Adventures in Long Island City 2nd - 6th Days

Tuesday April 12th 2011
Traveled from Manhattan to LIC. We started at the studio which hosted Keith Edmier's fabrication of the sculpture to be completed during my stay. I will go into greater detail about the sculpture and the host studio once the piece is installed in Sweden. For now I want to describe the events surrounding the work I did there. We worked through the day on the sculpture and then went back to Manhattan. I got to see Keith Edmier's studio on the way to our spot to crash for the night. Keith Edmier's studio is a strata of reference materials, sculpture, mold making/casting materials and samples. It was super to see the layout of such a great artist's work place. One thing that i thought was cool is that Dick Smith's "Monster Make-Up" kit was prominently displayed in Keith's studio. This kit was one of my prize possessions when i was a kid.

We then went to a mexican restaurant where I had a pumpkin flower quesadilla and then to the place to flop.
The place I stayed this second night is worthy of mention. I stayed at the flat of Frank Veteran, who is the physician that was in charge of attempting to resuscitating John Lennon at Roosevelt Hospital after he was shot by Mark Chapman. Frank Veteran is also the subject of several works by Keith Edmier -http://www.artnet.com/artwork/423873606/frank-veteran-1980.html

Wed April 13th 2011

Close to the studio and around the hotel in LIC i noticed a proliferation of eyeball stickers. These "google eyes" i found out belong to an art project called The Googly Eye Cru. These guys just put these eye stickers on anything that will look like a face with the addition of the sticker.
http://www.thegooglyeyecru.com/?page_id=14
Contact with this group is pending. I think it is time for The Googly Eye Crew to make there presence known in Tampa and Orlando.



I also met the gentleman that built the boat above. Reid Stowe who is known to hold the record for the longest ocean journey without touching land. He lives on his boat docked on the east river with his son. Very interesting man- his boat is also decorated by some really great wooden carvings.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reid_Stowe

Adventures in Long Island City 1st Day

Recently, I was able to spend ten days in Manhattan and Long Island City working on a sculptural project for artist Keith Edmier. The week was filled with interesting people and art ( a common experience in this city) but this trip was exceptional in all ways.




The first stop was at The Grand Central Oyster Bar which even though I have been through Grand Central many times had no idea existed. The place is absolutely beautiful with vaulted arches throughout. It also has one of the most extensive raw bars that I have ever seen. Check out this menu-
http://www.oysterbarny.com/pdf/dailymenu.pdf
I have never seen such a variety of fresh oysters to pick from. In Florida you usually get one choice- just raw oysters from who knows where.


My next stop was at Ye Old Carlton Arms Hotel. This place is one of the funkiest spots I have ever spent the night. Every room is filled with mural work. My room was on the 4th floor which has a hallway themed in an egyptian motif. The room I stayed in(8D) was decorated with a mural of an Italian town(done by artist Colette Jennings) with silhouettes in the small windows. One of them seemed to be depicting someone murdering another person by choking them down. The owner of the place told me that the artist known as Banksy spent a lot of time there and even did a mural in one of the rooms(room 5B). Also all over the hotel are painted works by Richard Hambleton.

http://www.carltonarms.com/

The Curse of the Crying Woman

Found! The film that haunted my childhood with an image that was burned into my memory, even if I had changed it around somewhat. The image from a black and white film of a long haired figure laying face up with its features gradually disappearing ( in my memory the face was nonexistent, a kind of scabbed over mass, and blood welled up from underneath the scab to completely obscure the whole mess)

The film is Curse of the Crying Woman, a Mexican horror pict which includes many of the things i remember as a child. The film was released in the USA in 1969 which is the year I was born. I can only imagine that I saw it years later on Creature Feature or some other television program.

Here is the sequence that I believe is the one that i have searched for all these years.

This sequence also reminds me of another similar all time favorite from "I Married a Monster from Outer Space" where the aliens, in their death throes dissolve into a rice crispy and goo kind of substance that flows out of their clothing.