The darker side of orange

Slow motion showing police attack a group of corralled women with pepper spray on the sidewalk on University during the Occupy Wall Street march on September 24th.

Construction zone fencing

It's a fence. It's a fabric. It's a fence made of fabric! So how can I not fall for it? Plus, it's orange.











Do they have this everywhere, or just in New York? Or just in the US? Or just in the North East? And what did we do before we had it? It's so ubiquitous and captivating, it's erased my memory.

Below and Beneath

A few glimpses of the chasms beneath our sidewalks and beneath our feet. First the brightly lit, oddly warm and inviting room beneath this sewer drain. It was cold and dusky and I think this was under 5th Avenue as I walked home from work a few weeks ago. The golden light is so much like the one that glows from the Gap or J. Crew right there.


On the other hand this enormous open pit on a platform at Broadway/Lafeyette was pretty scary even though it was tightly locked up in its big blue box. Some kinds of holes feel like their emptyness is going to jump up and grab you.

And of course I always notice the Subway grates from above. Especially if there's a beautiful blue puddle inside.

But this was the first time I'd noticed the blue sky shining down from above the sidewalk grates. So beautiful -- though a little uncanny -- seeing the outside so flimsily separated from the underground.

Good Fences

I just wanted to give a shout out to the Parks Department for the loving care they give to mending their fences.


Look at how many kinds of fence there are in one 3-foot stretch. Wrought iron, chain link and those wooden slats that arrive in big rolls on the back of Parks Department trucks. I can't decide if this is one complex fix or several attempts to correct the problem.


This one is hard to spot, but it's the most exquisite fence-mending. Two thin, hand-twisted wires spanning the gap horizontally.

Barbies Dance the Styrene Fantastic

A performance (starring the styrofoam) danced en maquette. Actual performance and performers coming soon -- stay tuned for details!

"Fainting Couch"

"Fainting Couch" in action

"Bench" and "Fainting Couch"

"Chaise"

And be sure to stick around for the after party!

The things you see in Chelsea

Over the course of two relatively recent visits, some highlights:
Reflecting pools under subway gratings.
Tiny mushrooms growing out of a tree on 22nd Street. (Lovely to see, but probably bad news for the tree.)
Some lovely Robert Morris felt pieces at Sonnabend, and some lovely ladies looking at a Joan Mitchell painting.












I've never felt much for Joan Mitchell -- all those later American abstraction heroes kind of blend together for me the same way classic rock radio filler does. I would never seek them out the same way I would never intentionally listen to Steve Miller Band. But this visit to Cheim and Reid I rather liked these paintings. Maybe it was the two ladies sharing the gallery with me. Maybe it was because I've been thinking about paintings of plants. Maybe it was just the way suddenly you hear Tiny Dancer on a car radio and find yourself singing along so happy to hear it again. And you know every word.

Or maybe Joan Mitchell is just like Aerosmith, who I do truly adore.

Foreword

The pedestrian sidewalk on the Manhattan Bridge, seen from the Q

It seems it's not conventional to introduce, but to dive right in seems too abrupt. I'll try to avoid over-explication, so this doesn't end up reading like the pilot of a long-running series. But if I wasn't chatty, I wouldn't be starting a blog.

So. This is an open sketchbook. It's about sidewalks, and things on the sidewalk. About cities -- especially New York City -- and public space and personal space and how it's not easy being green. It's not an eco-art blog, but rather an art blog with urban and eco leanings.

Or at least that's what I think it is. What it really is, dear reader, we will have to wait and see.