Sculptor: EvAngelos W. Frudakis
One of the pictures I did for the john lennon: in their own write book by Judith Furedi
I felt the challenge to do something with the IMAGINE mosaic and many of the images from the mosaic wound up in the book.
I arrived that morning with a ladder, a mirror, and a bunch of small objects that I could fit in a knapsack. Hopefully, I’d get some idea when I saw the word. This one didn’t end up in the book because I just had the idea this morning to flip it upside down. I like the idea, and could do a series of these. It’s more interesting what we make of it, then the thing itself.
I can imagine doing an interesting Warhol-like movie at the imagine mosaic. Just shoot one day at the circle. One full day.  Something in the vein of the Empire State building movie, though maybe not as long and with license to shoot hand-held, or whatever you feel. You could do it easily with the 500D etc. dslr. The final cut would be about five minutes or so. Can’t really use Imagine song for obvious copyright reasons. I’m sure Lester could write something for it in a few minutes.
Also, doesn’t the woman with the sunglasses look like she has one of the old Beatle mop tops?
This is the type of music I enjoy listening to. The picking, I learned it on the guitar as the Travis Pick, was done with two fingers, thumb and index finger. If you wanted to get fancy you could throw in the third finger.
A few years back, when things were looking bleak, I took my prints and setup a stand outside the Metropolitan Museum. It was a tough life. You got your place based on who got there first to stake out their claim; and you had to lug around prints and mats etc.
Sometimes, you’d go through a 12 hour day without a single sale. Other times, you might make a hundred bucks in a day. Eventually, the web site took off and I concentrated on that. But this morning, I was thinking about another way to go about it that would be much easier and take very little planning:
Get yourself an iPad, make sure you had a wifi connection to this site, and bring a few actual prints, as examples, but it could all be easily carried whenever you felt in the mood. Set up your card table and your iPod, and a couple of prints; and the iPod itself would be your kiosk. People could cruise through the site while you were there to chat about it; and sales would be done on the spot.
I expect I’m missing something – it seems too easy. But still something to think about. Plus, of course I want the iPad anyway, for the occasional presentation or just to have with me to show anyone that I happen to meet. Have iPad – will travel.
I doubt if this guy bought anything… looks a bit too enthralled.
How thirsty we are for a touch of the pure spiritual being. The more urban the environment, the greater the need. How many millions crammed themselves into Central Park that day to “see” the Dalai lama? Or was it to see Richard Gere? Or was it just to be there?
If you study the picture, far far away towards the center is a black square dot. No that’s not the stage, that’s one of the loud speakers. Keep going back until you see another smaller white dot. Yes, that’s the stage.
How many people could have heard the Sermon on the Mount? [See the scene in the Life of Brian for an idea of how it may have worked] But that day, you could hear the voice of his Holiness as you approached the entrance of the park. Would he send out mystical waves? Were you in the presence of a spiritual being, or in the presence of the analog air waves being manipulated by his voice?
Like many old-time New Yorkers – we didn’t think much of the World Trade Center in terms of looks. Just these huge boxes with none of the panache of the Empire State or Chrysler Buildings. You know what I mean. Giant cartons spelling power, but without any graceful touches.  I really only went to photograph the WTC twice. The monumental interiors that were like cities in themselves – you had to be somewhat impressed by it, but again – these interiors were just utilitarian.
So I’m walking around the exterior with it’s modern sculptures that mean nothing to me, and some temporary space for artists – which on this particular day has a piece of curved steel which if you stand in the right place reflects back the sun and the buildings. So, on this film roll, I went out of my way to take some shots of the World Trade Center, and I returned with exactly one WTC shot, which is shown below.
Photography, by it’s nature, is of course documentary. No matter what you’re photographing – there is a good chance that it will be disappear, and some chance that it will disappear due to historical reasons. Because of the distorted reflections, with strange shapes and glare of sun – that give it (for me) the feeling of an oracle. Or to put it another way, if the oracle of old spoke in images rather than words – it might have spit this image out.
1932 Rockefeller Center
Iron Workers
Lunch Time
* * *
Sculpture by Sergio… 19…
(That’s all I can see about the sculpture which was on top of a truck near Union Square)
Photograph (1999) of sculpture (19–) based on photograph taken in 1932
I wonder whether there’s ever been a time
When technology changed so much
In 78 years?
BACKGROUND INFORMATION: Lunch atop a Skyscraper (New York Construction Workers Lunching on a Crossbeam) is a famous photograph taken by Charles C. Ebbets during construction of the GE Building at Rockefeller Center in 1932.
The photograph depicts 11 men eating lunch, seated on a girder with their feet dangling hundreds of feet above the New York City streets. Ebbets took the photo on September 29, 1932, and it appeared in the New York Herald Tribune in its Sunday photo supplement on October 2. Taken on the 69th floor of the GE Building during the last several months of construction, the photo Resting on a Girder shows the same workers napping on the beam.
The copyright owner of the photograph, the Bettman Archive, did not recognize Charles C. Ebbets as the photographer until October 2003 (reportedly after months of investigation by a private investigation firm).[1] Many posters and prints of the photograph continue to list the artist as ‘unknown.’
- Buddy is recovering from his evening at the vets. He came back pretty groggy and shook up, but he seems to be getting back to normal, though his right eye is still messed up (the inner eyelid thing). I’m waiting for blood tests which will tell whether the eye is the result of an infection, or a genetic abnormality. If it is a genetic abnormality, I don’t know whether that is serious or not, though if his eye stays like that for the rest of his life, it will be irritating for him.
I managed to give him eye drops once so far today without a problem. One more time a little later. (Twice a day).
- There’s a sort of internet land grab going on with the new .co domain. It’s really Colombia, but it looks like Company, and it’s shorter than .com – so I decided to swap up two names which at the time of this writing haven’t propagated yet, i.e. not working yet. But here’s what I came up with:
blackwhitephotos.co and blackwhitephoto.co
Tons of stuff is still available with the ‘co’ extension.
- I got through a pretty large order (20 12 x 18’s) without a single (knock wood) printer issue. I’m always pretty superstitious about the printer(s) – because the second you say everything is fine – you just know something will happen. Although I’m at a point where I have workarounds for anything that’s happened so far.
- I have about 20 more prints to get printed and packaged; and I have a bunch of things I want to do… though not sure what order.
The documentary about Helen Levitt is taking shape, and I even got to see a small clip with me in it from Halloween last year. They need high-res shots from me for the movie, and I’m talking with the director about what pictures I might bring if there’s a showing / gallery event in New York. Anyway – this isn’t the movie that interests me the most. I’m much more curious to see how I turned out in the Weber-centric documentary. I haven’t seen anything from that one yet. It’s a much larger project, but I have been assured that I haven’t ended up on the cutting room floor.
- I’m at that point of summer where everyone (family-wise) is gone. I can tell you that there’s no doubt that Buddy is filling a pretty big role as my companion, because while he was at the vets, and I was walking around the house doing the usual whatever – I missed having him constantly underfoot.
- Still with the cigars. I look back and see that I made the switch July 1. I also know that it’s just this sort of thing with Buddy that would normally have sent me downstairs to get a pack of cigarettes no matter the price; and this time it didn’t. I calmed my nerves by going downstairs, sitting by the construction site, and lighting up a half-corona. Ten or fifteen minutes later, I was calm and ready for whatever was going to happen next. The other thing, is that I’m beginning to run into other outcast cigar smokers; well one so far; who also found the construction site a good place to relax with a stogy.
- I’m getting the air-conditioner problem fixed, finally. It started acting up again – dripping. Wrong sleeve. The guys that put it in wanted to charge me a few hundred dollars to put the correct sleeve in. That was three years ago. Now, somehow, I managed to get the landlord to take care of it. It’s not done yet – but they know it’s their responsibility.
- I am planning to get together with Lester and do a series of inexpensive photography books through Blurb. I haven’t been crazy about the Blurb black and white production quality – but I’m going for price point this time. And rather than having one large nicely produced book (SharedInk or MyPublisher have done excellent jobs in the past) I’m going to go for a series, oh – I said that already. But the books will be in the $20 – $25 range (paperback), and available for purchase at Blurb.
And of course at this point, after a lifetime, of this, I already have a list of ten books to do.
- I also want (I know this is going on too long) to get my movie collection organized and add things to it, on YouTube. The quality of YT really improved since the last time I was there, including the user interface.
- Okay. I apologize for this shopping list of things on my mind, but since I’ve written it out already, I’ll leave it… and I won’t tell you what I plan to buy in the supermarket, though I am still vegetarian (which also began on July 1)…
Subway Performer, Infrared Photograph (HIE Film, Leica M3) with IR Flash
Buddy, several years ago, in front of my light box
[ I'm trying to keep this in chronological order, so skip to the end to see the latest with Buddy]
I noticed yesterday morning that there was something wrong with Buddy’s right eye. Cat’s have a membrane, sort of a covering between the eye and the lid, it’s like an inner eye-lid, and for some reason, half of this inner membrane is showing. It must be irritating because his eye is watering badly as well.
I called the vet yesterday, and they came by, two women, this afternoon. Buddy is simply not a good patient. I tried to get him into a calm mood by brushing him before they arrived. And he was, but once they entered the house, things got ugly. I was able to put him up on the counter where I do my matting; and he was doing the usual amount of hissing, and soon striking out with his claws; but with three adults holding him we couldn’t get him still enough to work on.
The vet suggested wrapping him in a towel. Again, this did not go well. We got the towel around him, but now his panic went off the scales – and we couldn’t hold him. He jump out of the towel – off the counter – and onto a piece of rug that is his usual bed. He turned on his side, ignoring us, with the only sign that something was wrong – the twitching of his tail.
So the vet suggested that he would have to be tranquilized in order to do a full work-up. The eye-business could be topical, that is to say, not a bad symptom, or it could be a symptom of something worse. So as it stands, the vet will send someone over tonight who is a specialist at getting cats into carriers. And Buddy will go off to the hospital which is only a block away; get put under; and then they will hopefully be able to do the testing they need to do. Then he’ll be brought back to me.
I knew all along that this wasn’t going to be easy. I’ve had him in a carrier exactly once and that didn’t go well. He was absolutely scared out of his wits while he was in confinement. It is possible to give him a tranquilizer orally but it will take at least 20 minutes to work. So I’m just waiting for the call that the person with the large carrier is coming by.
I have to admit, that I really couldn’t get any work done – as I was worried about him all day and couldn’t concentrate on printing.
* * *
There was a change in plans as the person who was going to pick Buddy up in a carrier tonight wasn’t available; so it will be done tomorrow night around 8 pm. A day of reprieve for him. He’s not in any pain. But whatever is wrong with him has to be diagnosed, as it could be trivial or serious.
* * *
Next morning: Thank you all for your good wishes. Just so you know, he’s not suffering at all with the inner eyelid problem; not even sure he knows there’s anything wrong. Sleeps, and purrs, and does all the usual stuff. Tonight, he’ll be taken to the hospital nearby where he can be sedated and they can do a more careful exam (see below).
* * *
Next Day
Okay. Buddy is off to the hospital. How we did it. He loves to go to the door when someone rings. So when Jennifer (the cat picker-upper) was at the door, I cracked it open a bit so we could talk. She had a satchel with a grid that the cat could see through and she pushed the apartment door open when I told her to and I slid Buddy into the satchel, head first.
He immediately started letting out those terrible noises, but Jennifer was calm. There were two zippers that had to be pulled around and of course mine got stuck. But the other zipper could go all around so the whole thing probably took 30 seconds.
As she walked down the stairs with the cat in the satchel, he was still crying – but not crazy crying; and Jennifer said, That went really well. I was rattled. But not as much as Buddy.
So now I just have to wait for a call from the hospital. Whether I’ll get it tonight or tomorrow morning; I’m not really sure. I think it will be tonight. If that’s the case and they can do everything they have to do Jennifer can bring him back tonight and and he can sleep in his own bed.
Phew.
* * *
The call came around 11:30 pm from the vet. Buddy was resting, and still knocked out from the tranquilizer. They did blood work. And they looked at the eye. And so far the conclusion is that it may be an infection, or it may be a genetic syndrome (I forget the name). They are sending out specific genetic test samples to see if it is a genetic syndrome. In the meantime, I’m waiting for them to call me to pick him up, probably around 12 midnight, and bring him home tonight. They don’t expect to see anything that’s related to the eye with the general blood work. If there’s are other problems with kidneys, liver etc. that will show up. And it will take a while for the special genetic marker blood tests to come back. Buddy was pretty freaked out. When they got him there he had pooped in the satchel. I’m not surprised – he did that once before when he was very nervous and I was trying to get him used to the carrier.
Should be fun to give him eye drops, but he’s comfortable with me, and I’m pretty sure I can do it. One thing I forgot to ask, is if it is a genetic syndrome – if anything can be done for it. I’ll be glad to get him home and let him calm down; but so far, although we don’t know what is causing the problem, I feel okay that it’s not going to be anything that serious.
* * *
And I just got him back in the house. He looks good. I never saw him after he had a bath. Groggy, but good. Even his eye looks better. More later…
I remember selling one of these prints to Jim – and I’m pretty sure that this was in Washington Heights, and that it was the oldest house in New York City, and that someone famous, possibly Hamilton had lived there; now it is a museum; but that’s all I can recollect right now.
It’s the Jumel Mansion, Washington Heights. George Washington resided there for a while. (Thanks for the info Markus)
At any rate, I’m putting it back in the store.
Lester compiled old footage he had of me. I wrote the soundtrack a few years ago when Lester and I were taking another crack at the music biz. I never was very good at writing songs, that is to say words and music, but I could always make up soundtracks for movies that were purely imaginary, which is to say, tunes, themes, and lyrical melodies.
No matter how hard we tried (and we tried since we were in our early 20’s) we never could quite make any commercial headway with music. Looking back on our attempts, I think this was because we were living in the age of singer / composer and neither of us could sing very well.
Lester still writes songs almost every day. He loves it. I can’t get into it because if I do – my photography career suffers. I have so many interests, that I have to be careful to keep them in line or I run into trouble paying the rent.
I met Lester at a sleep away camp. We were both counselors and about 19 years old. I remember Lester as being a wild guy back then. By wild, I mean a sort of lovesick prankster. He was always pining for some girl. And he began a club for counselors where we would dress in black and sneak around at night throwing rocks at tents, and doing the sort of pranks you’d see in Animal House. It was the summer of the Vietnam draft lottery. We both escaped going because of the twist of fate – our birthdays both gave high numbers. Can you imagine sitting around reading the New York Times one fine Sunday morning with your pals to see who was going to be drafted and who wasn’t.
It was the beginning of a friendship that has lasted to this day (we are now looking at the big 60 which isn’t far off).
Hard to believe how quickly it went, and how we’ve changed in some ways, and in other ways are exactly the same.
In all those years, it’s hard to remember any serious arguments. We spent a lot of time running down creative paths and partnerships together. As I say, there was music. At one point, we both wanted to be artists. I can remember showing paintings and drawings on the sidewalks of Flushing Queens where we shared an apartment for a year or so, before having to sneak out in the early morning because we couldn’t pay the rent.
I taught Lester to play the guitar, that summer at camp. And he opened up what had been waiting to be released in me – my sense of humor. He was the first person that I was able to “riff” with. We would sit in the living room of the apartment in Flushing, with a tape recorder, and write skits, or pretend to be doing a radio show in the vein of Bob and Ray.
Even at that time, I was trying to figure out some way to live a creative life. I would eventually find a job mixing chemicals in a photography lab. And he was working for the (I kid you not) Blank Book Company. Which was fitting.
Our paths would twist and turn. He would get married and move to Jersey. I would end up at Grad. Film School. And he would be my lead actor whenever I needed someone to do crazy things in my movies. By crazy, I mean that I once did a short that called for him to walk down Fifth Avenue in his bathrobe on a winter day. And he was game.
Later we would end up writing screenplays together.
Again. There were never arguments that had anything to do with egos. He was better at plotting stories; and I was better at something, maybe fine-tuning his ideas. We might argue about the script, but it never got personal.
We lost touch as I took a sharp turn into programming personal computers. But one day, after not speaking for several years, I called him again and it was as if we had just broken off in mid-sentence. There had been no real reason that we drifted apart, and no reason that we drifted together again. You really could picture a some bits of wood floating in the ocean, carried hither and dither by currents until one day they meet again.
Everyone should have at least one friend of that caliber. It makes life a lot easier to get through.
p.s. Lester – is there some sort of shortcode that I can put into the blog post so that the image and video show up in the post… ? In other words, I’m not sure how to embed it.
