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art, demian, drawings, east side, figaro cafe, hegira, julie, prince st. loft, s., scott
julie and s. celebrated her 22nd birthday in march. she was as plump as a ripe cherry and as big as a watermelon
you know, when your head is in the clouds and you wear your heart on your sleeve; when you have clay feet and an unbounded imagination, the world is your oyster. but when a baby comes into your life sheer reality brings the traveling circus to a screeching halt.
spring finally came. mt. tom thawed. s. and julie scaled mt. tom in may. julie was in her eighth month of pregnancy. s. was proud of her. she made the hike to the summit without a whisper of complaint. she wanted to make the climb. and it was glorious in the crisp spring air to look down into the valley where the little town of woodstock nestled quietly between the green hills; so quiet like a toy town.
s. finished the cradle with sanded and finished oak spindles. he wanted her to marry him. that's when he found out that she had a husband somewhere in oregon. she cried when she told the story of leaving him and her two children behind.
the baby was born without much difficulty. the town jeweler, also a painter drove them to mary hitchcock hospital in hanover, new hampshire, where she rested after the birth of demian. s. gave him his last name.
the ultimate miracle is your first newborn; that tiny swaddled face and those tiny fingers with their tiny fingernails. s. was very impressed by the fragility of this new being entrusted to his care.
the ultimate disaster is poverty. s. got free drinks all night at the bar at the woodstock inn where hilton kramer, a good friend plied him with brandy alexanders. the reason for this generosity was a tradition. when you turn twenty one and can drink legally, it's on the house. that night kind of marked the end of the free ride.
you will remember that s.'s father was supporting him with $100 a month; enough to pay the rent and buy food. art supplies came out of the few sales of paintings and drawings. julie had no money at all and no one to call on for help. mr. right, the lawyer who lost the "cinnamon tree" was about to attach all of s.'s worldly possessions for his exorbitant legal fees.
s. sold 30 paintings for $300. to a forest ranger he knew through bob anderson. they had to leave the yankee paradise.
demian slept in the fresh new cradle s. had lovingly built for him but every night in august would wake up crying with colic. s. was the one who paced the night cooing and whispering. julie stopped breast feeding right away but pumped enough milk to satisfy the eleven pound infant. later they concocted a healthy formula. molasses and yeast and malt mixed in with regular milk. s. fashioned a backpack for hiking with demian.
this proved useful during their hegira from vermont to the cold grey streets of the lower east side.
demian, only three months old rode in the pack to " j. pockers". where mr. pocker was so kind as to buy another thirty pounds of drawings. he even gave s. an extra five dollar bill saying "for the baby, now this is just to buy him something o.k. ?"
the sunday times yielded an interview with jack beale, an artist with a legitimate AIR permit for a living loft on prince street in what later was called SOHO. s. was going to rent top floor of that building (the post office was the ground floor). the rent would be $150 a month at a time when that was almost a monthly income for most working class people. instead of paying rent s. became the janitor of the building. he operated the old freight elevator and stoked the enormous coal furnace every two hours or so. at night he could bank the coal and limit the air vents to slow the burn.
Although much of the fabled Beatnik-era ambiance is gone, you'll find coffeehouses like Caffe Reggio and Cafe Figaro which inspired writers such as Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs.
This ain't no Starbucks!
then s. went to "the figaro" where bob milo was the manager and landed a job cooking the usual hip coffee shop menu of salads and sandwiches, burgers and fries; and breakfast of course. the figaro was a ten minute walk from prince st.
through the fall and winter s. would bank the furnace and show up for a night of work at about 5:00 p.m.. work until 2:00 a.m. then clean-up the kitchen and close. he would get home and snuggle in beside julie and demian on the mattress on the floor.
at 7:00 a.m. he would get up and get the fire going strong. then on a two burner coleman stove julie would make a little breakfast while s. prepared to work on drawings and paintings..
the loft was great. it was so big and long that s. used to ride furniture moving dolly from the skylight area to the bathroom way down at the north end. next to the bathroom was a sink. that's where they set up the cooking area. a wooden spindle for wire cables served as a table. all through the winter they lived like that. s. didn't mind. he was happy. the place was dirty with grey city soot and he was dirty with coal dust. but he was determined to make the best of things. he was working to produce a body of work for his first one man show. what a dreamer….
but julie was not at all satisfied and s. had to search the lower east side for an apartment. he found one for $60 a month. it was a pig sty crawling with armies of roaches. they worked together painting walls ceilings and floors. the worst part was the war against the roaches and the smell of the poisonous spray. under the refrigerator there were so many dead bodies that s. had to use a shovel to bag and deport the mound of the vile creatures. finally, they aired the place out for a week and moved in. s. got a real bed and with a few found chairs and a table they settled in on the ground floor on sixth street between second and first avenues.
I think I would have preferred the soot in the loft to the roaches in the apartment. Scott, what makes me crazy is that your art was sold for pennies. But I guess that was a sign of the times and when one needs money, it doesn't matter the amount….especially when you've got kids. I just think people take advantage when they know you need money. Pisses me off really.
pissed me off too… still does. but you're absolutely right, " when one needs money, it doesn't matter the amount…" in venice beach i sold even published paintings sometimes for $20. just to get through one more day. although j. pocker was a very nice man who at least bought my drawings without hardly looking through them all, just as a pile; on the remote hope that someday they would be worth something. he'd certainly get his money back a thousand fold if i ever made it. thanks pam :happy:by the way, it was a little dutch cottage after we got rid of the roaches.
Art is almost always sold for pennies – except for the very few individuals who have, for one reason or the other, managed to attract the posh people.The art world is snobbish if any world.Price and quality don't equal.
I totally agree Allan….
it may be a natural, higher natural, device, to keep art pure. thanks for visiting and for the comments men. s. could have sold his soul to the devil a hundred times. something always warned him.
there's no end to the ways people can cheat. it doesn't make them bad, but they're not artists. it's a way of shortchanging themselves in my opinion. more on that some other time. :happy:thanks for the input john. tsk tsk tsk…
What's not done before often is causing the hype, is my idea. Or: what's done before copied 1 to 1, forgeries. I know several 'painters' who in total silence make digital 'art', project that on the wall or table and paint-copy that precisely. Many 'paintings' of aircraft are made that way…. ssttt…
😎
meli,this is a very interesting entry,I am in love with the paintings in this post,I admire s. fo giving his last name to the "new life" in his life,I am puzzled of "why Julie never mentioned her kids to you prior to the proposal…?"I don't care about the marriage, many make a mistake but as a mother I can not get it! how on earth she never mentioned the kids!I am proud of you for giving so much love to your "son"!! from making the crib to going all over the town with him in your back… Also I wonder since Julie was depending on you, why the demands for a new place? Of course you don't have to answer these quesions,butwas it her desire for a better life? or was a character of a woman that "never is happy?" sorry,:( for selling your art with no major profit back then, but the imprortant thing isthat you did survive !think this way: you never sold your hands, eyes and imagination….see how many amazing art pieces you did after those….I am looking forward to the next entry meli …:yes:
thanks san for the nice comment. it could never be a movie because it's too episodic. but if i ever am noticed as an artist by this world, now, or after i'm gone, all of these tales will certainly help any biographer. :heart: but the best part is, my grandchildren will get to know a little about me at least. when i finish, if i ever finish, i'm going to save it all on disks and bequeath them to the children. they can decide whether their children can bear reading it.
Such an interesting rich life you have had, and still have. It seems almost trite to say it reads like a movie. It's better than any film! Well, in my mind anyway. 😀
great and thorough comment meli :heart:you'll see… it gets worse. the answer though, is: "character of a woman that "never is happy?"" just what you said.and i am totally satisfied that i have been allowed to go on using eyes, hands and imagination. it's all i want. the only problem with money is that when there is not enough, people keep pushing you around. and it's hard to work when you move every two years or less. ya know?
sweet dreams are made of this… it's a song. :sing:
I hear you…. :heart:
hug hug hug :heart:
It certainly could be a movie…maybe a mini series! :lol:Anyway, I think it's great that your grandkids will get to read about your life. I wish I had that.
absolutely ! and there are 203728377388499 covers of it too!I am giving you the link for Lenox since I love her :heart:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQHrspjw4aA(she and I share the same color/shape of eyes )
Scott. Take heed. You're not the only one with this particular story. I understand the Angeliki entry. I met 'fate' in a slightly different way – a British friend was 'surprised' lately by his 'daughter' of whom he knew not even her existence. These things do happen (all the time?).And I agree: I applaud your will and perseverance not to sell out your principles and do what you 'must' do: make finest art!:yes:
BTW. Today on German (CNN) N-TV an item about a colleague of yours: Lars Stroschen, who was in a same position as you about 10 years ago and put his art (partly made per computer) in a large old house, made a gallery first and a hotel next of this. Today one fights (!) to get a room there from all over the world! Absolutely a MUST SEE WHY!
http://www.propeller-island.de/english/2/4/ That is this famous hotel….
http://www.propeller-island.de/rooms_neu/room_detail/11/index.php The ROOMS !!!!!!
See for example bedroom 31 23 and 37. Many guests want to change rooms night after night "to do them all". It's a wild place of art and leisure in Berlin…
http://www.propeller-island-galerie.de/art/graphic/erotic/1/erotic_1.html
Maybe that inspires you to even greater things! There still is so much to do and enjoy…
😀 :doh: :wine: :wine:
meli :heart: thanks. i needed that. i even bought the song from amazon for .99. i was disappointed though. i thought i was buying the video. arrggh still it's a great song and annie lennox does it better. :happy:yes, san, it would lend itself to a mini-series (as in "the tudors"). wouldn't that be something. of course everyone will love what's coming up. woodstock,ny, on the road with timothy leary, the communes, "buffalo" and "lama" the ashrams, "the haight", "sunset strip" and the scenes on the beach in acapulco.john, that is quite a heroic undertaking. totally fascinating. he certainly solved the problem of uniting housing with art. thanks for the introduction. i spent over half an hour looking at the rooms. :up:and he may well be a 'colleague', but he's out of my league.
He has that funny hotel to promote and sell his art, Scott. There still are wealthy freaks out there that you can host to get them buy your art… That's clever – put a few nifty wigwams around your home and have them come. Did you see his price list?Just an idea….:doh:
If I only had the space, hell yeah.:coffee:
You know back in 2000 or so I was in school, still in the community colleges, and there was this one coffee machine in this one off-the- beaten-path building. Ten cents for a cup of coffee. The stuff had to have been sitting in the machine for ages. So you'd stick a dime in and out would come this boiling hot cup of kick-ass caffeine rush. Whoa! That might be the best coffee I've ever had. :up:
and only ten cents… you should have requisitioned it for your home.
yes, i saw his price list. see, that's the difference… sometimes people use art to make money. i use money to make art. :lol:ed,that's totally not true. maybe today, but in those days places like the figaro were the only place you could get a really tasty cup of coffee. the thing about haunts for artists writers etc., is that the uniformity of starbucks coffee shops is the opposite of places which become forums for philosophy and art.to become such a 'scene' takes an original atmosphere… the bulletin boards. the ambiance…. become magnets for individualists.i know, you were just kidding. :happy:
"Cafe Figaro which inspired writers such as Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs. This ain't no Starbucks!"Maybe no Burroughs, but the coffee is better at Starbucks. :p
I've heard that if you boil tea for too long it decaffeinates it.
i was told by a chemist that boiling coffee changes the chemistry of the caffein into a kind of poison. so watch out what you drink. 💡 :no:
it stands to reason that it will be ruined by boiling.
you are too kind david. but i appreciate it. :happy:movement has always fascinated me. if a painting can seem alive… wow. that's marvelous. chagall could do it… matisse sometimes. degas certainly did it in ballet studies and the horse track. :up:
Scott,I really like the painting of the ladies swirling about. It reminds me of Edgar Degas–He was a master at capturing motion in his art, especially the horses! Your work is comparable in my eyes. :yes:
what a life. s.About paintings and the new found fad of digital paintings.I have had often arguments about it with my hubby. Hubby is a full time digital painter, he has done very RARE works of art with brush and paint on people's walls, not even on canvas. His work is amazing. BUT, I would prefer some real art, done with a brush and some paint on a canvas. I don't like the ease that one has in reproducing digital work and calling it an original, even when they can change just one pixel in it- I can't take that seriously. I like real paintings, the life and soul of an artist is there on canvas, in each brush stroke. The textures and even the coolness and the faint aroma of the paint and sometimes even the artist themselves. :heart:
very right isabel. i could lecture on the subject but to keep it simple… there's a vibration in original art that has to do with the essence of the artist, not the personality. it's too easy to get lost in 'slick' with digital.i could see it though in telling a story through animation. but still that's a story not a painting. i go through stages because there's so much more to life than art. life itself can be an art. but now and then i hunger for the world of paint and brushes.thanks isabel :heart:
Heh, behh, I-sabel/Artman. My wife, the archeologist, says the same, but I firmly disagree. Go try to do digital art ! That not 'something' and see "hubby"'s work – that top-class, those fishes. OK, make it simple to cash off —> design electronically a new STAMP !!! My Dutch friend Jan (John) van (from) Munster (German city) once made a digital image of the Dutch Queen on a stamp and became a millionaire with it. Just try and start from there!!! That easy, really?
Jan experimented with light and other materials, very "simple" designs, but esthetically well designed. A great intern. artist indeed.
It's the idea and trespassing all that has been done before, that makes the bucket full!
:chef:
i don't want to be rude but, apparently, john, you have no idea what we are talking about. we're not talking about amazing feats of imagery or skill with the 'mouse' or even the power of the imagination to come up with striking results.simply saying that the machine leaves no metaphysical trace.or baraka as the sufis call it.take a print of a great painting of your choice to the museum which houses it, be open and attentive and you will perceive another level of impression.i really didn't want to argue about this, but it's too late. my fingers are faster than my head. :happy:
You aren't arguing with me, you put up a very good opinion! I appreciate that. My claim refers to the thought that "artists make art in a nutshell" and particularly with a computer. That's not so. Only that was what I meant. :wine: :wine:
"artists make art in a nutshell"no entiendo. in a nutshell is sort of like the 'tzimus', or when you boil it all down that's what's truest.if it means that an artist can make art even in or with a nutshell… i get that. that's true of natural artists.i think the nutshell is "i love, therefore i wish to create." by s.c. 5-29-09
Haha! Again and I know you understand it: meaning that an artist makes art as some pastime, some quicky, in an instant. Well, I can't… It needs some preparations, some plan and it takes its time to perfect it.
"I don't believe in an art that is not born out of man's need to open his heart."::: Edvard Munch :::
How I do agree with that !!
it is indeed wonderful when a few people can agree on something. :heart:good quote meli, thank you :heart:john, i may not paint every day and even not for a month or two, but everything is always ready. for watercolors or oil paintings. but i do draw a lot…. that's a kind of ongoing preparation.
😮 I love you much!
*dances in rounds like a happy child* :heart:
i love you too meli :heart:
:D:left: well, about art and what makes art, it's a passion from the heart. :heart:
What's wrong with those ladies? So euphoric, Scott – do you have a new shampoo or something??
meli, sweet lady :heart: don't get dizzy now. just jump on the next plane… :faint:isabel, i guess you are totally right. :heart: thanks for the input. :happy:dr. john, i think it's some kind of 'astral pheromones'. :sherlock: 💡
John,it is what lays btwn the ears, not what on the head :heart:
* smells the air and she knows that *the woodstock flower man* will be waiting for her with baklava, hugs and wine **calling the airlines*
Haha, Angeliki, very ad hoc! Wooot! I hope that Scott is no contorsionist though, you never know then….:sherlock:
hmmmmmmmmmafter knowing Scott for the longest :heart: time, I think we can surprise ourselves in many things but not in ideas…
wait a minute… not so fast. i haven't divulged even a tenth of my ideas.they're not really my ideas, of course. just the ideas i have wholeheartedly adopted from the writings of great men who were smarter than i. but i can testify that if anybody in this enchanted world of cyberspace knows me well. my sweet meli, :heart: takes the cake.
:happy:can I have a cherry too ?:p
till then I offer a hug 🙂
meli, :heart: you can have as many cherries as your sweet heart desires. :happy:where are the cherries? will i ever get this right… i wonder. there should be not one but three cherries here… gotta run. figure it out later. :heart: :heart: :heart:
all hugs are appreciated here. :happy: