about smell-a-vision

over the weekend I did a lot of things. I went to the Ai/Ap party in midtown, the big deal for illustrators and photographers. Usually it's a raucous party with substantial drinking mixed with substantial elbow rubbing, all while looking at the mounted work of the hot shot illustrators and photographers of the year. It usually takes place in this old church below Houston, but this year it was a change of venue, and a change of format, and a change of admission price. It was 40 bones to get in the door. So, most folks were severely disappointed when they got there and learned that instead of mounted work on the walls, everything was shown on a $300 slide projector. Also, it was simply hors d'oeuvres verses the prime rib we might have expected for 40 bills.

At first most of us were almost unwilling to forgive this new little wrinkle in the fabric of our Friday. But, as with any open bar environment especially if filled with creatives from various fields, we soon overcame the blasphemy of showing high end art on low end video equipment, and everyone was having a rollicking good time. Myself? I went with the tequila, which tends to bring out the lion in me. (hear me roar!) There were a great many conversations that evening, some which I will remember fondly for years to come. None the least of which was a brief conversation I had with a woman who had a fairly small build. Her glass was getting to be low, and I was heading back to the bar, so asked if I could get her a refill.

She explained to me that because of her size, she's learned when to say when, and if she's ever in doubt, she asks herself, "what would Jackie do?" referring of course to Jackie O of first lady fame. I was impressed by this, and of course, over brunch retelling the story the next day, my friend jack announced, "ah! So that's what I've been doing wrong... I always ask myself, what would dan do?!" Oh my. Food for thought kids. Incidentally, I had a very tasty bowl of chicken,avocado,cilantro soup that morning. It was very tasty. Got it at the Cuban café on smith street in Brooklyn.

well anyway. After a while the party was a wrap, and it was time to go check out Finian McKean downtown. Another great time, including the ride with our whacky and temperamental taxi driver, who couldn't understand all the traffic. (no point in explaining it was 65˚ on a November Friday night in new york city)

Also went to that BMA over by prospect park as well, so we could check out the work of Edward Burtynsky. Amazing photos, very well executed, and I would recommend taking the time to see this show if you are in town. I believe it's up until January, but that's not an excuse to put it off. I left inspired like you get when you go see something good.

oh, also got to see Spoon. That was great. Those guys know about how to rock. I tried to phone in an audioblog from the Nokia Theater while they were on stage but I guess the server was down or the music was so loud I was misinterpreting the prompts. But it was a great show, and though I've put a couple of pictures from the show up here, I do not apologize for the failure of my low res CCD chip. I told you it was dying, so we'll just have to deal with it together. Actually, i plan to sell the old eMac and buy another pinnercam with the proceeds.

after that? I had to pitch new york city to some foreigners. (out from Oregon of all places) once they left for the plane, we sat down to some intelligent conversation over a couple of rusty nails. Here's Where We Get to the part about Smell-A-Vision. See, when we left the bar, we got to walking, it was early Sunday morning. A nice little Sunday morning stroll. (maybe 4:30am or so) and I tell you what, every where we went the garbage was coming in the windows. Every single trash can was filled to overflowing and pouring into the streets. Mind you, it was a warm night, (not like mid-july or something) but warm enough to remind you that new york doesn't have the cleanest sidewalks for licking.

So what I did was, I started taking pictures of the trash cans as I came upon them. (get it? Smell A Vision?) Yea. I got to thinking. People understand that there's a lot of trash in this town, but it's not the first thing you think about when you think about taking a Sunday morning stroll through the park. I like to think about lox and bagels. The New York Times. Coffee and cigarettes. You know... New Yorky stuff. But this was something I had to share with you. Please contemplate the new scroller, "a lovely morning stroll" on today's update. Consider that these photos were made between (roughly) Washington Square Park and Union Square. Not a great long walk. But my god what a lot of trash. And filthy trash at that. Makes you wonder how in the hell those folks who travel over here to run in the marathon could even consider running it barefoot. I mean... COME ON MAN!!!

that's just plain silly.


Now, I'm not going to get all arty and tell you that those trash heaps are beautiful in some way. Some kind of art about reclamation or urban decay. It's not like that at all. I'm just saying, that's the stuff they barge on out to the sea and drop it in. That's just the loose rubbish on the street that gets dumped in there. And no, I'm not going to tell you to get all green about it and try to enforce earthday six days a week. I'm just saying, "would you look at that?!" so, please do. Maybe you'll see some garbage you recognize. I spotted some SPARKS cans here and there. I don't know. It was something to do. Also, you might notice a sort of ethereal glow in some of the stroll scroll images. That's because my camera is slowly dying, and to get the lens to open up, I have to push the blades with my fingers. But see, I had eaten a nice, juicy shwarma pita before getting out there and discovering the trash, so you know, that's the shwarma filter. Strangelyy appropriate for that project.

In other news, YES! I got the new G5 in the house. More RAM on the way. I must say I do love it. It hasn't crashed once. (fucking better not either!) But it's great man. I finally feel like I'm working on a machine that understands what I'm trying to do here. So, I spent the day adapting to the newness and organizing files and getting images in place for today's update.

I am all caught up. I have no pictures on any of my flashcards, and I get to start from scratch tomorrow morning. Good times.

In the meantime, please enjoy yourselves. The archives have been updated, and we're up to speed on this end.

I know there was something else I wanted to say. What the hell was it? Oh yes. For those of you who missed Finian McKean with us last Friday night, he's playing again this Friday night at Sunny's in redhook. Click on the Finian link in my links for more info. Also, Semi-Precious Weapons is playing at CBGB's on Thursday night. I'll be there taking photos. You wanna get famous?! Come on by, there's folks in Hummelstown Pennsylvania and Nishinomiya Japan that would love to see your face, even if I do put a black marquis over your eyes for the hell of it. I'd love to see you there.

Until the next time, keep it real, and thanks for coming back.

dTown 57˚ and I see half a moon from my window.

ps. oh yes. please take a moment to click on the links of my sponsors. they're at the bottom of this blog. (thank you google...)