130 FACES

February 14, 2010. It’s St. Valentine’s Day, and what better way to celebrate than with friends seeing art? I had brunch with friends, Philip & Parker, at the Salmagundi Club, looked at what art we could, and then headed off to the LGBT Center to see a show called “Comfort of Men” by Branden Wallace. As we left The Center and turned north on 7th, we came across this art, which my friend Keith had been telling me about. Felix Morelo has been creating these ephemeral exhibitions around the neighborhood, and what a wonderful sight. All of these faces, so many of them, each individual and still familiar, stretching ahead of you, beckoning you on, speaking to you as you walk along, keeping you company. They might be leading you somewhere, but maybe not. Maybe they are just being there, counting off, and announcing their existence.

AMALGAMATED DESIGN

October 24, 2009. When I first noticed this building, after years of walking by as I left Union Square, it was because the columns on either side of the door had been decorated with the standing figures at the top and bottom, along with the designs on the three verticals. It was striking in both its simplicity and its complexity. It was before the tags had been sprayed over some of the design, and before the crawling orange sprawls, like an awakening fungus on a tree, had grown into its space. There is something organic and natural about the orange, almost inevitable, evolutionary if left to its own devices. But I also lament the loss of the beauty of the original, still clearly visible on the upper left.