Thursday, May 15, 2008

Mayhem

http://www.observer.com/2008/chaos-chelsea-hotel-s-photo-party-erupts-mayhem

Chaos at the Chelsea!

Hotel's Photo Party Erupts in Mayhem
by Chris Shott |

May 19, 2008, The New York Observer.

Also on Friday, May 9, the Chelsea Hotel’s grand ballroom was opened for the first time in years, hung with more than 100 photographs of the ancient bohemian enclave and its many edgy inhabitants, including rockers Patti Smith and Dee Dee Ramone.

Celebrating its 125th anniversary, the legendary lodge recently saw its second management shake-up in less than a year amid stalled renovation plans and evictions of at least 15 tenants. Perhaps it’s unsurprising that hotel vice president, David Elder, who co-curated the exhibit with resident photographer Linda Troeller, was chased from the exhibit hall by a masked doppelgänger dressed in a hotel bathrobe. A stink bomb was also set off.

The next evening, on his way to a party celebrating the exhibit, Mr. Elder was fiercely confronted at the front desk by a tenant, Arthur Nash, himself a curator, who’d beaten the landlord in housing court only a week earlier. Mr. Elder fled to the hotel’s subterranean Star Lounge, where a bouncer stepped between them, allowing his escape into the bar. (“I never got physical with him or threatened to get physical,” Mr. Nash told the Transom later. Mr. Elder refused an interview.)

Later, after stepping outside briefly, the hotel exec returned to the party with a security guard after being doused from a balcony above. Staff called the cops. When they arrived, with stun guns drawn, firefighters were already there. Someone had called to complain about overcrowding inside.

Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Chelsea Hotel

Celebrate the 125th Anniversary of the Chelsea Hotel

"Chelsea Hotel Through the Eyes of Photographers"

Curated by Linda Troeller and David Elder

Friday May 9 noon to 6pm
General Opening 6-8pm

Saturday May 10 noon to 5pm
Sunday May 11 noon to 5pm

Chelsea Hotel Ballroom 1st Floor Lobby
222 West 23rd St. New York, New York

Photos by Linda Troeller and Keith Green

PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release: April 20, 2008

"Chelsea Hotel Through the Eyes of Photographers" – 125th Anniversary Photography Exhibition of the Chelsea Hotel

The Chelsea Hotel turns 125 this year and to celebrate its anniversary, photographer and Hotel resident Linda Troeller, curated the exhibit, "Chelsea Hotel Through the Eyes of Photographers," collaborating with Hotel Vice President David Elder. The show features work from over sixty photographers shot in and of this iconic Hotel ranging from historic images of residents such as Virgil Thomson, Patti Smith and Dee Dee Ramone to the edgy and atmospheric. “With so much of New York City history vanishing, these photographs testify to the pivotal value of the proliferation of culture generated at an artist-oriented place,” said Ms. Troeller.
The exhibit, in the ballroom of the Hotel, is on view for the May 9th from noon to 6pm and general opening 6-8pm;
May 10th Saturday from noon to 5pm and Sunday May 11th from noon to 5pm.

The Hotel Chelsea, a legendary bastion of creativity, has often stood in the eye of New York City's cultural storm. The ghosts from the Hotel's earlier days saw Arthur Miller hide away to write in a back apartment following his
divorce from Marilyn Monroe; Janis Joplin “talk so brave and sweet” to Leonard Cohen; and Ralph Gibson print his photographs for his first Lustrum photography book in his tiny kitchenette.

The Hotel Chelsea is located at 222 West 23rd Street, between 7th and 8th Avenues, near the E, C, F, and 1 trains.

Press photographs are available and the press may visit the show by appointment before the opening.

Photographers featured in the show are from New York City and around the United States, Finland, Sweden, Spain, Italy, Germany, France, England, Canada, and Mexico.

Alana Cundy
Alex Geana
Anita Chernewski
Anton Perich
Arthur Weinstein
Bailey Ann Rosen
Barbara Alper
Barbara Nitke
Bettina
Bjørge Sandroad
Brad Trent
Carmen Montoya
Catherine Klemann
Catherine Leroy
Christian Rothmann
Christopher Maguire
David Gahr
Derek Johnson
Diane Hughes
Dina Von Zweck
Dirck Halstead
Ernst Spycher
Fern Logan
Hoyt Brown
Ira Cohen
Ivano Grasso
Jamie Robinson
Jean Pearson
Jules Siegel
Jürgen Frank
Keith Green
Lisa Ackerman
Linda Troeller
Lothar Troeller
Maggie Hopp
Majori
Marc Antoine DUPONT
Marcia Resnick
Mark Edward Harris
Mark Sink
Martine Barrat
Mary Ann Lynch
Marzia Schirripa
Matthew Kristall
Mia Hanson
Michael Lavine
Neil Polen
Nicola L.
Nicole Wolf
Patrick McMullan
Peter Badge
Peter Simon
Rachael Cohen
Ray Block
Rebeca Senovilla Zubiaga
René De Carufel
Richard Turchetti
Rita Barros
Robyn Desposito
Roger Jazilek
Rose Hartman
Sam Bassett
Sanford Kreger
Stephanie Chernikowski
Susan Olmetti
Sylvia Plachy
Sylvie Lancenon
Tina Paul
Tom Parsons
Zev Green
Lee Levine
Merle Levine

Thursday, May 1, 2008

My draft story of the hood

I am going to miss our neighborhood.

i have lived in Denver most of my life and here in the highlands as an artist and activist since 1991.

18 years ago i moved in the north side from nyc. I picked this area because of the great cultural diversity and it was thick with artists. I purchased my house for 55k.The houses surrounding me abandoned and the corner homes were drug dealers.In many ways it was safe.You just stayed out the way. I started a large community garden and became friends with most all my neighbors who were at first not to pleased with a white person on the block. With the community and Our Lady of Guadeloupe Church I helped build the ceramic mosaic walls along I-25. I helped stop traffic engineers from building a clover leaf highway exit at 20th . Now it is a lovely green belt of grass parks and play grounds. :)

I met a wonderful Denver historian David Spencer “Spence” who taught me how to sleuth the history of my block and home from county records and micro film articles .. to where I found wonderful stories of the first 19th century residents. One is Minny Wilson a wild druggist the ( Wilson drugs store on the corner of 30th and Zuni) she owned my house and lived next door. Her grand children brought me her diaries. My 92 years old neighbor knew her and has been through it all and back. A.nd now at the end of her life its the end of the neighborhood.

First was the working class Irish and Italians then came the new workers the Hispanics and always the artists.. then the greedy developers follow after seeing white people around .Now things are a changing very fast.

I will miss the woman walking their kids to school. (white people drive their kids) the Sunday Mexican polka music in the air .. Zuni Plaza..Taqueria El valle with the old man playing the guitar and no white people or English spoken.. its all going soon .. I am soon going to have to go to.

I am a white artist and i don't have generations behind me..but I am sick and sad to the loss of a once culturally diverse and historic neighborhood .

Density is important rather then urban sprawl .. and I am resolved to the changes. It’s the greed of the developers that don’t even live in the area. The low standard of building quality and design. All has me very upset and frustrated.

Poverty is the steward to historic preservation, thus is the special unique charm to our area. Do not developers get it? The reason the neighborhood is so hot right now is because of this special historic quality.

I have been watching the families get pushed out on my block one my one these past few years. Most lived here for over two generations.

I have been watching and documenting beautiful historic buildings scraped so a developers can build a particle board palaces. Because they paid so much for the property they have to use up every square ft of the land leaving no trees no yards.. and they go up as high as codes allow. Shading out the neighbors and ending privacy.

The worse part They are so extremely poorly constructed.
It is this era of Disney land buildings all faking wealth but in reality are built extremely shoddy . Just As long as it looks wealthy it doesn't’t seem to matter to a new generation of buyers.

I welcome well thought out design that is a quality solid build ..it’s the fake the hollow that I have problems with. It’s a symbol of our culture now .. over extended ..hollow and owned by the bank. Throw away ..no craftsmanship .. empty of personal taste.

These are my tales of my block.
In the 1980s Pena administration brought a lot of change in the north side. He implemented several rehab programs bringing including putting in historic street lights and creating businesses and home ownership to many of the poor. It solidified the hood Hispanic.It was beuatiful.Many of the businesses flourished. Soon those families made profits and many moved to the suburbs while renting out the properties to a poorer Mexican national class of migrant workers and day labor. That is when the area became even more dangerous and drug ridden. Our corner store was called “stop and stab”. Lower highland was a section with the highest violent crime rates in Denver. best I can say it kept the developers at bay and east highland emerged. Slowly in the mid 80s the artists moved in to the abandoned buildings and crack houses. They lovingly restored them .. by the mid 90s developers saw white people around and soon were soon starting to buy up the low priced land and structures. Its an age old story. Now the old families and artists and all other working class all are being pushed out. Young professionals are moving in.

This is a brief documentation of the destruction my block to date.. and this is just my block.. this is happening on every block in the area.

The first of six beautiful historical buildings to go on my block was one of the earliest buildings on the hill ..it was a wood structure meaning it pre-dated mandatory brick so it was 1860-70s.. it was a small wooden house . It was scraped and a giant multiplex was put in its place covering every inch of the lot .. David Spencer addressed the planning meetings and all we could do was to get them to put brick instead of stucco on the outer wall which is three stories of windowless nothing. ( facing the street).

The worst example of night mare construction is across my alley.
A beautiful solid 1890s home with a carage house scrapped for this horror build by Remax ,all international investors that saw this was a place to throw money into.
It now towers over my two story home.( The garage starts at 14ft then three 14ft stories above that). This project I got a first hand view of the worst building practices I have ever witnessed.
The list is long on mind boggling mistakes that started with miss measuring the foundation which led to jack hammering sections out thus cracking the foundation ruining the structural integrity.. this is just the start ..that winter and spring and following fall was extremely wet with snow and rains. Water penetrated the unprotected particle board roof wall and floors over and over for many months during construction delays. Mold was growing .. and have you ever seen particle board the gets exposed to water over and over? It puffs up expands and looses all it tensile strength.
.. I felt sorry for them cause it all had to be replaced.
Well to my stunned amazement the day labor Hispanic crew was screwing down the chicken wire and starting to stucco over the damaged wasted particle board. Total shock .. someone should blow the whisle on this one. Maybe that’s a job for our council woman Judy Montero.

The next worst travesty on my block is next door. The two families pushed out . Two solid historic homes scraped. One in particular, a stone block home soon to go was built by stone cutters that help build a large part of19th century Denver. A important historic foot note is now forgotten forever. The painful night mare is they are going to rebuild a fake Disney version of Victorian architecture .. all plastic and styrofoam covered with stucco, and fake rock skins.. and making them multi units with no yards. I my opinion it’s the lowest of the lows in architecture today. And I have it right next door, My privacy is lost with three stories looking down into my windows and private yard spaces. And of course is the loss of the view of down town and the view of the mountians is enought to slit my wrists.

A recent event on my corner is a huge solid historic stone and brick building that was just scraped. It housed six long time families that had to abruptly move. Also the historic house next to it and the long time second generation family. What was insult to injury was the demolition crew was sending all the red stone slabs and .. foundation stone blocks .. the bricks all to the dump. During after hours The new owner would not allow me on the property to save the stone and the demolition crew said they will have me arrested if I am caught on the site.

Conclusion, I am sad and frustrated watching families and diverse culture pushed out, watching a great historic neighborhood go down. Nothing one can do really. We can re zone to R-1 but that limits the rights of property owners and i am against urban sprawl. I guess just be happy get to know my new neighbors. I will have a film and slide show soon just for the historical documentation of if it all.

Bobby LeFebre

This poem by Bobby LeFebre speaks about changes in the neighborhood. The poem’s topic is gentrification—the process of new residents with money (the “gentry”) moving into an older neighborhood, often displacing longtime residents. To me, this is not about “urban renewal”; it is truly about “pushing out” the history, people, and roots of urban neighborhoods.

Push Out

I remember when my neighborhood was just called the Northside
Now they are calling it the “Highlands”.
Bilingual bookstores are now Boutiques
and the liquor store is carrying exotic wine.

They’re calling it progress….
Progress on the same Barrio streets
those people once warned their children to stay away from.
Now they flock to the Barrio armed with
developers plotting out a new place to live.

I see the transformation.
They say it is an evolution…….
as if what had existed there before was somehow subhuman, but my neighborhood had history.

The concrete beneath the feet of customers at
coffee shops has a story woven within the patterns of the cement…..
unfortunately its format is not compatible with any of the programs installed on their laptop computers so….
they’ll never get the message.

My neighborhood is changing before my eyes
Old Impalas and Monte Carlos are becoming Mercedes,
Parking spots have been invaded by SUV’s,
and I have to drive to get Mexican food.

They removed the tennis shoes from the power line
yesterday,
painted over a mural of La Virgen de Guadalupe,
and closed another Brown-owned business,
…..they replaced it with a “doggie daycare”.

I remember when the police patrolled the streets,
rollin like thugs two to three squad cars deep,
cuffing before questioning………
interesting…….
Now the Police interaction with the changing
demographic is smiles and handshakes.

Gentrification is as compassionate as a suicide bomber detonating in a preschool schoolyard.

My culture is suffering worse than it was before the push out,
meanwhile, the pushers, they discuss popular culture in an overpriced eatery that used to be a shop that sold herbal remedies for people too poor for doctors and prescriptions.

They have placed streetlamps along the same walkways where the darkness of night provided a shield for drug deals,
graffiti ridden walls have been painted over,
trashcans have been added to every corner,
and there is even a contraption on every light post that has baggies for dog shit.
All of this in the name of beautifying the Barrio.
All of this was asked for before,
but back then……
it was only dirty Mexicans asking;
if they wanted a better neighborhood then why didn’t they just move….

And now it has become so damn pretty that sometimes I have to remind myself of the pain, but some things are just impossible to change,
the blood has been washed away,
but the shape of the stain in my mind remains.

I know why the bricks on the corner building are chipped,
there was a drive-by there,
but prospective buyers don’t know that,
…..they just think it gives the building character.

The sound of profit drowns out the cries of the people who were there before

Gucci shoes erase the remnants of the chalk line that was there before

Before long there will be nowhere else to go.
It couldn’t get much worse

Now don’t get me wrong,
the barrio I knew was not an ideal place for a flower to grow.
There is nothing beautiful about drug deals and Brown on Brown crime.
Nothing luring bout’ streets filled with litter and disproportionate illiteracy rates.

Living paycheck to paycheck has never been fashionable
…………..there was beauty in the struggle though

I received the call yesterday
My landlord informed me he is “negotiating” a deal to sell the property in which my apartment sits.
A deal that would leave him with a profit and us packing…….
We have started to collect boxes.

http://www.myspace.com/lefebrebobby
www.bobbylefebre.com
Contact: lefebreb@yahoo.com
720-436-1830

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Untold Stories

Andy Warhol Reading Group Lecture Series

mondaymay5

7pm: MY (untold) stories, a lecture with Mark Sink

Local photographer, Mark Sink experienced The Factory in its active years. Come hear Sink share his experiences with Andy and the other characters who roamed the famous studio in midtown Manhattan. This event is free and open to the public.

Mark Sink, an artist, photographer and private art consultant, represents and curates local and international cutting-edge fine art photography. Mark hosts photography workshops with The Denver Darkroom and Working with Artists. Studio photography services include, portraits, documentation of artwork, as well as product, architectural and fashion photography.

The Dikeou Collection is located in the Colorado Building, 1615 California St, at 16^th St, Suite 515, Denver, CO 80202. The Dikeou Collection is free and open to the public Wednesday-Friday, 11-5pm. To contact the Dikeou Collection call 303-623-3001 or write to info@dikeoucollection.org

For more info about The Andy Warhol Reading Group and future events, contact Rachel Cole, rachel@dikeoucollection.org

Bold face names are linked
Check out zingrecsDENVER
and more dispatches from zingmagazine's anonymous intern

WORLD PINHOLE DAY

Thank you Damaris and Joseph for making the day.

Friday, April 25, 2008

Siren Song

'American Eve: The Birth of the It Girl and the Crime of the Century'

By Paula Uruburu
April 24, 2008 11:55 p.m.

Chapter 1: Siren Song

Evelyn Nesbit, image of an age, its sins, its soullessness . . .

Most don't know that her given name was apparently Florence Mary. She was not-so-plain Flo to her family and "Flossie the Fuss" to the chorus. She was "Kittens" to Stanford White, "Evie" to John Barrymore, and "Boofuls" to Harry Thaw. She was "Mrs. Thaw the younger" in London, "Le Bébé" in France, and "Mrs. Harry" when in Pittsburgh. Schoolgirl. Florodora girl. Gibson girl. "Angel-child." "Snake-charmer." Vixen. Victim. The ur-Lolita. The very first "It" girl before anyone know what "It" was. She could be what anyone wanted her to be. And inevitably was, even if it wasn't what she wanted. To anyone familiar with E. L. Doctorow's novel Ragtime, the name Evelyn Nesbit may evoke the mauve-tinted crucible of the sentimentally inclined and cynically named Gilded Age To others it may signify passion and perversion, murder and scandal, "love, hate, villainy, perfidy, and outraged innocence." The extinction of an era. And a red velvet swing.

Riverhead Books/ Penguin Group

Herself a product of the Victorian past but with an approach to life that was unconsciously and uncannily modern, Evelyn Nesbit unwittingly embodied the country's paradoxes and ambiguities at its trembling turn into the twentieth century. At times she seemed the very picture of nineteenth-century sentimentality and girlish purity, yet her naturally bewitching Mona Lisa smile promised something dangerously new and enticing. A self-inventory of her visible assets tells the story: the curled pink ribbon of a mouth (painted red only for the stage) contrasted with "slightly olive-hued" skin; huge, dark, sultry eyes set in an angelic face, all framed by a "profusion of burnished copper curls." It was an image that spoke of both the vitality and freshness of an antediluvian world and the brave new world of the Century of Progress. As with Eve before the Fall, Evelyn's natural charms and air of innocence created an overwhelming and immediate impression of incorruptibility in certain poses. Yet the deceptive maturity of her heavy-lidded gaze and ever so slightly openmouthed expression of apparent self-satisfaction in photo after photo suggested an Eve who had already tasted forbidden fruit.

In those first few years of what would prove to be a thrilling and ingenious decade of crusaders and con men, cakewalks and coon songs, contradictions and coincidences, class wars and conspicuous consumption, Evelyn Nesbit became its most precious commodity, even though, as the newspapers reported, she had come to New York with "nothing but her looks." But her face was her fortune (as her parasitic mother well knew), and Evelyn's mercurial rise to fame and equally precipitous plunge into notoriety only five years later reflected the era's accelerated, intoxicating, and uniquely schizophrenic mood.

Riverhead Books/ Penguin Group

Postcard pose of sixteen-year-old Evelyn for Sarony, 1901.

All the feminine myth and mystique of the ancient world seemed to coalesce with contemporary American freshness in Evelyn and form a "beguiling new creature." She was Freud's "eternal question," embodying both "contemporary social types like 'the charmer' and 'The New Woman,' " as well as more universal abstractions such as "virtue, progress, etc., raised to nearly mythological proportions." Like the nation itself, she was poised fearlessly on the brink of uncharted discoveries but apprehensive about abandoning the illusion of security or sentiments of the past.

To the reporters who followed her every move and unprecedented rise as a celebrity before there was any discernible evidence of a singular talent to justify such attention (we of course no longer harbor any delusions with regard to the modern cult of personality), she was a startling silky contradiction, "a vision who assailed one's senses like a perfume at once delicate and heavy, overpowering and yet faint." As the American Eve, her delectable budding underage appeal proved irresistible to the renegade creator who wanted to cultivate her as the rarest fl ower in his Garden of too-earthly delights. Yet no matter how different she may have looked from one image or photograph to the next, the public felt they knew her. Women wanted to be her; men wanted to own her. She became a maddening object of desire, and tragically, a victim of her own beguiling beauty during the "gaudy spree," which she would help bring to a stunningly shameful end.

At first the publicity that swirled and hummed around Evelyn would have you believe that hers was a fairy- tale existence. She was seen as a modern-day Cinderella who came from a city of literal burning ash and coal to become the "glittering girl model of Gotham." She then made the precarious but inevitable leap from studio to stage. From there it was but a cakewalk to a life of luxury as the "mistress of millions" once she became Mrs. Harry K. Thaw, of Pittsburgh. Or so the newspapers said. And all before she was twenty-one.

An unwitting sexual anarchist draped in a crimson silk kimono and laid out seductively on a pure white polar bear rug, she could incite the wrath of reformers and excite the imagination of the public merely by sleeping. Once the "Madison Square Tragedy" tore its way into the headlines, the "little butterfly" generated more newspaper sales and publicity than Hearst himself could ever have manufactured. Through two trials riddled with theatrical tribulation and shocking revelations, she was the "pale flower" whose petals took on a "bruised pallor," with sympathetic observers wishing she had "grown wholesomely in a wholesome garden." Others, like the sculptor Saint-Gaudens, were less charitable, commenting just before he died, in 1907, that "she had the face of an angel and the heart of a snake."

Throughout her humiliating and protracted ordeal on the witness stand, Evelyn's ubiquitous and mesmerizing image—and what it represented to a nation of novice interpreters—captivated even the most cynical New York journalists. Irvin S. Cobb, a well-known syndicated columnist and social critic, described her as "the most exquisitely lovely human being I ever looked at—[she had] the slim quick grace of a fawn, a head that sat on her flawless throat as a lily on its stem, eyes that were the color of blue-brown pansies and the size of half dollars; a mouth made of rumpled rose petals." Yet even as her startling testimony helped push an unsuspecting and unprepared America into the modern age, while canny entrepreneurs sold hastily manufactured little red velvet swings on the street outside the courthouse, as quickly as Evelyn's star rose, it fell victim to the very culture that created and consumed her.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Want to go to China ?

From my great artist friend Susanne Junker:

Dear friends,

I proudly announce the opening of stageBACK gallery, a space from an artist for artists in Shanghai, China.
We had our # 0 opening last saturday and it was a big success, thanks to all of you who came by.

The idea to open an art space blossomed in the fall of 2007 with the wish to be a part of Shanghais fast growing urban culture.
Especially in our days, cultural and intellectual exchange between the West and the East are of great importance.
This is what this space stands for: FREEDOM - ART - PARTY.

stageBACK is now located on 696 Weihai Lu, a already "famous" old opium den and artist occupied warehouse in the center of Shanghai.
A few years ago, artist moved into this building and it reached it's first "fame" with the premier open artist workshop event in 2007. It also resisted
the demolition last summer and all tenants signed a new lease for the next two years. Since then, individual spaces are getting fixed up,
little galleries pop up here and there, people invest in the space to improve for themselves and visitors.
About 40 artist studios and galleries are now located on 696.

Special thanks to:

Susan Shen for her help and patience. She helped me to discover most abandoned spaces in downtown Shanghai - what an experience!
Silvia Xu, who showed me 696 Weihai Lu, and made me be at the right place at the right time.
Chris Gill, who was so cool to translate all my extra renovation wishes to the constructer, Mr Jin, who thinks I am crazy.

Our # 0 show will be still up this weekend, thursday to sunday april 24 - april 27, 14h - 18h or by appointment. Please drop by.
I am curious about your responds and open to all ideas and art works and projects that will improve stageBACK now and in the future.

For more info and photos please check:

http://www.stageback-shanghai.com

http://www.smartshanghai.com/blog/967/Back_from_the_Brink.html

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=613998020

http://www.youtube.com/user/stagebackshanghai

best wishes to all of you

Susanne

Saturday, April 19, 2008

Photo Spring

Westword

"Denver's Month of Photography ended weeks ago, but many of the exhibits are still up and running. So maybe the highly successful March event should have been called the "Season of Photography," or even "Photo Spring." Regardless of what it should have been called, it was an incredible chance for gallery-goers to see an amazing range of photo-based creations by some of the most interesting artists in the world. For this reason, the community owes a debt of gratitude to Mark Sink, who thought it up, and Rachel Hawthorn and Sabin Aell, who helped organize it. And last, but hardly least, credit must go to the gallery directors and curators who elected to be a part of it by mounting photo shows."

http://www.westword.com/2008-04-17/culture/freeze-frames/

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Chelsea Hotel Show

April 1, 2008

Dear Stanley and the Chelsea Hotel,

I first lived there in the early nineteen eighties. Staying for several months at a time. I carried a camera around my neck night and day. It was Stanley always at the desk who started calling me Stieglitz. I really loved that for he did not know my great grandfather was the founder of the NY Camera Club in the 1890s. His studio was just a couple blocks away.

I have thousands of images of the residents at that time.. many of the lobby hang outs there. I was friends with Richard Bernstein who did all the Interview magazine covers..his place was so so cluttered with stuff we worked on several projects together. I photographed Viva’s daughter for her acting. I am friends with the current resident Rene Ricard, he was always so mean to me in the early days. But I believe he always really liked me. He returns my calls and is very pleasant these days. I think he was the most important art critic of the 1980s.

I have to many stories and so many blur together but I will try a couple draft notes.

A wild girl friend at the time, Patrice Hartman locked herself in the bathroom and broke a glass and attempted to commit suicide. I kicked the door open and pulled her out. She ran out and into the lobby and out onto the street with nothing but her underwear. I later found out that was the room Sid murdered Nancy.

My stepfather Ed White was best friends with Jack Kerouac. He was Tim Gray in On The Road. I guess they spent a lot of time there together in the 1950s. And Jack wrote On The Road there. I spent some time with Allen Ginsberg there, I can’t remember whose place it was, and we made a lot of pictures together. That was his thing at the end of his life.

I photographed the artwork of wonderful Nicola L there and the work of John Wells. I spent a lot of time with the painter Robert Hawkins while staying there. I am going to write Robert ask him to remind me who we partied with there. Was it Teri Toye and Patrick Fox? I think it was. And who was the long hair and bearded hippy that spent a lot of time in the egg chair in the lobby? He had giant holes in his earlobes that he would put a rolled up NY Daily newspaper in. So many names have escaped me.

I was lucky to be friends and spend time with Andy Warhol. He never wanted to talk about the Chelsea for some reason. He would always say why are you staying there? its so dirty.
I shot lots of fashion shoots there. Never had to get permission.

Well thank you Chelsea Hotel for great memories thank you dear Stanley and thank you Linda for doing this. You have motivated me now have to start a dig into my contact sheets. I want to find my images of Stanley the man who called me Stieglitz.

Best
Mark Sink

Damaris's birthday

Sunday, March 23, 2008

temptation

Thanks so much Mark!!!  Heya, if you are at all interested, you should come
visit Dan and I on the boat- we'll be in the Mediterranean for the summer, and
then the northern coast of Africa and back to Brazil... if you ever feel like
getting away and sailing away...

Morning Glory

Friday, March 14, 2008

In the News

Rocky Mountain News click

WESTWORD - click

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Rights

As a response to the 'I Am Buried' competition launched by Corbis in August 2007, and the competition rules claimed all rights from the entrants forever and throughout the universe. Pro-Imaging was so outraged at the avaricious terms of this competition that we decided there and then to build a campaign to name and shame those who ran rights grabbing competitions.

That campaign has now been launched and if you want to see the named and shamed competitions you can read the details on our Rights Off List. Read the Bill of Rights to see details of how we test the rules of photography competitions.