Mays, Karl Malden, Davids Carradine, Chuck Daly, Steve McNair, Robert MacNamera, Merce Cunningham, Frank McCort, John Hughes, Les Paul, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Robert Novak and now Ted Kennedy. That's a hell of a list no matter where you stand on any subject. Rumor has it it has been the most remorseful summer of all time and we still have about 20 more days. Is there meaning behind all this death? If I knew that I wouldn't be writing a blog. It has served to prove the maxim that life is short, live life like it's your last day of life, life is fleeting and live life to the fullest among hundreds of other ho-hum philosophical adages. As I walked down Fifth Avenue watching people of all ages, races and philosophical leanings, I thought of the list of luminaries that had passed and what they have done to inspire and lead so many; there has to be people who will take the place of these great people because what they have left behind is the way they lived and an inspiration for other people to live there own lives...

The Masterpiece...

2009-08-20T20:41:00.006-04:00

I was out for a walk on a very sweaty day my shirt soaked from the inside out. I grabbed some fruit at my corner fruit and veg cart and stumbled down the block looking forward to feel the kiss of some expensive air conditioning. Sweet, sweet cool air. And much to my surprise I noticed two women, looking up into my window, pointing. I thought that perhaps Bertha was doing a song and dance on the windowsill. She likes to show off her talents to anybody that will watch, especially the fairer sex. I arrived on the scene and joined the two women looking up into my window. What's so interesting? I asked, noticing that Bertha was nowhere to be seen. The painting, the painting, one of the women gushed. It's nice, I said, looking at the painting I have named the masterpiece because it is. It has hung in my many homes for over 25 years. It has traveled across the Atlantic back and forth twice been uptown, downtown and upstate and it hasn't lost its shine. Yes, the other woman purred, looking at the little girl's face in the painting, she's the Mona Lisa of our time, she sighed. Wow, I thought, these women really know their art. Finally, they both sighed and went their own way. I looked up at the painting and then entered the apartment building and my apartment, switched on the air conditioning and took another good look at the masterpiece. I had obtained the painting from friend and painter, Werner Hoeflich, in a trade for a painting of oranges that I had done. I think I got the better of that trade. The painting itself is very simple, sepia and white, a recording of the early eighties in New York City when the subways were never air conditioned and covered with graffiti. On closer inspection the painting has many monikers scribbled into it including: 'sweatshirt' and 'open doors for you" to name a few. It is as a masterpiece usually is, more than it seems and every time I look at it I find something new. I poured myself a gin and sat down feeling the sweet kiss of air conditioning and stared intently at, The Masterpiece, letting it entertain me once again...

Walking The Dog...

2009-08-11T20:01:00.005-04:00

I write a lot about walking Around The Block but I haven't written much about walking my dog Around The Block, twice a day, 365 days a year, probably because my dog doesn't walk, she stops. Her name is Bertha or Birdy depending on what she has done; Birdy when she is cute and Bertha when she is everything else. She is a Tibetan Spaniel or Tibbie pure blood. They are a breed of lap dog that came from Tibet where they would run around the Monastery sounding the alarm if there was impending danger or intruders; they have a high pitch bark that is more than enough to warn the monks of oncoming peril; they also would spin the prayer wheels and on those cold Tibetan nights the monks would put them under their robes to keep themselves warm. Marilyn Monroe owned one which caused a spike in interest in the breed in the 50's, but I regress. My walks or stops with Bertha are amusing, her stops are usually in front of people of interest, children and women, she lifts her head and preens to show off her cuteness that she is quite sure of and waits for the forthcoming pet. This happens about five times in a walk, so I've met a lot of people through Bertha; I think she thinks she's the canine equivalent of e-Harmony. Her interaction with other dogs is almost non-existent, she ignores all that pass except for Labradors and Golden Retrievers, I think they remind her of her only two dog friends; she ignores every other dog she passes except for any dog that shows any aggressiveness and it does not matter how big the dog she goes into an alpha-dog growling and barking and usually turns away the aggressor. One time a giant Rottweiler made a move for her and she snipped at it's nose and growled making the mammoth dog go down and roll on it's back and show her belly. The owner of the Rottweiler laughed, admonishing it,' You big baby Dolly'. Bertha turned and walked away wagging her bushy tail,pulling me along. When we get back to the apartment she lays down and waits for her next walk or stop, or whatever you want to call it...

Rain Dementia...

2009-08-01T15:55:00.006-04:00

'Where's my umbrella?' is the new phrase that has invaded the minds of New Yorkers everywhere. The rain is falling again, if I didn't know better I thought I might be in a terminal shower. Umbrella salesmen are making a million, the streets are clean, the parks are muddy, people walk ominously looking up, there is always a cloud in the sky, rust is the new chrome, green is everywhere even under my fingernails, puddles are everywhere, kids splashing in them not so cute anymore, people being caught without an umbrella plod and don't run, you don't get any less wet running, awning and scaffolding have become meeting places for the soaked masses, newspapers are damp, everything is damp, ducks waddle up Madison Avenue feeling right at home, rain hats have become the style, leather briefcases are stained and ruined, thousand dollar hair-dos done, cement is crumbling, wood is soaked and stained, heavy, parades of ponchos, the subways are humid, buses sweating, raincoats, trench coats, the smell of mold and mildew,the 2nd Ave tunnel a big muddy pond, we're swearing in the rain not singing in the rain, raindrops keep falling on my head, when the rain falls you run and hide your head, rainy days and Mondays, it's a hard rain, it's a gentle sprinkle, it's a deluge, it's a monsoon, at noon it's dark as winter, the sun has become a forgotten entity. Rain dementia is taking over in a frothy, wet deluge. It is the rainy summer of our discontent, all this rain and no rainbows but there's always a way to make yourself feel better, think about all those people who bought rentals in the Hamptons. Gotta go, where's my umbrella...

Do Something...

2009-07-20T17:27:00.007-04:00

I headed out to Carl Schurz Park on a sunny day wanting to catch some ray and read a novel by a friend and writer, Joseph Riippi, who lives on the Upper East Side and whose works I have caught in dribs and drabs and always appreciated, but this was a novel and I was excited to read it cover to cover while sitting and sucking in the sun and all the skin cancer it could provide. I arrived a little late in the day so most of the benches were full, fat guys stretched out like drawn pork, red as beets and not really caring just sucking in the heat after a month of drenching rain. A toy poodle ran around her elderly owner like Indians circling a wagon train yapping like a hyena and the woman cried out exasperated, 'Shandy! Shandy!' I decided to come to the rescue and asked the woman if I could help, 'Grab her leash,' she yelled. I did and the black curly haired devil nipped me on my ankle, I think it was trying to bite my throat. No blood, no law suit. I handed Shandy over to the woman and she thanked me profusely while also admonishing the dog with the threat of no cookies when she got home. As I searched for a seat I hoped that the book DO SOMETHING, Do Something, DO SOMETHING published by Ampersand Books would be spellbinding and riveting as the new Harry Potter movie has been described and I had decided not to go to so I could enjoy a sunny day, get some ray and watch people play and read. I finally found an empty bench and settled in watching two jet skis racing down the river their rooster tails rainbowing behind them. As is my custom I flipped through the pages and stopped at a page so that I might read two sentences from it; I've found that I can usually tell if I like a book by this act of pure coincidence. I had flipped to page 40 and the first two sentences read: 'Martin sits in the back of the police cruiser blood on his forehead, vomit between his legs. His ass burn from the rash forming there.' Winner! Riveting! Spellbinding! Yes, I think I will like this book very much so I decide to DO SOMETHING, Do Something, DO SOMETHING, and so should you, make a mad dash to your computer screen or closest book store and buy the book and read it. That's what I'm doing...

The Morning Song...

2009-07-13T12:49:00.005-04:00

I found out that I had a poem published in the prestigious Boston Literary Magazine http://www.bostonliterarymagazine.com/. It's a cool deal, you should check it out because there are a lot of good poems in there. Anyway, to celebrate the momentous occasion I decided to take a walk. The sun was out and the sky aquamarine and the first thing I run into are two nanny accompanied toddlers looking up in a tree where a squirrel was doing an acrobatic act jumping from limb to limb; the toddlers laughed with glee at its exploits. I laughed and moved on. I headed to 5th Avenue to do some people watching. The pedestrian parade on 5th is all I needed and more, hundreds of museum goers and residents walking, talking, enjoying the day. I watched them from behind my dark sunglasses noticing their gates, conversations and looks, trying to get any inspiration I could for a character in a story I haven't written yet. At 72nd Street street I spied a very beautiful woman being dragged by a myriad of colorful balloons skipping across 5th Avenue. I decided to let her lead me in her direction. She wore a white dress and also wore dark sun glasses. Everyone she passed would turn and look at her. The balloons bouncing and floating seemed to almost pick her up off the ground. I followed her to Lexington and 79th Street and then let her float off by herself. I headed home repeating the mantra of my poem, The Morning Song, The morning song goes a lot like this, first a yawn and then a wish, then a long sure stare, and the where turns to there...

Making Bacon...

2009-07-03T12:03:00.011-04:00

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is full to the brim, tourists, tourists everywhere and children under foot, over head and crying insanely next to the Rodin sculptures and I think I'm hearing a dog bark from the American Wing. I'm hearing more languages than a Berlitz Library but I part the chaos of the masses like Moses parted the Red Sea, heading directly to the Francis Bacon show. You either love him or you hate him. I actually started out hating him or his art anyway but after living in London for a while I started to like him. His life was the first thing that brought me into the fold. He gallivanted from London to Berlin to Paris and back again. I mean this guy lived a life and a half. His drinking was renowned, hanging out at The Colony with Freud and the other artist debauchees in London, one being his lover George Dyer, who he met when he caught him robbing him. Also admirable or inspiring was his buying back his old paintings and destroying them in front of the gallery he bought them from. And his studio,the glorious chaos in constant disarray, looking as if it would be impossible to create any type of painting there, much less one of the pristine paintings of Bacon full of gore and chaos. A studio that is now on display as a piece of art in a museum in Scotland. As I learned more about Bacon I started looking at his art closer; at first I was put off by the gore of his imagery and horrifying subject matter, the scream, being the overblown theme through out most of his work, but then I started looking closer, the detail and the exactness of his painting got to me. His work may portray everything ugly but they are nothing less than beautiful. Although Bacon was a professed atheist from his painting I detect a great god lover. A lot of his subject matter concern church, Crucifixion, pontiffs etc. My favorite paintings though are his studies of baboons. I circled the show a couple of times looking at the paintings. They are brave paintings floating behind glass and display all that Bacon had seen in a mercurial life. It's a beautiful show of ugly images...

Books, Fashion, World Peace...

2009-06-26T16:13:00.012-04:00

More Barnes and Nobles than you can shake a book at. I'm not complaining but another Barnes and Noble is opening on the corner of 86th and Lexington. I'm not a big book store fan I like small cozy reading spaces. But when I'm in one of those small cozy book stores I feel guilty downing dopios and reading cover to cover books instead of buying them. You can actually do that at Barnes & Noble like I did last week when I read Obama's book in two sittings. But things are a bit out of control now that there is another B&N opening up on the corner of 86th and Lexington. I mean there is already one on Lexington and 87th Street and one between Third Avenue and Second Avenue on 86th Street. That's a lot of Barnes & Nobles in a two block area. A lot of books to sell! I thought books were becoming obsolete with all the electronic readers, Kindle and the like. But not up here in the two block radius of the Upper East Side. It's book city man! Hallelujah reading! And that isn't the most exciting thing that's happening on Lexington and 86th Street, with all the bad economy synergy circling the globe like a warped 45 record, whatever that is or was. Here, finally is a store I can wrap my mind around or at least buy some threads from. In fact it is my favorite fashion store H&M. It's the coolest thing since Gimbels and if you remember that store you probably know what a 45 is. I went in and bought a shirt and the place was hopping, a sure sign of better times. Books and fashion, what else could you ask for, I guess world peace wouldn't be a bad thing either...

Art Is Everywhere...

2009-06-16T12:50:00.008-04:00

One of my favorite things in life as I have often said is finding real art but not in galleries, museums or people's homes but everywhere else. So I decided to go discover some art on the street or subway or somewhere else altogether. I prepared myself by opening my mind and a sixteen ounce Bud. I walked out the door feeling a little buzz and a lot of enthusiasm at finding something aesthetically pleasing. I passed on a puddle reflection because I did that about 100 entries ago; and if nothing else you have to be original. It was the day of the Puerto Rican parade so there were plenty of Puerto Rican flags waving on hot rods all over the Upper East Side but I passed on those images, too; way too easy. After weaving through scores of humanity celebrating all that is Puerto Rican and wondering why it hasn't been made a state; it would jig things up here and besides I'm tired of the whole even number thing, 51 states would be a lot of fun! Anyway finally, after over an hour of scouring the streets I found a pattern on a sidewalk that was quite interesting, how it was formed, I don't know, but without a doubt it was art so I clicked the pic and walked on. I decided to get on the subway to head downtown and escape the joyousness of the parade. And there it was the second piece of art and it was not only an image but a whole performance piece. A woman and her cute as a bunny son were drinking hot chocolates. The boy set his down on the floor to eat a glazed donut and as donut eating usually does, makes you lose your attention, he lost his and kicked over his hot chocolate that rivered down the subway like a tsunami. His mother yelled like a banshee, screaming at her son as any matriarch might do when embarrassed by their children. They left the subway and the chocolate puddle and when I observed the spilled milk folly, there it was, more art, right there on the subway floor. I took the pic and left the subway a good day had. Two pieces of art found and a good feeling about all that is and a renewed faith that art is everywhere...

Thinking About Leaving...

2009-06-09T10:30:00.031-04:00

I was walking not out of curiosity, not to relax or to go to any destination but a bar was starting to look good although it was ten o'clock in the morning. Beer isn't bad at ten in the morning and like most sordid alcohol aficionados I could explain with the usual good reasoning that it was happy hour somewhere in the world. I was trying to think about a title for a painting and I was steaming about my Chase credit card which I have had for over twenty years recently I had been told in two consecutive months that my interest rate was going from 9,9% to 12% then from 12% to 29% with no explanation as to why? I was going to call but decided to wait and let my anger wane since the last time I called I lost my temper with one of the robotic service operators some where in Azerbaijan who could not answer any of my questions and when I asked for a supervisor I was left to wait fifteen minutes until the original operator came back on to tell me she was the supervisor. I asked why she had not told me that to begin with but I don't think there is a translation for 'because I'm an idiot' in Azerbaijani. I hung up readying my wicked pen to exorcise some banking evil, I sent the letter but I haven't heard anything except that my interest rate was raised to the rafters. I know I'm not the only peasant who is feeling the pangs of our financial institutions becoming fiscally retarded. It used to be that people robbed banks but now banks are robbing people. These pitiful institutions who flaunt their crews of MBA's from the heavens are what everyone should have realized they were if you ever hung out in a macroeconomics class, howling, boring, useless places people count money whether it is money they have bilked, stolen or sharked off of trusting patrons. Not long ago it cost more to do a bank transaction on a Citi Bank ATM than it cost to buy a share of Citi stock. That made me laugh and feel a little better. After another hour of calming myself down I headed back to my apartment and put the finishes on the painting that will be in a show at the Rogue Gallery in Chelsea, 526 West 26th studio 9E, this weekend. I decided the title would be, Thinking about Leaving. I put the finishing touches on it and felt a bit of respite from my banking headaches. In fact I kind of forgot about them, art does that, so does walking and so does just remembering I'm lucky I'm not a banker or a thief since they are about the same thing these days...

A Man Ray Day...

2009-06-01T15:52:00.004-04:00

Sometimes you just trip Around The Block and come upon something that you find quite interesting, in fact, a dream come true. And there it was on East 79th Street. The Shepherd & Derom gallery was presenting the works of one of my favorite artists, Man Ray, who lived from 1890 and 1996, who not only took photographs, painted, printed lithographs, to my delight he also created my personal favorite a chess set that he designed and carved. It cost a cool quarter of a million dollars. But what is a quarter of mill if you find yourself moving chess pieces that were touched by everyone from Picasso, Klee, Dali, Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Duchamp and every other master artist of the day that had stopped by to challenge Ray and move the ivory across the checkered board. I felt the power and magic floating from the smooth rounded pieces not to mention the chess board itself. I had a Jones to play. I had a bigger desire to steal, but instead I just drooled. The photographs in the show place you in history with a cool black and white aura. Gertrude Stein, Alice B. Toklas, Marcel Duchamp, Picasso and his son Paulo, Max Ernst, Paul Eluard and others are just a few of the artists that Man Ray photographed living and visiting Paris at the time that are depicted here. It's a ride down a mind blowing history of modern art. It is a small show but it is grandiose in the rewards the viewer receives. It is a check-mate in inspiration. Man Ray was not only a recorder of history he was a great artist himself which is what a Man Ray Day is all about...

Starbucks Is Bombed...

2009-05-26T09:38:00.012-04:00

I noticed the police tape and the preponderance of uniforms and jackets with letters screaming from them but didn't know what had happened. I asked a smiling cop with a twinkle in his eye what was happening. A bomb. A bomb? I asked incredulous. Yeah, a bomb. What were they trying to blow up? I asked. The cop shrugged his shoulders. And left me to wonder, what anybody would want to blow up at Third Avenue and 92nd Street. I found my answer when I got closer to the site. It was a Starbucks. The bomb had actually blown up a bench and blown out two windows. I know people can get a little pissed off about four dollar cups of coffee but a bomb? This bomb was way to close to home and I slept on it and woke up with nightmares of the ramifications. I returned to the scene of the crime the next morning having read an article about the bombing in the New York Times, it seems it was similar to four other bombings in the city over the past year. They all happened at about the same time of night and none of the others had injured anybody. While I was taking the picture of the blown out windows a woman in a car waiting for opposite side parking yelled at me saying, the guy in the car in front of me had witnessed the bombing. I lowered my head into his car window and asked what he had seen. It looked like teenagers. I live above. It woke me up. It was really loud and stunk of gun powder. That must have scared the crap out of you, I noted. He nodded. Well I'm glad you weren't hurt. Me, too, he answered. I waved and took a look around not noticing anything that was compelling. People were sitting in the Starbucks working on their lap tops and sipping libations like they always do, the bombing not disturbing their obvious routine on-goings. I walked away feeling eerily bedeviled, none of these bombs hurt anybody, but sooner or a later one will and then what? If this is a teenage prank, teenagers are a lot dumber now than they were when I was a teen. It worries me as I imagine IED's lining the Avenues in Manhattan.
I calm myself by trusting that city, state and federal forces will catch these bombers before the worse case scenario plays out...

Boutez En Avant...

2009-05-17T20:52:00.025-04:00

It stands there ominously, protecting the Upper East Side from all comers or used to anyway; it was the 94th Street Armory built in 1895 to be home to the infantry. Through the century it has been the home for soldiers, polo ponies and now gifted students. The saved facade is red brick with parapets and a large arch way entrance and seems totally out of place surrounded by pre- war and post-war buildings, townhouses and private homes in the very up-market neighbor- hood. I walked around the facade feeling the history. The bricks have been cleaned and look almost fake, the blood red color making it even more formidable. The facade is the only thing left saved from the wrecking ball at the last minute in 1966 when it was made a landmark. When it was taken over by Hunter to serve as their middle and high school for girls it was dryly referred to as the "Brick Prison". In 1974 a lawsuit was won and the all girl school became coed. It is one of the best public school's in the nation according to the Wall Street Journal and Newsweek. On the other side of the wall is a playground with basketball courts and infant swings and slides. On the wall by the entrance on Madison Avenue are the words, Boutez En Avant, the battle cry of the original armory, meaning, Charge! Not all the neighborhood are thrilled to have the "sore thumb" in their backyard but as I look up at the red brick wall that has been such a big part of the Upper East Side history, I say boo-hoo to those that find it an eye-sore, close your eyes when you pass it. Sure, it is out of place and time but it is perfect none-the-less...

Metropolitan Museum Maelstrom...

2009-05-11T09:26:00.019-04:00

May 1 is always a good day for me, not because in some places children are circling poles with colorful ribbons or some nations are showing off their war arsenal, the thing that makes me happy is that The Metropolitan Museum of Art opens their roof garden. Unfortunately, the first couple of days of May the weather didn't cooperate. Finally, on Thursday the sun shone and I walked to the Met to see the much heralded sculpture that graces the rooftop, Maelstrom, by Roxy Paine. It did not disappoint. It was as magnificent as the day. The sculpture is a shiny silver labyrinth that covers the whole roof, a leafless gargantuan tree, spraying it's branches upward and outward like a fountain of metal; the light splashing off of it making everything glow. One of the silvery branches actually goes into a water main with a red open valve wheel. I thought it might be cool if water would go into it and the marvelous maelstrom could spray a light mist from all directions. It doesn't, but regardless, this piece is a magnificent, eye grabbing and crowd pleasing masterpiece. You have to marvel at not only the scope of it but the preciousness of it and not only the child like play but the mature reality. It is this disengaging and engaging melding that make it so interesting. After gazing and following the flotsam of shiny branches from their beginnings to there ends all you can do it is stand back and gaze at it in awe. The final question always being how they got it up here. The many welded joints sanded but left to give more of a branch-like effect probably are proof that Roxy and hordes of welders put it together on the roof. I hope someone got that on video. There is nothing better than enjoying a seminal piece of art on a sunny day on the roof at the Metropolitan Museum of Art...

Flower Eating Squirrels...

2009-05-02T09:42:00.008-04:00

I Walked Around The Block checking out all the spring flowers blooming. The daffodils on Park Avenue are especially inspiring. Carl Shurz Park is flooded with plumage of all kinds. On my walk I spied brownstones with flower boxes cascading with forget-me-nots; trees with small plant stands brimming with daffodils; azaleas popping and forsythia screaming; all in this smorgasbord for the eyes walk. Around every corner there was more floral fantasia for me to succumb to. On one corner a man was tending a small garden around a tree, planting some already blooming pansies. He stood up as I passed and grumbled and I thought he was talking to me. What? I asked. Damn squirrels, he mumbled. What? I asked again. Damn squirrels ate all the flowers. Bummer, I said under my breath imagining flower eating squirrels. I'll show em, he said. I slowed and looked back as he took out an authentic looking owl and put it in the dirt next to the flowers. I chuckled and moved on wondering how long until the owl would be removed by some fake owl stealing passerby. When I got home after all the flower inspiration I finished a project I have been working on since January. It seemed the right time to finish what I have been calling fourteen flowers. They are small paintings on paper, board and plastic I have found on my walks. I am happy with them. It's as nice to paint flowers as it is to see them and one thing I know for sure is that no squirrel would consider eating mine...