Tag Archives: chavez
Protected: Neighborhood Faces Query
Reporting Notes: Lower East Side
Night life in the Lower East Side is very lively. Ludlow Street, Orchard and Rivington quickly fill on weekend nights with young, trendy folk that don’t clear out until the early hours of the morning. With a variety of bars, the selection in the Lower East Side is hardly limited. Some places include Max Fish, Cake Shop, and Fat Baby. Playful names and decor keep the area fresh and young. I plan on looking into how this loud night life affects the older residents of the Lower East Side next time I come around.
Protected: Amanda Burden Post
Protected: Response to “Deadly Choices at Memorial”
Con Artist: Connected Artists with a Connected Vision
Two years ago, the ambiguity of Lower East Side’s “Con Artist” left entering passersby a bit confused. Vintage clothes hung all about the room, records filled the corners, and a funky array of trinkets were scattered upon every flat surface. The place seemed to be solely defined as a store. And yet, just past this eyeful, artists filtered in and out on a daily basis as they worked, collaborated and displayed their art in the space’s back room. Brian Shevlin, owner and founder of Con Artist, was not okay with this disconnection. “The store was taking away from our vision,” Shevlin said, “A lot of people just thought we were a thrift store, but we’re more about our artists’ collective. Our concept has always been to create, build and prosper and that just wasn’t getting communicated.”
After much revamping, Con Artist has finally molded into its intended form: an artist workshop and gallery. The workshop is any young artist’s dream. With plenty of supplies, space, storage, 24/7 access, and most importantly variety, Con Artist has virtually all the tools a budding artist needs to hone their craft and explore others, or as Shevlin put it, “play around.”
While the idea of a space where artists can gather and work on their craft within a community is not exactly a new one, Con Artist definitely has its unique perks. For one, the space is not dedicated solely to one type of art medium, such as pottery, or printmaking. The range of tools and equipment available to members of the collective is expansive and virtually all-inclusive. “When you’re a creative person you’re not usually like ‘Oh I only like to paint and I hate doing anything else creative.’ It’s usually just one of the many things you do,” Shevlin explained. In addition to providing tools and space, Con Artist provides a business aspect to the operation, one that apparently is often overlooked by other similar locales. At Con Artist, members of the collective are given opportunities to gain something back from their creative process besides their pieces. Frequent gallery showings and participation in artisan fleas allow guests to purchase art as well as any other miscellaneous objects the artist wishes to sell. Essentially this is the “prosper” of the “create, build, and prosper” idea, and with Con Artist’s small commission of 20% for each sale, it seems like a generous one.
Shevlin’s vision of an affordable artist space and business model stemmed from his own frustrations as an art student. “Basically art is a constant expense until you’ve made it,” he said. Over the years, he came to realize that in order to make ends meet, he (and other young artists in general) usually had to work in a completely different field to make extra money, something he felt unfairly detracted from an artist’s creative focus. With this reality in mind, Shevlin set the price for monthly use of the workshop at a generously low price of 180 dollars per month, the collective membership price at fifty dollars, and storage price ranging from twenty to forty dollars per use. Most other art spaces charge upwards of three to four hundred dollars in total for such amenities.
Even in a struggling economy however, Con Artist’s price is hardly their only allure. Their growing group of seventy gains much more than money, they gain an incomparable atmosphere of mutual respect and non-stop inspiration. Even with the constant ebb and flow of people, it’s evident that problems between members are minimal. Managerial duties pertain more to the intricacies of event planning and smooth processing than to crowd control or scuffles between members. In fact, even those who are not active within the workshop anymore, still pay the collective membership price to stay connected to their fellow artistic peers. How does such a large group of creative people with a variety of different tastes work so harmoniously you might ask? Shevlin attributes the harmony directly to the ambience. “In a shared space such as our workshop, everyone is exposed. It’s like being naked on a stage. No one’s got anything to lose.”
Liebling Commentary
A.J Liebling is brutally honest, yet not malicious. He exposes the silliness of humans without laughing, the dirt without comment, and their aura without distortion. I find his writing refreshing. There is so much repressed judgement in journalism today, and as much as some writers believe they can successfully mask their opinions, many cannot. With Liebling’s writing, I cannot detect suppression. Instead, Liebling allows the people in his stories to reveal their own character through speech and description.
My favorite story was “Getting By.” Liebling’s description of the professional faster and the professional eater were brilliant. Here you can see how Liebling reveals their character, merely by quoting them and through seemingly objective statements, with just enough sarcasm in the undertone. For example, on page 102 Liebling includes a short description of Mr. Di Laurentis (the professional eater) followed by quote on how he bent dimes with his teeth:
“Mr. Di Laurentis was square shouldered and blocky, but not overly fat. He stood five feet eight inches, weighed 180 pounds, and was thirty-seven years old. His black hair was pomaded and he wore a wrist watch on a gold link bracelet. His jaw was broad at the base and he bent dimes with his teeth. “Don’t tell anybody I do this,” he said, as he demonstrated on Billy the Oysterman’s favorite ten-cent piece, a family heirloom.” It seems somebody had once told Mr. Di Laurentis it was against the law.”
At no point does Liebling comment on Di Laurentis’ blatant stupidity. And yet, the reader cannot help but pick up on it. That’s good journalism.
Neighborhood Faces: Clayton Patterson
Sporting a bright red zip-up and his signature skull cap, Clayton Patterson arrives at 161 Essex Street and leads the way into his gallery, the extensive archives that have made Patterson one of the most reputable folk historians of the Lower East Side. He has spent close to forty years now documenting the life and culture of the area through photography, film, and art. Even at 63 years old, it’s clear that he has no intentions of slowing down.
“A lot of it is built in your own intensity,” Patterson said, “ whether you have the love and dedication and ambition…because if you do that’s a disease…but it’s a good disease to have.”
Clayton Patterson is not a native of New York City but he is most certainly a figure of it. A proud city dweller, Patterson is extremely passionate about his work. The intimacy he feels with the Lower East Side is palpable. So while he may have not spent his adolescent days hanging out on city stoops, he has plenty of pictures of kids who have. He may have not grown up with the American government, but he cares about the fact that they’re cutting art programs in schools, and he has made documentaries exposing police brutality. Patterson believes the key to establishing a name for oneself is to develop something unique and to believe in its potential so wholeheartedly, that others believe in it too. So although Patterson spent the first thirty years of his life in a town he described as “primitive” and “isolated,” his philosophy is hardly reflective of the fact.
“A big part of ‘making it’ is creating an illusion,” Patterson said, “I mean, you want your illusion built on facts and reality but, you have to create an illusion…if you can’t create an illusion of how great it is…you’ve got nothing.”
Patterson touches briefly upon the topic of Occupy Wall Street, as well as Romney’s recent “47%” comment. Lines begin to appear on his forehead. “I hope the youth of today doesn’t lose sight of the advantages they have…when I was a kid growing up it used to be like NBC, CBS…they were far away, they were castles in the sky, impenetrable institutions…now with the new technology, everything is much closer.”
As someone who spent his first years in the U.S without a green card, and a more-than-limited budget, its clear that Patterson relates to the struggles youth are dealing with today. And the illusion idea was one he became familiar with. He had to build his reputation from scratch despite having already built one back in his hometown of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Back home, Patterson was a fine art print maker, well-known for his skills. He also taught courses at several schools, including the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University. Patterson was comfortable in Canada, but unfulfilled. He wanted more. At NSCAD, Patterson got a taste of New York through the artists who visited from Manhattan. Patterson was intrigued but it was not until he visited New York for a weekend on a school-funded trip that he decided to move.
“Coming here for the weekend you kind of had that feeling,” Patterson recalls, “at that time the Bowery was down and dirty… but it sort of gave you the point of view that you too could be here…welcoming, not too intimidating…enough to let you know that it wasn’t all just paved with gold or whatever.”
Despite being lured by the welcoming atmosphere of the Lower East Side, Patterson’s first gallery exhibits were in Soho, with a crowd he quickly grew tired. At the risk of losing money and stability, Patterson began to focus on the Lower East Side. To display his work, Patterson bought a building that was once a sewing factory and converted the space into two parts: a small storefront for his custom baseball caps, the other an art gallery. The gallery looks like something out of an I Spy book. Paintings, photos, books, stickers, dvds and posters flood the room with color and imagery. While the stimuli would surely prove overwhelming to some, it does not seem to faze Patterson. Upon entering the room he pulls two chairs from the clutter effortlessly. After extending an inviting palm towards one, he sits in the other and looks around the room the way people do when they realize someone is looking at their work for the first time.
“It’s all about doing what inspires you and makes you happy…” Patterson said, “That’s heaven.”
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Protected: Reporting Notes: Lower East Side
Backgrounder: Lower East Side
The Lower East Side is defined as the area below Houston, above Delancey, and east of Bowery (NYbits). Less than a decade ago, the area was considered to be a “seedy” part of New York; gritty, and far from glamorous. While it still does not have the completely polished look of Soho, it has definitely shaped up. The Lower East Side is now the home of countless artsy boutiques, bars, restaurants and galleries (NYbits). These changes may be due to the significant shifts in the area’s demographics during the last 12 years. According to the online magazine Bowery Boogie, “On the Lower East Side, whites now make up more than a quarter of the population. Hispanics accounted for 44.4% of the population in 2000. Now, they account for a little more than a third.” The picture along with the article is of a stop sign, with the word ‘gentrification’ under ‘stop.’ I think the collision of these two groups is a definite conflict story, especially considering the booming night life found in this area (more on that in my Reporter’s Notes).
The male to female ratio in the area is 1:1, and the percent of married couples are 50% (Areavibes). Based on the place of birth by citizenship, 47% of the people in the L.E.S are considered foreign. 37% are in state residents, 8% are out of state residents, and the other 8% are out of the United States residents. The median household income is around $46,000, most people gathering this money directly from their salary, as opposed to social security which comes in 2nd as a source of income. These incomes directly correlate with the price of rent, which is an average of $1,600. The apartments in the Lower East Side vary. Some are brownstones, but most do not have the most glamorous outer appearance. However, as explained on NYBits, the outside of apartments are among the last things to get renovated. So, while many apartments in the Lower East Side are undergoing renovations and becoming more refined and modern, this fact is not always reflected on street-level.