nonetheless

Andrea Nelli - GRAFFITI A NEW YORK, out of print for more than 30 years, the book was reissued by Whole Train Press on April 13, 2012. The first edition, which is considered one of the first books ever written about graffiti and street art, was published in 1978 by Andrea Nelli.

Andrea Nelli was twenty years old when he went to New York. It was early 1970’s and most subways were completely covered with graffiti; so did most of the subway and Manhattan walls. He saw BIG-0-116, EVIL ERF14, RAT FINK 131, SUPER KOOL 223. They looked undecipherable codes, written everywhere with black spray. Eventually, he understood that they were always the same names repeated throughout the city. To capture the compositions of the graffitis, Nelli started shooting photos of them, which subsequently got him in touch with the different cliques of graffiti artists who then introduced him into the scene. 

Still a student, Nelli focused his thesis on this just born movement but was already quickly spreading. With the explosion of the phenomenon in the following years, Nelli decided to published,  in collaboration with New York’s old school street artist icon COCO 144, ‘Graffiti A (in) New York’ in 1978, which showed the phenomenon from the beginning and showcased selections of more than 100 photos taken five years earlier of graffiti names and art. *

“to get your Name around”. The rule of graffiti

GRAFFITI A NEW YORK - Andrea Nelli from Whole Train Press on Vimeo.

On Christian Marclay’s “The Clock”

Both The New Yorker  — “a masterpiece, in its way, it’s not always serious: this is a crowd-pleaser…It’s a funny film: a collage that’s also a kind of Duchampian ready-made.” — and The New York Times — “It is hard to walk out of Mr. Marclay’s loop because inside it you are protected from the dreadful inevitability of endings” — recently reviewed this installation/film; both say it’s worth seeing. However, neither mentioned if the whole film, all 24 hours of it, is worth seeing, or how the film or the experience differs from seeing it from a different time of day.

VeblenesqueGorge recently saw this at pre-dawn:

There was also somewhat more fascination in seeing what film characters were up to at four in the morning than four in the afternoon. …

Watching The Clock, though, you find yourself anticipating the changes in the day as they are refracted through the film clips. How is what people get up to at 4am different than at 5am?

Anyway, this is my weekend plan. Will be watching this in four 6-hour[ishes] shifts: Fri., 12am-6am; Sat., 12pm-6pm; Sun., 6am-12pm; and Tues. (or some weeknight next week), 6pm-12am.

It’ll be a doozy.

The Clock is showing at the David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center (Broadway, between 62nd & 63rd sts.). Admission is free.

It runs from 8:00 am – 10:00 pm, Tuesday through Thursday, and then continuously from 8:00 am Friday through 10:00 pm Sunday. It’s closed on Mondays. Now through Aug. 1. Check @LCAtrium twitter feed for line updates.

UPDATE: Saw all 24 hours of The Clock, and it.is.worth.it . But even a few hours of seeing this installation/film is worth it.

If you missed it at Lincoln Center, Christian Marclay’s The Clock will be showing next winter at The Frick Collection. Dates and times TBD.

MOMA has also acquired it and will be showing it there soon.

Past to present … New York’s people and and places spill on to the pages of countless books about the city.

A literary crawl of New York

1930s

Call It Sleep by Henry Roth: … capturing the immigrant patois of the Lower East Side, 1934’s Call It Sleep has no equal. “You stay righd hea in de daw an’ don’ go ‘way or I’ll moider you!” one character exclaims.

1940s

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison: A brilliant early novel of the black experience in modern America, set largely in Harlem where the unnamed narrator moves through the streets of Manhattan, unseen by whites… . “I’m in New York, but New York ain’t in me, understand what I mean? Don’t git corrupted,” advises one character. It ain’t pretty but Invisible Man is a bitter, brilliant and dismayingly current portrait of New York.

1950s

New York 19 by Tony Schwartz: … Not a book, but an album. … Schwartz was a lifelong agoraphobic who rarely moved beyond the confines of his block, and yet managed to capture the cacophony of Manhattan’s streets.

1960s

Lunch Poems by Frank O’Hara: … Some poems might read as code to a non-New Yorker. … But his 1964 work Lunch Poems includes the famous “Ave Maria” which calls for something many of New York’s inhabitants lack - space. “Mothers of America”, he writes, let your kids go to the movies! Get them out of the house so they won’t know what you’re up to.”

1970s

The Power Broker by Robert Caro: No man has done more to shape what modern New York City looks like than Robert Moses, … Caro’s biography is a study not only of the man who changed New York but the New York he changed.

1980s

Bright Lights Big City by Jay McInerney: The endless search for booze, cocaine and sex that characterised New York City in the “me me me” … The real hero of the novel is Tad Allagash, the narrator’s friend, who is obsessed with the hurly-burly world of Manhattan. Cynical, cyclical and Celine-like, McInerney’s book suspends a certain fast-living era of New York in ambered perpetuity.

1990s

My Misspent Youth by Meghan Daum: Chasing away the hangover of the 80s, the 90s were a time of reckless hope in New York City. … Meghan Daum’s book of essays captures one woman’s enchantment and subsequent disillusionment with the ever-retreating ideal of Manhattan living.

2000s

Lush Life by Richard Price: Richard Price’s crime novel in 2008 isn’t all that different from the LES in the bud of the 20th century, as portrayed by Henry Roth in Call It Sleep… but the treasure of the novel is Price’s ability to peek into the windows and psyches of both LES old timers and arrivistes.

— by Joshua Stein for The Guardian UK

capitalnewyork:

Though “Bleecker Bob” is identified with some of the great names of rock and roll through the decades, and especially downtown movements from the Village’s folk scene through punk, new wave and alternative music, now, time is finally catching up with the oldest record store in the Village.

There are cracks in the black and white linoleum floor. Dust gathers on Bob’s collection of art deco clocks, many of which have stopped. Though the landlord of their building on West Third Street has been good to Bob over the years, he’s finally putting the rent up in line with prices in the area. Bleecker Bob’s is getting priced out.

‘For the Records’: Capital presents a documentary about the final days of Bleecker Bob’s

When it goes, it will take with it a huge part of the history of the Village. ... And, next time you’re in the neighborhood, stop in while you can.

First St. Mark’s Bookshop, now Bleecker Bob’s.

And my sentiment on record stores and shopping for a physical media.

theparisreview:

Despite your best efforts, it looks as if our faithful friends at St. Mark’s Books are going to lose their lease. That’s the bad news. The good news—at least, if you care about keeping bookstores in lower Manhattan—is that they are trying to find a cheaper location in the East Village. Help them raise money for the move: join the “cash mob” at three o’clock this Saturday afternoon. The first five customers who spend $500 or more will receive a free one-year subscription to The Paris Review.

dontblinktees:

-______________________-

Gee, Think Geek, where have I seen this before??

What I want for Christmas.

i-am-the-oracular-spectacular:

One day. Me and you.

(via frenchcinema)