Chanel Mobile Art

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I put together the in-progress shots I have taken during my stint at the Chanel Mobile Art project in Central Park. The event has opened to the public and runs through November 9th. The exhibit houses approximately 10 art installations, including painting, photography, film, and sculpture. Each visitor gets a personal tour, guided by an MP3 player (which thankfully is NOT an iPod!) and makes for a unique experience. As I heard a visitor remark yesterday, “Say what you will about liking the art or not, but you’ll never experience anything like that again!”

Writing Anywhere

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My current job has me working night hours in Central Park. I’ve got into the habit of showing up for work early and sitting in the Mall to do my daily writing. For non-New Yorkers, the mall is best explained as “the filming location for EVERY movie scene of a couple walking during the fall in NYC”. Lots of foot traffic, but it isn’t distracting, and you can’t beat the scenery. Being outside has also proved that not having internet access while I write is actually a good thing.

Pizza in Central Park

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The Chanel project continues in Central Park. I’m finally, after two weeks, into the groove of the 6 p.m. to 2 a.m. schedule, enough so that I can get some things done during the day and get back to writing. I guess the two week acclimation period is just another indicator that I’m not in my early twenties anymore (when I used to work the night shift aboard ship with no problem).

Here’s some information: The raccoons in Central Park go nuts over pizza. We see them every evening, stealing cookies from the catering table and generally being nosey. On Saturday night, though, we had pizza and they went nuts. Literally under foot, four of them at a time working together to get to the pizza boxes, multi-pronged approaches from opposite sides of the tent. Quite funny.

Oh yeah, and the building continues to go up. It looks like the cross between a UFO and a conch shell.

USS Intrepid Underway

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This past Thursday, October 2nd, the floating museum USS Intrepid returned to her west side Manhattan berth, after a yard period and exile to Staten Island. Intrepid was launched in 1943 and served through WWII and Vietnam. She doesn’t look a lot like she did back in 1943 anymore, due to upgrades and refits, but she’s still an impressive ship.

The tow was right at mid-day, and there were a surprising number of spectators on the 14th street pier here in Hoboken. I say surprising because I only found out about the move the day before, and honestly a big gray boat moving along the Hudson isn’t that odd of an occurrence. I met some very nice people, and some tourists from Boston shared their picnic lunch with me.

The photos are a bit washed out due to the time of day, but the ship still looks better than I’ve ever seen her, sporting a new coat of paint. More photos here.

Central Park Gig

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So, Chanel has decided to build a temporary museum in Central Park, as reported in the New York Times, and I’m helping.

We’re about a week into the project. In the first photo see the beginnings of the foundation and skeleton of the UFO-styled building. In the second photo the multi-faceted glass roof is being hoisted into place. My production assistant duties involve a little bit of everything, from helping move trucks onto the site for unloading, to running off the raccoons that love the catering tent. As you can probably guess, New York City raccoons aren’t afraid of much. Overall, it’s a big change from sitting in a Blackberry littered cubicle at a law firm, and that ain’t bad.

I’ll keep posting photos as the structure goes up.

Hour of the Wolf: Part IV

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This past Saturday the 23rd, the members of Altered Fluid once again crawled out of bed at an insanely early hour to hold a meeting on WBAI’s Hour of the Wolf radio show. As usual Jim Freund did a great job hosting as Alaya Dawn Johnson and her story sat on the chopping block. You can find the PodCast on the radio station’s website (scroll down to Hour of the Wolf, 9/23 show).

I took this photo at dawn, as we FINISHED the show. So much for me becoming a night person to prepare for my upcoming job.

The Sun Also Rises

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Since I’m preparing to work nights on an art installation in Central Park this coming fall (more on that later) I decided to get up early and watch the sunrise this morning. I thought these shots a good contrast to the sunset shot of yesterday.

I’ve recently come to the realization of why I love photography. First, it is simply the art of capturing what is there. Point the camera, shoot, and the world takes care of the rest of it. Secondly, photos are process of capturing that which is temporary. The clouds, the colors, the Empire State Building, and especially the person holding the camera. All temporary.

KGB Reading

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Lauren McLaughlin will be reading at the KGB Fantastic Fiction series tomorrow evening, Wednesday the 16th at 7 p.m. Lauren’s first novel, Cycler, was released by Random House last month. As you may remember, I interviewed Lauren for Sybil’s Garage No. 5 late last year. That interview is available as a free download on the Senses Five Press website.

Fall

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I’ve been feeling guilty about not posting lately. I’m making myself more busy than I should, and it doesn’t appear I’m letting myself off the hook anytime soon. I did get some time just to sit on the deck this evening, though, and caught this photo. The shadows today and the quality of the light both during the day and at sunset reminded me that fall is upon us. My favorite time of the year.

Travels Part 2: Upstate Retreat

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After returning from the Nationals, Kristen and I went up into the Catskills of New York to spend a few days at the Dai Bosatsu Zendo. If you want seclusion you can’t do much better than this place unless you know of somewhere that has no electricity. We spent several days in what they call Beecher House; it has some connection to Harriet Beecher Stowe, but I am not sure exactly what that connection is as of yet (I haven’t researched that hard, though). Regardless of the connection, it is a great place to write. I took a few photos of the lake, from the lake, and of the family of 7 snakes that lived under the patio, who would come out every morning and sun themselves on the grass.