Sailing Past the Median in the Flatiron Prow

Cups of the Day #94

Fire Escapes by Gwyneth Leech

Colored India Ink on white, upcycled coffee cups.

I am surprised that it has passed already - the halfway point on my journey in Sprint's Prow Artspace at the Flatiron Building! Favorable winds of goodwill have buoyed us along since September 20th, and the exhibit has been extended until February 18th, 2012. 

I must admit, my first day drawing inside a sweltering triangle of glass seemed endless. I paced and peered out the windows in all directions. How was I going to manage this? But a routine took shape and my temporary studio has become an enjoyable and productive place to be five days a week. When I am not there, I think of drawings I would like to do, gestures and patterns to explore.

 

The artist at work

Photo by Trish Mayo

View from Fifth Avenue, December 2011

I top up the cup stacks daily with my own beverages from the many coffee bars and delis nearby. In addition, friends have donated stacks of their own used cups, each one with name and date on the bottom, and the place they drank the coffee, expanding the record of social moments.  I love to take lucky dip and see what color or text comes up from a coffee bar in deepest Brooklyn or Queens that I haven't yet had the good fortune to visit!

Rainy Day window

November 2011

Orchids from Eve and orchid cup

Colored India ink on white paper coffee cup

October 2011

Looking back over the first half of the journey, there are so many highlights: cups reflected in umbrellas during torrential rains, twins in brilliantly patterned rain coats smiling in at me, my hot dog cart so hard to draw, the tricky fire escapes on the buildings across 5th Avenue. Then there was the Bicycle Barber who came to call and gave me and the exhibit's curator, Cheryl McGinnis haircuts, the freakish blizzard that engulfed the Prow before the end of October, and Eve Suter who brightened a dark afternoon with a bouquet of coffee colored orchids in a tall white cup.  Not to mention the many great conversations with old friends, and new ones from around the world.

Hot Dog Cart Cup

White-out pen and colored ink on

Maroon printed paper cup

September 2011

Summer styles have given way to winter coats. I spy Santa hats, Christmas trees and giant bags of shopping these days. The trees in Madison Square Park changed to gold and are now a tracery of black branches against the pale stone buildings beyond. The sweltering heat of late summer sun turned to chill breezes inside the Prow. For awhile I sat bundled in coat and sweaters. Finally, the heat kicked on in the ancient radiators, sending the cups spinning in waves of convection.

Freak blizzard at the Prow

October 2011

Nights come early now and more and more photos are posted online, documenting the windows in all weathers and times of day.

Fortified by stacks of coffee cups, ample art pens from Faber Castell, the never ending flow of visual stimuli on the streets outside and the promise of many interesting social moments yet to come, I am looking forward to the rest of the crossing. February 18th will be here before we know it!

Night Photographers, November 2011

to view a Flickr album of other people's photos

of Hypergraphia at the Flatiron click here.

Drawn to Coffee Cups: the Complexities of Keeping it Simple

Cup of the Day #93

by Gwyneth Leech

White ink and colored India ink 

on green upcycled paper coffee cup

Numerous people have remarked at how simple the idea of Hypergraphia is - drawing on paper cups and hanging them up. My reply is, "it has taken me 30 years to get this simple!"

Hypergraphia is not my first go round with upcycling - I was doing it as a young artist living in Scotland. Then it involved collecting truck loads of plastic detritus from beaches and making them into sculpture. (That was in the days before digital photos. Where the heck did I store those slides?)

Now the paper coffee cup says it all. But how did I get there?

Aerial salt marsh views painted on

paper coffee cups

Stacked in the studio, October 2010

In 1999 I moved to New York City. Let's face it, New York can be a tough town for artists. There is so much stimulation, so many museums and art exhibts to see, so many other artists working here, not to mention the roiling sea of the art market that can buffet a person every which way. In the midst of all that it is easy to lose your sense of self and your visual compass.

To counter these currents I decided years ago to keep it local and keep it simple. I would paint portraits of my friends and their families. I did this happily until the complexities of commissions and the fraught politics of representation began to wear. Family portraits were not straightforward after all!

Wall of painted coffee cups

6 feet by  6 feet

In the studio, January 2011

I became interested in a local landscape, of tidal salt marshes along the coast of New Jersey, utterly familar to me from years of summers at the shore. It is the aerial view that intrigues me, first seen via Google Earth. The meandering streams and waterways look elemental, like the circulatory system of the body. Google Earth wasn't enough. I had to see it up close - first from boats, then planes. But it is not so easy to cage a lift on a small plane. Then back in the studio I struggled to get it down on large canvases, my ideas outstripping my time, my resources and my storage space.

Cup Collection

in museum display box with mirrored back

July 2011 

Finally, I started to pay close attention to my coffee cups which, in a casual way, had become the locus of an ever expanding lexicon of drawing and painting ideas, including abstractions based on those salt marshes. Started at meetings some four years ago, when paper replaced styrofoam, my image-making-on-cups habit had grown and grown, from stacks in my studio to a small window exhibit on 38th Street, and now to the Prow of the Flatiron Building where I will be drawing and adding new cups to the installation through February 18th, 2012.

I may even have 1000 drawn cups by then!

Hypergraphia Cup Installation

Sprint Artspace, Flatiron Prow

Interior view, December 2011

The exhibiting of the cups has presented its own complexities. I recently found pages of notes brainstorming the installation. I imagined elaborate ways of weighting the cups involving collections of personal items, household objects and even playground sand. Display ideas discussed were shelves, racks, pedestals. Finally the exhibit's curator, Cheryl McGinnis said she saw the cups "hanging every which way" which led to the breakthrough solution - loops on a line. Many different kinds of materials later, I alighted on the perfect weight of mono-filament and just the right kind of loop, reliably knotted yet imprecise enough to orient the cups pleasingly in all directions. 

Thus, after many meanders and through a process of trial and error, the seemingly uncomplicated and organic Hypergraphia installation came into being.

Hypergraphia Cup Installation

Sprint Artspace, Flatiron Prow

View from 23rd and Broadway

December 2011

Recently I calculated that Hypergraphia, the Cup Installation has been featured on over 75 web publications and blogs, including articles in Japanese, Portuguese, Chinese, Korean, Russian, Turkish, French, Arabic and Macedonian!

All this from the simple paper coffee cup held in the palm of my hand!

Raising the Cups: the Cups Take Off

Cups of the day #72

Gwyneth Leech, the Cup Drawings

goes up in the Fashion Center Space for Public Art

215 West 38th Street, NYC, off 7th Avenue

February 28 - April 1st.

Shouldering my Ikea bags full of cup drawings at the end of last week, I wove my way from my art studio on 39th Street, through the trolleys, dollies and racks of clothes that are still trundled across the sidewalks in the Garment District. At #215 West 38th Street, men in boiler suits on a morning break let me into the back door of the Fashion Center building. I unpacked my stuff onto a table in the unused shop space behind the window gallery and rolled my sleeves up. 

 

Arriving at #215 West 38th Street

The exhibition packs up small but this is only part of it.

The giant Ikea bags are inside already.

I then spent hours looping, tying and stringing cups together on clear fishing line before anything appeared in the window.

  A few trial cup sets go up.

By the end of the first of my two hanging days, I had a lot of cups suspended and the window was beginning to have the explosive quality I was looking for. I dreamed of tangled lines that night.

End of Day One.

Day two was a race against the clock - looping, tying, stringing, up and down on the step ladder, in and out to the street to check the hang and to document the process.
People were beginning to stop and take photos with their cell phones.
A mother and son came by.
"Mom, Look at all the coffee cups!"
"Yes," said mom. "See, there's Starbucks and Lenny's and Bread Factory and deli cups. She drew on every cup".
She turns to her son. "You could do that!"
 

The side view into the window from the stoop.

I continued to string cups in the space behind the window. The street door was closed and the boiler-suit men stopped there on breaks for a smoke, as did security guards and also staff from Ben's deli next door. They had a close up view of the cups through the side window and I overheard an exchange:
#1 "I never understand what they show in this space."
#2 "Well, read the description in the window."
#1 "I never understand the stuff they write there".
#2  reads the panel out loud.
#1 "But it's just coffee cups."
#2 "No, they aren't regular coffee cups. Look, each one is different."
#1. "Did she design them?"
#2. "She must have, like fabric.
#1 Oh, OK. That's a lot of cups of coffee.

#2. Understand now. Capisce?

#1. Yeah, yeah.

 

The view from the Hypergraphic's seat. 

At 5:00 PM  I was out of cups - they were all hung every which way, filling the space delightfully - and my time was just about up. I placed my chair - a small armchair with a wooden fan back which came from husband's grandfather's house in Scotland - then set out all my saved-up empties and my drawing materials. Monday I will start five weeks of sitting in the window every week day from 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM drinking my coffee or tea, drawing on empties and adding to the installation. Everyone is welcome to come and have a coffee break with me through the plate glass. But please don't smoke, I beg of you!

The view of the window from the street at the end of hanging.

A year's worth of cups. I drank and drew all that!?

Just before it was time for the security gate to come down at 5:30 PM,  I took a last look at the window from the sidewalk, nearly staggering with exhaustion. A man carrying messenger envelopes stopped. "I saw you working on the window all day," he said. "The way the cups hang at all those different angles is so cool. This window is great. It's like art, or something."

Gwyneth Leech, the Cup Drawings

 February 28 - April 1

Fashion Center Window Space for Public Art
at 215 West 38th Street

Monday - Friday 9:00AM - 5:00PM

 The artist will on site drawing and adding to the installation

Monday - Friday, 11:30AM - 1:00PM 

 

Spanish Coffee for the Three Kings

I picked up a Spanish coffee this morning from Café Lali on 10th and 45th, one of my favorite stops. As I waited for my espresso and hot milk (no sugar, please) I noticed the bag of Bustelo coffee beans under the counter - a bracing blast of Cuba.

Cup of the day #58

Three Kings Cup by Gwyneth Leech

Colored ink on cream colored paper cup 

with black and red printing

The weather is freezing and the cup kept my hands warm as I made my way home along 47th Street through a canyon of black garbage bags surmounted by discarded Christmas trees. What with the holidays and the December 26th blizzard, there has been no trash pickup on our street for over ten days. When are they going to haul all this off to a landfill in Pennsylvania? Truly shocking to see how fast our post-consumer waste accumulates! Adrian Kondratowicz has the right idea - use decorative garbage bags to turn these mountians into art installations.

Now, as for the Christmas trees... OK, when does Christmas end? For the New Yorker who goes out of town for Christmas, that tree can be out on the sidewalk as early as Christmas Eve (very sad sight). For many, it is December 26th, and for even more people January 1st sees the dried-out, tinsle-tangled relic on the curb.

But New York City Parks Department and I are in the know. Christmas last 12 days, and they don't pick up for wood chipping until after the twelfth day, which is January 6th and the Feast of the Three Kings. 

In my mind Three Kings is a Spanish holiday since I had never heard of it before a post-Christmas trip to Spain with my family when I was 6. We were spending a year in Switzerland, my dad a university professor on sabbatical leave, and had travelled by train to Madrid.

January 6th found us in Toledo. I remember a cobbled street outside massive city walls. In the distance we spied the three kings - literally: brilliant colored robes, shining turbans, jewels and gifts! I dashed ahead of my family, running across the cobbles. It ended as many of my early memories seem to - with me tripping and falling on my face. By the time I was up-righted and the tears wiped away, the kings could be seen getting into a car and driving off. The disappointment is still keen.

Adrian Kondratowicz's biodegradable trash bags 

crowning a street corner

from  anycoloryoulike

Eat/Art, Stumptown and the Porcelain of Daniel Levy

I was headed West on 29th Street from Broadway to shoot some photos of the many and varied food-related artworks in the exhibition Eat/Art at Atlantic Gallery, where I am showing three cup drawings.

Cup of the Day #53

Trio of Gingerbread Cups by Gwyneth Leech

Colored ink, sumi ink and white-out pen 

on paper coffee cups
in Eat/Art

I was hankering after a coffee but discovered that the blocks I was treading are a culinary desert, being instead the Midtown heart of bling; store after store is an Aladdin's cave of costume jewellery, watches, trinkets and ornamented baseball caps. On each door stern notices are taped:"Wholesale Only, "Tax ID Required", "No Retail". What is it about such admonitions that make me want to buy something?

Just past my gallery destination, a sandwich board annoucing a studio sale at 155 West 29th caught my eye, and I detoured up in a worn freight elevator to Daniel Levy's amazing porcelain-ware production studio on the third floor. He has been working in the neighborhood for many years and had a wealth of exquisite handmade objects for sale. I left with a black and white cup and the beginning of an idea about porcelain coffee cups in my head.

In Eat/Art at Atlantic Gallery, just a few doors away, the shopping opportunities are plentiful. All the artworks are 12" or less, very reasonably priced and can be taken home at purchase. In addition, 10% of each art sale during the show goes to Just Food, "a local nonprofit organization that connects farms to inner-city residents and helps them grow their own food and otherwise increase their access to fresh ingredients."

 Coffee filter artwork by Linda Stillman

Medium: used coffee filter, 

acrylic on panel with plastic cap

in Eat/Art

I still had coffee on my mind, so naturally my eye was drawn to an illusionistic wall mounted half cup by Chris Zeller, a jaunty coffee filter artwork by Linda Stillman, a charming green demi-tasse in oils by Whitney Brooks Abbot, and a light-hearted tea bag mobile by Christina Sun. To go with, there are artworks using toast and Froot Loops, paintings of muffins and pancakes, and several delightful cakes made from ceramics. You can see some of the pieces in a New York Times article here or on the gallery website here.
Better yet, head on down to see the show yourself. It is up through December 23rd, at 135 West 29th Street, Suite 601.

As I was leaving, I  asked Pamela Talese, organizer of group shows at the gallery how she survives working in such a caffeine wasteland. "Oh, you just turned the wrong way when you got off the train. Stumptown at 29th, is just a half block the other side of Broadway. It will more than meet your needs."
Indeed, at Stumptown the beautifully lit display cases of pastry, the juanty fedoras the staff wear and the impeccable fern pattern in my latte foam were works of art in their own right.
And the coffee, roasted in Red Hook, was excellent too.

Kokkino by Zekio Dawson

Mixed media

in Eat/Art

How to Collect Art: Starting Small

Anyone can be an art collector, as demonstrated by the following story:

Cup of the Day #48

by Gwyneth Leech 20210

White out pen and Sumi ink on brown paper cup

in Eat/Art at Atlantic Gallery November 30th to December 23rd

I was at the Container Sore in Chelsea the other day, dithering over how to display several of my coffee cup drawings which will debut in a group show,  Eat/Art at Atlantic Gallery opening on November 30th.
I was at the back, surreptitiously removing some display items from an attractive clear acrylic corner shelf with a rounded front, and trying out my cup drawings for effect. Lovely. Perfect!

I went in search of a customer service rep who could hunt up stock.
Paul was happy to oblige, and returning a few minutes later with three shelves, he asked me what I planned to be putting on the them, thinking of weights, screw, and wall types.
"These," I replied, and lined up six cup drawings on a display table.

"Nice!" he said, examining one closely. "Reminds me of my mother's friend in Queens who made a million bucks manufacturing paper coffee cups. You know, that Greek kind - We Are Happy To Serve You."
Was her friend, Leslie Buck the man who designed the Anthora cup and who passed away recently?
"I don't think so. I believe it was the guy who printed and distributed them. They were everywhere at one time. My mother used to tell me, you can make a living in a myriad ways; If you find out everything there is to know about a thing, the world will beat a path to your door."

I like the way she thinks.

Looking at my cups led Paul to another story. "I have been in New York City all my life - well since I was four. Back in the 1980's I bought a piece of matchbook art, covered in a graffiti design. Bought it from a graffiti artist in Washington Square. Tag name was SAMO. He turned up not long after in art galleries:  Jean Michel Basquiat.

 Jean-Michel Basquiat! The young art star who shot so brightly across the New York '80s scene and came to a tragic end at the age of 27. One of his paintings sold for over $14 million at Sotheby's in 2007. I would love to see that matchbook!

"I picked up a Keith Haring back then too, and some pieces by other graffiti guys. They were selling them on the street and I loved the art they were making. I still have those paintings."

As I headed to the cashier, I asked Paul if he has a secret vocation.
"Not really," he said. "I do like to talk to people, which I can do in this job."
"Oh," he added, "and I have a pretty great art collection."

Moral of the story: buy it because you love it.

Graffiti Art lives on

at 5Pointz

The ever evolving graffiti museum in Queens, NY

For people interested in collecting art, here are

some websites where you can find quality artists to follow:

New York Artists Circle Portfolio

The Drawing Center

Artists Space

White Columns

Don't hesitate to contact directly artists whose work you like and ask where they are exhibiting or how you can see their work in person! Artists will be happy to add you to their mailing lists for upcoming shows and open studio events.

Staying, Not Going: Artists Loving New York City

There was dire and somewhat funereal news from Crain's Business this week in an article called Artists Fleeing the City. It paints a depressing picture of a future New York City with no practicing artists, turned into a shopping-mall art center showcasing only artists from out of town. 

 Cup of the Day #46

Dark Cup by Gwyneth Leech, 2010

Sumi ink on white, encasustic treated paper cup

It is true that the cost of living is high and buyers scarce. Yes, the city has gentrified and those derelict neighborhoods which artists have so successfully pioneered are few and far between. Long commutes and job juggling are exhausting realities for many and can surely interfere with the regular and high level production of artwork. Consider my portfolio of paid jobs since coming to the City: university teacher of digital movie-making, professional choral singer, portrait painter, maker of commissioned videos for artists, census worker, music librarian, writer, movie extra and, last but not least, exhibiting painter (yes, even some commercial gallery shows and art sales).

But this is the sentence that lost me:  "Though the nation's bulk of the art galleries are still here, artists and other creative workers say the feeling of community that used to exist in New York is gone, and with it the spark that fueled ideas".

Really? They must be living in a different city from mine.  I can't go anywhere around New York City without falling over artists I consider part of my community. These are not just visual artists, but choreographers and dancers, writers, video artists, actors and musicians of many stripes. And none have plans to move. Yes, we complain and we do talk about real estate a lot, but the exchange of art ideas continues to be vigorous and fruitful and fueled by the unique character of the city. We just have to keep thinking broadly, creatively - and collaboratively to get the best out of this town. 

Back in the 1950's, what was the New York art world? Fifty men hanging out in the Cedar Tavern and  five art galleries galleries to show in. Now it is thousands upon thousands of us, of all races and both genders, crossing paths in every neighborhood. And what is the secret to hanging on, staying motivated and keeping the artwork flowing? Strength in numbers: getting together in groups large and small to drink coffee, pool our resources and share what we know. I do this literally, several times a month. Generosity is the key, and despite its cut-throat reputation, New York City artists are the most generous people I know. 

Yes, times are tough and money is tight - but the abundance is real.

Cup of the Day #47

Burgeoning, by Gwyneth Leech 2010

India ink on white and green printed cup

Breakfast on the A Train

I was on my way downtown, bleary-eyed, to attend a monthly meeting of artists at breakfast time. I stopped on the way at Amy's Bread on 9th and picked up an oat scone studded with golden raisins and walnuts (amazing, always) and a Twinings English Breakfast tea in a white paper cup.

Cup of the Day #46

Networks, by Gwyneth Leech

Colored ink on white cup, 2010

At 8th Avenue and 42nd Street, I boarded the A train and got a seat.

Eating breakfast on the subway train always feels a little weird, but I was hungry and my scone was calling out to me. Surreptitiously, I opened my paper bag without crinkling and then maneuvered the tab on the cup lid without spilling or elbowing my neighbor. Having accomplished these difficult tasks, I looked around and took a quick survey:

3 starbucks drinkers,

2 deli coffee drinkers,

1 Amy's cup (me),

6 wearers of Ipods  with identical white cords and earpieces,

3 newspaper readers,

1 book reader,

1 young person desperately trying to finish writing an essay,

And 4 people asleep.

The woman opposite me with the heavy makeup and tired eyes had a laptop case at her feet. She was juggling an Ipod, the New York Times AND a Starbucks Vente coffee. 

Clearly for some people, sleeping on the way to work is not an option!

Sculptor Bernard Klevickas

Waiting for the subway 
with his morning brew, NYC

photo by Stanley Klevickas

Cinnamon Apple Crisp with Coffee: Chickens Coming Home to Roost

I came across an apple sale on 9th Avenue the other day. 43rd Street Kids Preschool were raising money with a fine selection of New York States apples - Macoun, Macinstosh, Honey Crisp and Empire. I am a sucker for apples generally and the New York State varieties are terrific in season. I staggered home with plenty (watch the elbow!) and now need a recipe. I am still dreaming about a dish of hot apple crisp and a hearty cup of coffee I had with it at the 165th Annual Dutchess County Fair not too long ago.

Cup of the Day #43

Strutting Cup by Gwyneth Leech

Colored ink on white cup, 2010

I was there at the tail end of the summer with my sister, her husband Scot and my younger daughter. Kitty and Scot have a farm in Dutchess (Scot is a Timothy Hay farmer among other things, but that is another story) and they go every year. There are animals, agricultural exhibits, carnival rides and food, food food. Where to begin? How could anyone eat their way through it? We did our best, and here I am two months later still thinking about that apple crisp. 

On the animal front, there were cows, pigs, sheep, goats, rabbits. All highly entertaining to the seven year old member of the party. Being a city kid, Grace usually only sees these in books.

Cup of the Day #43

Strutting Cup, Verso by Gwyneth Leech

Colored ink on white cup, 2010

Towards the end of the animal exhibits we entered a large hall - chickens and roosters! The fancy breed poultry!! The cages in rank upon rank took me straight back to the first time I saw this type of exhibit - 1983, the Royal Highland Show outside Edinburgh, Scotland. I was an art student. Those birds were heaven-sent. At least five years of poultry-inspired art ensued: paintings, drawings, sculpture and videos. There is something in the shape of a rooster as it cranes and struts that has persistently fascinated me. Generally, I don't use chickens as subject matter anymore but an underlying form is still lurking in my artwork and pops out when I least expect it. Why, a veritable flock of chickens appeared unexpectedly on this cup drawing just the other day.

They reckon dinosaurs looked a lot and walked a lot like chickens (and ostriches and Emus). I like that thought.

La Poule, Video Installation by Gwyneth Leech 1988

With a 2008 Soundtrack by Martha Sullivan

inspired by Jean Phillipe Rameau's 

18th Century harpsichord piece, La Poule
(Paolo Bordignon on harpsichord)

Afternoon Tea With Julie Andrews: The Sing-Along Sound of Music

Pity our neighbor, the filmmaker Angelo Guglielmo; our younger daughter’s favorite show is the Sound of Music. Almost every morning, the CD goes on and she joins in with gusto. I keep turning down the volume, but she loves to belt “Climb Every Mountain” with the abbess. He must hear it through the apartment wall. 

Indeed. That’s why he phoned the other day to ask if we knew about the Sing-Along Sound of Music coming up for one night only at the AMC 25 Cinema on 42^nd Street. “You have never been?” he exclaimed. “Gracie will LOVE it. I have done it a bunch of times. It’s a real thing. You will see”.

Cup of the Day #39

Blue Moon Cup by Gwyneth Leech

White-out pen and Sumi ink

on blue and white printed cup, 2010

So there we were at 6PM on a school night, doing homework in the back row of the AMC, and getting ready the afternoon tea we had smuggled in her Hannah Montana backpack, my large Celestial Seasonings English Tea from the deli miraculously unspilled.

I have a particular affection for the Sound of Music. Aside from the fact that it is a nearly flawless movie in every way, as a teenager I spent a summer month in the grand mansion that is the Captain’s movie abode, a real historic house called Schloss Leopoldskrön outside Salzburg. My dad, a law professor and a lover of travel, had co-founded a global faculty for the study of international corporate and market law and the Schloss was the site of that year’s Summer Seminar. He was teaching with the family in tow. So I can tell you with great authority - The gazebo was built for the movie, but the grand entrance, the golden ballroom, the terrace and lawns, statues, lake and stunning mountain view – all real.

And here, for the first time since I was a kid, I was going to see the movie on the wide screen. People packed into the theater buzzing with excitement, some in costume (here a nun, there a Black Shirt). We heaved a collective sigh when the first misty views of the Alps came on the screen. Then, as the tiny figure of Maria is seen coming over the saddle of an alpine meadow, orange letters popped onto the screen and every last one of us burst into song.

Well, it wasn’t all that tuneful, especially Grace’s contribution, but we sang every last song and chorus. The audience cheered, clapped and laughed in all the right places. Each arch expression and Machiavellian maneuver of the baroness’ received their hissing scorn, as did the Nazi bad guys. And the addition of a misplaced quote or whistle from the audience added an unexpected layer of hilarity.

In a happy daze at 10PM, we walked home in the company of new friends: a little girl and her mother who sat next to us during the movie, the girl a child actress up from Florida for a Broadway audition. Home-schooling with her mom, the Sing-Along Sound of Music was her homework that night.

As I was tucking Grace into bed, I asked her which was her favorite scene.

“When the kids hide in the lobby,” she replied without hesitation.

You mean in the big house?

“No, in the lobby,” she repeated indignantly.
Oh, I get it. Grace has no idea idea what an abbey is. But, true New Yorker, she has seen plenty of lobbies!

Captain and Maria in the Gazebo. Sigh.

The Sound of Music, 1965

Celebrating the 45th anniversary, 2010

Doing the Rounds: Espresso on the Lower East Side

 Cup of the Day #37

Wheel cup by Gwyneth Leech, 2010

Colored ink and white-out pen on brown cup

I stopped by Cheryl McGinnis Gallery on 8th Avenue and 38th Street the other night for the opening of Radial Patterning, an attractive show that appeals to my own off-beat patterning tastes. The Full Brew  recommends it.

While there I ran into W., a mom I see in the neighborhood and know from Preschool days 10 years ago, but who I have never seen in an art gallery before. She is a friend of April Vollmer, one of the exhibiting artists. W. and I had a friendly chat about life and public schools and then I went on my way.

Next stop was a couple of gallery openings on the Lower East Side, half of Manhattan away - A train to the F train to the Delancey Street stop. I went to support Mia Brownell and Judith Page, artist colleagues both having solo shows in that 'hood.

On the way down Orchard Street for Judith's show, I noticed the Tenement House Bookstore all lit up. A book reading had just finished and a crowd was milling about inside. Hm, I thought idly, I will step in for a minute. Maybe I will see someone I know? Not likely because I really don't know anyone in the booky set.
But as soon as I enter I see... W's identical twin sister! Literally.
"Oh," I say, "I just saw your sister at Cheryl McGinnis Gallery!"
"Yes," she said, "she went there tonight and I came here."
So what are the odds that in this city of 8 million I would run into both sisters on the same night, miles and a culture world apart?
It really is just a village.

After the openings I stopped at Orchard 88, a pleasant café which opens airily onto the corner of Orchard and Broome Street. There I was happy to see no one I knew. While sipping a pepperment tea, I fell into conversation with the manager about their coffee specials. Too late in the day for me, but I am going to go back soon to try their Frozen 88 - vanilla gelato, caramel and espresso, the coffee roasted locally at Irving Farms.

Orchard 88 has been there seven years. Big gentrification is afoot down on the LES. Back then, it was one café in a block of brassiere vendors.
Now that would have been a sight to see.

Kosha by April Vollmer
in Radial Patterning at the Cheryl McGinnis Gallery

From April: "this is woodblock and mixed media on washi, mounted on a 12 x 12 x 2 inch wood panel. Kosha refers to the layers of the self in Indian philosophy, and the work is made from multiple layers of slightly transparent Japanese paper.
It is a series of 12, some include drawing, some include offset printing on washi, but I tried to get some woodcut in all of them."

Click here to visit the exhibition website