Thursday, July 27, 2017

French Roast on Sixth Avenue


Corner Bistro Study
Oil on panel
5x4 inches
Sold


In 2006 I created a series of small paintings for an exhibit in the former Ansonia Windows on 10th Street and Sixth Avenue. French Roast located up the block made for a nice subject of the neighborhood.

This week, French Roast in the Village closed, yet another neighborhood restaurant to disappear from the New York City urban landscape.

To read some comments on this closing, check out this blog post on Jeremiah's Vanishing New York.

Thursday, July 13, 2017

Stoop Sitting at the Salmagundi


Salmagundi Stoop Sitters
Oil on canvas
12x9 inches


In this new painting, 3 women are sitting on the broad brownstone steps of the venerable Salmagundi Club on Fifth Avenue and 12th Street. Stoop sitters were once a common sight with people congregating outdoors to catch up on local gossip, get a breath of fresh air and check out the goings-on in the neighborhood. These 3 caught my eye as I was leaving an art exhibit at the club a few years ago and there was something about this intimate scene that gave me the idea of this painting.

When I was growing up in a Queen's co-op, we didn't have stoops but we did have copings, short brick walls where both kids and adults gathered to meet up and congregate. Sometimes the residents in the apartments facing the street and the copings were none too happy due to the noise that filtered up to their homes, but that was the neighborhood.

Stoop sitters as well as fire escape sitters are still around, but not as numerous as they once were in this urban city.

For more information on the Salmaguni Club, here is a link.