L E S Galleries

There are 61 Lower East Side galleries.  Today I visited about 8.  The area is from Lafayette to Ridge Street and E. Houston to Henry Street.  The staff are all very nice and for the most part are happy to have you take some pictures. 

Sicilian Photographer Davide Bramante puts 8 to 12 photos on one negative.  His work is at the Mark Miller Gallery on Orchard Street.  Along with the work of Felipe Galindo.  Mr. Galindo's show is called used/reused.  He takes objects like the program to an art exhibit and draws people on it who are looking at the art.  My favorite was a flattened can of Budweiser Beer on which he drew 4 guys.  It's called 4 Buds.  You can see more at the web page www.markmillergallery.com. 

Arnold J. Kemp's 'don't make friends' comprises full-scale digital scans of torn and crinkled foil, ripped into various mask forms

Kim Keever's "Early Man and Missing Landscapes" are 5 large imaginary landscape photographs that Keever has photographed through the wall of a 200 gallon tank filled with water that he injects pigment into.
An extraordinary creative group of people to fill our eyes and minds.

Opening night for the L E S Galeries

I didn't make the opening last night.  I was busy rescuing a damsel in distress.  She was very drunk and collapsing on the street.   About in her forties or fifties carrying two shoulder bags.  I reached to help and touched her.  A mistake.  She recoiled.  So when I asked if she was all right she slurred that she wanted to be left alone.  I left; went to a bar for some club soda and to watch, to see that she was all right.  She leaned on a fence with her head down and didn't move for the time it took me to drink the soda.  I went back out and talked to her.  You see, I was thinking of that girl who got drunk and was raped by a police officer.  We're all too vulnerable to add to it by being drunk in public.  The Damsel listened to me talk about all the traffic and how dangerous the streets were at night.  She agreed to let me help her home.  I really had to lift her because she couldn't walk.  Fortunately, there was a Starbucks and she agreed to a coffee.  When we got inside I found a table with two young ladies.  I thought they might help and might make my Damsel more comfortable.  They were taken aback by her condition and ignored us.  The Damsel wanted an espresso.  I got her a double.  She drank a little and then nearly conked her head on the table.  Eventually, I thought to ask my espresso friend if she had a cell phone.  She dug it out of her bag and gave it to me.  I asked who should we call.  Her husband, Harold.  I couldn't work the phone.  I gave it to the young lady at the table and she found Harold; handed me the phone, saying you're really nice.  I dialed Harold and gave the phone to our Damsel.  She mumbled into the phone "I'm coming home" and hung up.    Then got up and stumbled out of Starbucks.  She was intent on getting home by herself.  I caught up.  Got her to wait.  Went back got the phone and her bags and walked her to her apartment building.  By then she was on her own two feet and asking me my name telling me who she was, thanking me etc.  She had gone to a meeting and a lot of hard work was brought to naught.  Frustrated she got drunk.  Don't ask me who she is.  I'm just talking about it because this is what happened to me last night when I thought I was going to a Gallery opening.       

"Circumstance"

"Circumstance" is an Iranian film produced  by among others Sundance and Netflix.  Written and directed by Iranian-American Maryann Keshavarz, it is about two girls aged 16 beginning a romantic relationship.  The President of Iran has told us that there are no gays or lesbians in his country, and about 8 years ago, while sharing a cab with my friend Andrew we got into a discussion with our Pakistani driver about gays in Pakistan.  He assured us there weren't any in Pakistan.  "It's just in the West there are such things."
So it is always good to see and support artists who are talking truth to power.  Modern Iran is shown not only as a patriarchy but with a defined class system.  They show the wealthy, educated class with their privileges and the poor on the streets, panhandling.  People have criticized the film because it doesn't look like Iran and the actors have foreign accents, but never having been to Iran and not speaking the language, this is not an issue.  One of the subplots is about a group of girls, the 2 girls, 2 male friends and an Iranian-American.  They decide to do voice overs to the American  film "Milk" and then slip the DVDs into casings with other labels.  It's a funny scene and cleverly subversive.
I am reminded of the time I went to hear Nuola O'Faolain speak at Barnes and Nobel.  She read from her book, "Are You Somebody?  The Accidental Memoir of a Dublin Woman"; about the Ireland she grew up in; how much it has changed and how that change happened.  "It was pop culture", she said, "liberation through Rock and Roll." Tom Stoppard's play "Rock and Roll" explores the same idea.