A Child Of Atom

I just came across the website of photographer Bill Sullivan who photographs sequences of people in the context of the same situation, or device, and then does large scale installations of the photographic series. One of those series is New Yorkers coming through the turnstyles at the entrance of the subways. All of his subject were photographed without their knowledge, as he stood by his tripod and pretended to read a magazine! Viewing them in sequence, as he has them laid out on his website really is an amazing experience, and the array of faces and expressions that he captures is amazing. One note of interest in this series is how dated some of the subjects look. The series is dated 2004, but some of these people are wearing fashions straight out of the 70's! So much for being the most fashionable city in the world.

Okay... Google has this service, it allows you to search images as well as just words, right? With me so far? When you search something you can just click "Images" right there at the top of the page.



And then you'll get pictures of what you searched for. So, if you arrived here with the search term "atom drawings" or "atom sketches" or "atom pictures" you might want to try that instead, maybe?

Here, I'll even do it for you the first time. Click here.

You're welcome.

For once my vaunted powers of coincidence have actually worked in my favor! As you know, earlier this month I opened two shows. One of them was written and composed by a couple of friends of mine who had worked with me at a summerstock for the past two years. I had seen this show there and encouraged one of the theatres that I work with frequently in the city to consider it for their season this year. Back when it was all arranged my friends had considered coming out to see the production, but time being what it was, and the unfortunate holiday timing of the opening I figured that it wasn't going to happen.

Skip ahead to this week. One of the actors had a small incident with a costume article that meant it needed to be replaced. I had shopped for it earlier in the week and headed down to the theatre this morning to deliver it so that I could see it on her and determine if it needed any quick alterations, or what-not. When I arrived I discovered my friends, the authors, standing in the lobby! They had decided to take a last minute flight to NYC and in their rush to pack forgot an address book that would've contained my number. Without that ripped shirt I never would've known that they had come in. I stayed and watched the show, my first time seeing it with an audience, and then we all had a quick lunch. (It's children's theatre and they were going back for the second show in the afternoon.) It was awesome to see the show with the kids, to see what they reacted to, and how worried for the characters they seemed, and doubly so since I was able to see it with my friends!

This weekend Kid Flash and I decided that we were on vacation. We both agreed no email, no phones (cell for me, land for him, can you believe he doesn't have a cell?), no outside world. I was coming off a three week tear of constant work (and I do mean constant, there were several 24 hour days), and he's about to start a new semester of school, so we both feel like we need a break.

After a week of debate and perusing last minute travel packages we both decided that neither of us wanted to make a decision. It basically came down to that, sad to say. So we chose to stay in the NYC and be tourists in our own city. This included checking online before every meal to see how the restaurant was rated and reviewed, and visiting stores that we normally wouldn't. In some cases it worked out fantastically (go to Sarabeth's and get the pumpkin waffles, yum!) and in other cases not so much (what is the attraction to FAO Schwartz?). We visited the Museum of Natural History so that I could see the Planetarium, which I had never been to, saw Pan's Labyrinth had some great sushi and Korean food, and visited Toy Tokyo and the 80th street flea market.

Monday was a highlight though. We hopped on a Metro North train and headed upstate to visit Dia: Beacon. Dia is a collection of modern art, comprised mainly of over sized sculptures and installations from the last 4 years of art. The highlights included Richard Serra's "Torqued Ellipse" series which includes 4 gigantic steel ellipses that fill the room they occupy. Each giant steel wall can be walked around, and in some cases through and between and being in close proximity to them is the only available way to experience them. This often means passing between the sculpture and the walls of the room in only 3 or 4 feet of space. The shapes of the walls and the twisted (torqued) cylinders can only be experienced from within the sculptures themselves. It's really quite amazing. Like most modern art some of the other galleries are hit or miss, but I'd definitely recommend a visit if you have a day or so. The trip up is about an hour and the galleries took about 4 hours to properly visit.

It was great weekend of not being pressured by the real world, and experiencing New York as a tourist (sort of... we avoided Times Square and several other annoyingly tourist congested areas). Now, back to the work.

Continuing my style themed 12 of 12 entries I decided that for this month's that I'd stick to panorama style shots. (This is all based on a project started by Chad Darnell.)

Okay... I've spent nearly every day since the New Year... working. And working. And.... working. In the past two weeks I've opened two shows. I designed both the set and the costumes for both shows. That's the equivalent of 4 shows worth of work.

One of the things that this means is that I've spent an inordinate amount of time in the various Salvation Army thrifts around town. One of the peculiar things about thrifting in New York City is that you have to know your neighborhoods in order to find what you are looking for. If you want men's clothing then 21st street is the best location for you (it's the closest to the gay neighborhood). If you need clothing for larger sized people you'll have to leave Manhattan, (I've never found a dress over a size 12 at a Manhattan thrift). If you are looking for anything that is actually vintage avoid the thrifts closest to NYU or SVA, (all the students will have bought the good stuff already). My favorite Manhattan thrift though is 46th street at 10th Ave, they ALWAYS have some highly surprising items. Because of their proximity to the fashion district they seem to get a lot of leftover samples from designers. Last week I bought 6 pair of pink opera gloves, just in case I ever need them. This week I've seen a dozen plaid girl's jumpers in various sizes and colors, (which I was dieing to use but it didn't fit either show, dammit!) and my favorite: several dozen powder blue floor length t-shirt dresses with open backs. Again... how can I use this in a show? Why am I not currently designing something that calls for this?! This week it also seems that someone with a collection of 70's polyester print shirts is cleaning their closet. THIS I could use. I bought several for my shows and a couple for myself as well. A great boon to my design.

Today I went in to discover a wall of dance pumps, several dozen pairs of about 4 different styles. I discovered that each style was labeled. The first had a name and "Robbie and Linda's Wedding." So... wedding leftovers I guessed. I looked at one of the other styles and found that they were labeled as well, but said "Robbie and Julia's Wedding." Huh. Robbie got remarried? Weird. Why would Robbie have kept all the bridesmaid's shoes from his wedding's? It wasn't until I crossed the room and found a rack full of black belts with silver studs and saw that they were all labeled with names as well that I put it all together and realized... somewhere in this thrift was a pretty large chunk, (if not all) of the costumes from "The Wedding Singer" which had just closed on Broadway over the New Year's weekend. I immediately went to the t-shirts and started digging to see if I could find the Van Halen t-shirt, but it didn't seem to be there. Of course it's possible that it hasn't been processed yet. I have to head back there tomorrow, and I'll probably look again. But really, where else but Manhattan?