West Coast-based surf-noir outfit La Luz will be at the Bowery Ballroom next Friday (Aug. 26). Ahead of that, here's a video for their single, "Metal Man."
Friday, August 19, 2022
The Gallery Watch Q&A: Tilde Thurium and Nicole Aptekar on 'Anaphoric Fractures'
Interview by Clare Gemima
Photos of the Artists: Shoshana Soleyn; all other photos courtesy of EVGallery
There is absolutely ZERO way that any form of digital consumption of "Anaphoric Fractures" could compete with an in-person viewing experience. This intelligent and ambitious show at EVGallery on 11th Street showcases 10 multimedia sculptures created by Tilde Thurium (below) and Nicole Aptekar (second photo) — each with an infinitely captivating amount of intricacy and flare.
I was lucky enough to meet and chat with the artists about their processes, collaborative relationship and greater visual arts practices. "Anaphoric Fractures" runs until Sept. 3, and I highly recommend making an appointment to visit the gallery NOW.
Tilde Thurium: The reception has been overwhelming. I am profoundly grateful. Everyone I've interacted with has been curious about the process of producing these works. It feels like the audience understands the feeling I intend to convey.
Nicole Aptekar: It's been fantastic to see people's reactions to our work! I had a pretty good understanding of what it might be like, having shown at EV Gallery last October, but it was actually a somewhat different crowd than the previous show!
Lately, I've found that the most commented-on pieces are never what I expect they'll be. Given that we're making abstract work, hearing how people connect and interpreting them for themselves is really powerful and heartwarming to experience. One of the main things I took away is that my process perspective can mask how people will see the final pieces. In a number of the works for this show, there are curved lines extruded and twisted through the pieces, and to me, this geometry is used like variations on a theme. Still, to most people at the opening, the results were so different that they didn't connect them as explorations of a similar technique.
CG: How did you initially meet, and what attracted you to each other's unique visual lexicon?
TT: We met in 2011 at a vegan pizza place in San Francisco that has since ceased to exist. Nicole's work immerses the viewer in a geometric landscape; seeing her art, I felt an immediate resonance with my approach. Her style is more precise, and mine is more organic, but fundamentally we are both taking the audience on three-dimensional journeys.
Knowing Nicole has pushed me to become a better artist than I otherwise would have. I felt like she profoundly got what I was trying to communicate visually. She is a prolific creator, and her practice has inspired my own for many years, even before we made our first collaborative piece in 2018.
NA: We met way back in 2011! This was in San Francisco, just a few months before my first solo show, and I was working on an event with Gray Area Foundation for the Arts. I stopped at a tiny little vegan restaurant across the street on a break.
Tilde had eye-catching tattoos, we got to talking, and I soon found out that they were a painter. We started hanging out and have been friends ever since. We've helped out on each other's projects back in San Francisco and have encouraged each other's art practice. Both of us work in abstract, but Tilde's always been so colorful, and I've historically been so scared of color in my work. I worked exclusively in white until like 2017 or so, and since then, I've moved to black and metals like gold or silver.
I'm not entirely sure how we got the idea to blend our mediums together, but we started working towards a couple possible ways to do so in 2018. I've got some files from before we settled on the method we used in the show. I think initially, we were trying to experiment with etching construction lines into the wood, and having Tilde paint around them. I like our current process better.
CG: Tilde, you work out of San Francisco, and Nicole — you’re based in Brooklyn. Can you shed some light on how your collaborative dynamic operates long distance?
TT: When we first agreed to start working on Anaphoric Fractures, we talked through initial themes and colors we wanted to explore. We decided I would start the process and send the work to her as I finished. From there, I would send Nicole photos of works in progress. She would give suggestions from time to time, which were really helpful and pushed me to think about composition in a new way.
When a painting was done, I would mail it off to Nicole. Then she would start designing, cutting, and assembling the sculpture, which is much more labor intensive. Over the course of Nicole's work, she would send me renders and snapshots of pieces in progress. I would offer suggestions. The whole process was a reciprocal dialogue, one of the dynamics that inspired the show’s name.
NA: Well, the first piece we made didn't have the distance. I moved to Brooklyn in 2019! That said, I think working long distance actually works better for us. Tilde regularly sent over progress shots of the paintings as they came together, and we could discuss them at length and conceptualize how the paper sculpture might engage with the painted form long before it got completed. Then once it made its way over to me, I would do the same with iterations from my process. If I were local, I think that would probably just get saved for when we could meet up in person, rather than being a daily/weekly sort of thing. The final results would have been much more of a sequential handoff rather than a continuous collaboration.
CG: Each sculpture is accompanied by a body of poetic, stimulating, but also cryptic text. They have also all been given verse-form titles. How important has writing become throughout your collaborative process, and how is it intended to aid your audience’s overall interpretation?
TT: The titles help the viewer place themselves within an imaginary world. Nicole and I are both evocative writers, but our tones and rhythms are markedly different. We each wrote the text for half of the pieces, as it felt important to make balanced contributions to the show's written and visual aspects.
NA: The writing is a thing I've done since my earliest pieces. I used to be hugely embarrassed by it, but all of my sculptures have been 'inhabitable' in my head–they describe a scene in a world that's often fairly dark.
When I finish a piece, I sit with it and explore where in that world it takes place. The writing you're referring to is the result of that process, the description of that moment in the world of the sculpture, and I extract the title from the writing. For many years, after pulling out the title, I'd delete the writing; it just felt too personal to me! Some friends eventually convinced me not to, and starting with my previous show, I included it in the show. The reception has been so surprising; people seem to appreciate the words, even with how strange they are.
For this series, Tilde played along with my process and went through the exercise themself! We traded off who would write the longer moment of the piece and who extracted the title from it. It's remarkable to me how different our writing styles are for this process, but in the same way that the pieces feel natural and cohesive as one; the titles and texts all feel like they fit together.
CG: Each of the 10 works appears to be an extreme labor of love.
How long do these works take to create — from conception to installation, and what have you used to make them?
TT: I'm a very slow painter. I spend about 1/3rd of my time on a given piece doing small touch-ups, trying to make it as perfect as possible. I estimate I spent at least 20 hours on each piece.
NA: I'd say it's pretty variable on my end! There are pieces where the sculpting process goes really swiftly, with just a few variations and iterations, and ones where it's a lot more of a struggle to land on something I'm really happy with, with massive swings that engage with the painting in completely different ways or use totally different shapes. I'd say the longest time any one piece from this show took about three months.
And the shortest — about a week. I design my sculptures in Rhino, which is architectural CAD software. I've written some software to aid in my process over the 11 or so years of making paper sculptures, which helps me produce the work in a more reasonable amount of time.
Once the sculpture is designed, I use my own slicer software to get the 40 paper layers and then cut them one at a time with my laser cutter. If they have gold or silver embedded in the paper, that's an extremely manual process, so the cutting can take anywhere from a day to three or four if the adhesive and gold are uncooperative. Almost everything gets at least a once-over with an Exacto blade just for cleanup, and then the framing materials take me another two days on average.
CG: What is the most nerve-wracking aspect of crafting these sculptures, and at what point in production does it take place?
TT: On my end, a very procedural part: shipping the paintings off to New York in the mail! It's unlikely that they would get lost, but if they had, it could have been catastrophic.
NA: For me, once the paper is cut, there's only so much handling it can take before it stops looking 'perfect,' and there are often many steps still to come! The edges and spindly lines are quite fragile, and the gold/silver is tricky to have it come clean. I'm a perfectionist, and through working with the gold, I've had to tone those tendencies way down, as it's never going to be computer-render perfect, and that slight organic edge turns out to be a lovely contrast. The nerves calm down once I've finished photographing the work and sealed it in its frame; at that point, it's safe from me!
CG: What is the most rewarding part of being a visual artist exhibiting in New York City at the moment?
TT: Seeing people's expressions as they react to the work. Having engaging conversations with other artists and viewers who are curious about the process and enthusiastic about the results.
NA: It's been really meaningful to hear from folks that I'm helping bring back their experience, vision, and memory of a New York City filled with art and life after the truly rough first year of the pandemic. It's nice to have openings and see so much work in person again. I'm also really appreciative of how EVGallery engages with the street and neighborhood; the openings are as much outside as they are inside. It's just wonderful to interact with so many passers-by!
CG: Some of the visual techniques in each sculpture can be read as dichotomous — fluorescent, acrylic paint, webbed inside the monochromatic, cut paper.
Are these contrasting design choices deliberate or accidental?
TT: The material contrast is one element that makes these pieces work. The intense colors highlight the sculptures' depths and provide a strong focal point. The paper adds dimensionality to the flat paintings and provides the contrast that gives the work balance.
NA: I think that's one of the main forces that pushed us to work together. Our styles have some similarities but a lot of contrast, and it's satisfying to work to merge those differences together into a cohesive whole. It's a lot more challenging for me to work this way, but it's pushed me to experiment in ways I don't think I would have tried for years.
CG: Based on your distinctive and individual practices, how do the works in Anaphoric Fractures differ from what you would usually make in your studio?
TT: A few of these works are consistent with pieces I would produce in my solo practice. The rest diverge. Instead of abstract perspective blocks, I experimented with alternate geometric forms to give Nicole some liberty to layer over more of the paintings with sculpture. This experimentation has generated some themes and ideas I'm excited to incorporate into my solo work.
NA: My own works have a lot less color! Until this show, I'd only worked with black, white and gold. In my head, I've been dancing around the notion of adding color for probably five years, and this has been a good way to slowly test the waters of what that might feel like emotionally. As I said before, I've also experimented with many new techniques in this series, as it seemed like a safer space to do so. My individual practice is more methodical and controlled, slowly layering in new geometric primitives over the course of years rather than months. After some of these pieces, I feel like I have a lot to explore on my own.
CG: What are your thoughts regarding collaborations with each other in the future? Any exciting projects in the works?
TT: For "Anaphoric Fractures," I began all of the works, and Nicole then designed sculptures around the paintings. In the future, I would love to try making some pieces in the opposite order, where Nicole would design a sculpture that I would then create a painting around.
NA: I doubt that this is the end of us collaborating! I am excited to explore a few tangents I've been working on in parallel with this exhibit. After about a decade of hiatus, I've wanted to move back toward larger-scale installations again, and I'm hoping to find the right venue to make that happen.
Also, back in 2020, I had a residency at NYU's ITP. I have been working on paper sculptures framed with robotic armatures surrounding them to produce an even more kinetic experience for an object hung on the wall.
~~~~~~
Clare Gemima is a visual artist and arts writer from New Zealand, now based in the East Village of New York. You can find her work here: claregemima.com.
Some appetizing ghost signage uncovered on 14th Street
Some time/day we'll dig into the NYPL Digital Collections to see what this business may have been.
And the workers are — per some EVG reader reports — combining this space with the former Lower East Side Coffee Shop for a Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen.
Residents come together to pick up trash around Tompkins Square Park
Photos by Allie Ryan
More than 30 residents (and one rat and one superhero) turned out late yesterday afternoon to help pick up litter around Tompkins Square Park.
As previously reported, Jonothon Lyons, creator of Buddy the Rat, and NYC entrepreneur Michael Quinn launched a community litter clean initiative called "Buddy's Brigade: Litter Exterminators."
Quinn reported that they picked up a few volunteers along the way. "Some were inspired to join after watching us parade around the park," he said. "A few children walked over from the playground to pitch in."
He added: "I never thought picking up litter could be so much fun."
EV resident Allie Ryan, who took part and shared these photos, noted in a tweet: "Now we need someone trained in needle pick up to come."
East Village residents have said that essential maintenance of Tompkins Square Park has declined in recent years.
Thursday, August 18, 2022
Thursday's parting shots
TY LISA Project NYC...
Masked garbage bandit spotted on 12th Street (OK, it's just a raccoon)
Reminders: Volunteer litter cleanup this afternoon around Tompkins Square Park
Jonothon Lyons, creator of Buddy the Rat, is launching a community litter clean initiative called "Buddy's Brigade: Litter Exterminators."Lyons and NYC entrepreneur Michael Quinn are hosting a series of volunteer community litter cleanups around New York City with material resource support from the Department of Sanitation.The first cleanup will be around the perimeter of Tompkins Square Park this Thursday (Aug. 18) at 5 p.m.Volunteers can meet at the corner of Seventh Street and Avenue A on Thursday. You don't need to bring anything: Quinn said that the Department of Sanitation will be supplying all of the necessary resources and equipment. They will also be coming back to pick up the trash, he said.
Rake Wine debuts on 3rd Street adjacent to Urban Wine & Spirits
Photos by Stacie Joy
Vinicius Aboin (above) co-owns the space with Jorge Arias, who operates Urban Wines & Spirits on the corner ... which you can keep an eye on from the cafe...
Aside from Aboin, EVG contributor Stacie Joy met managers/bartenders Ian Garcia (left) and Elbert Giron ...
As we mentioned back in December, Urban Wine & Spirits was opening a small wine bar — via a separate entrance on Third Street — in the shop's new corner space.
According to Rake's website, the cafe "is inspired by the many small 'mom and pop' wine bars that are located throughout Europe."
There's a food menu with a variety of bruschetta, fresh bread, olives, and meats and cheeses. The space accommodates about 20 people, with a few sidewalk tables weather permitting. There are plans for events such as wine tastings as well.
The hours: 5-10 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday; 2-11 p.m. on Friday; 1-11 p.m. on Saturday; and 1-10 p.m. on Sunday.
Boot party: Why so many immobilized vehicles in the East Village?
Reader Carl Bentsen said he saw three boots on one block... and we counted about a dozen or so on a recent walk...
First, why a vehicle's owner might get the boot. According to the NYC Department of Finance:
If you do not pay or dispute your ticket within approximately 100 days, it will go into judgment. This means the City takes the legal step of entering a default judgment against you for the entire amount plus penalties and interest. The City can take steps to collect the debt, such as sending your debt to a collection agency or seizing assets. If you have more than $350 of tickets in judgment, your vehicle could be booted or towed.
And there's this rather jaunty video about how to get one removed...
The Department of Finance reportedly suspended the booting program on March 16, 2020. As Streetsblog reported in the fall of 2020:
According to data provided by Republic Immobilization Services, which currently has the contract to boot the cars of drivers with multiple unpaid parking tickets, the city deactivated between 5,000 and 15,000 cars per month before the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
The Guardian reported yesterday that the city is owed $534.5 million in unpaid parking fines.
Anyway, we don't know at the moment when the boots were returned post-March 2020 ... or why the marshal booted so many in the East Village this past week.
Mayor Koch first introduced the boot... and it went out of favor for some years before making a return in 2013.
Wednesday, August 17, 2022
Noted
You fucking thief! I am watching, and when I catch you, I will kill you!
Report of a fire at 313 E. 6th St.
The FDNY first reported the fire at 2:03 a.m. ... with the "under control" coming nearly 90 minutes later...
No word on the cause of the fire.
Manhattan 2-Alarm Box 0437, 313 E 6 ST, MULTIPLE DWELLING A
— FDNYalerts (@FDNYAlerts) August 17, 2022
Neighbors reported seeing flames coming from the roof of No. 313 (reader photo below). The FDNY said the fire started in the cockloft.Manhattan 2-Alarm Box 0437, 313 E 6 ST, MULTIPLE DWELLING A, COCKLOFT , Under Control
— FDNYalerts (@FDNYAlerts) August 17, 2022
This morning, boards covered windows on the third and fourth floor of the circa-1900 building, which has three residential units.
A new residential building for this block of 9th Street
The now-approved permits, first filed in April 2020, show 10 residential units, most likely rentals given the square footage.
This is the second former residential parking lot on the block to yield to housing... No. 639, an 8-story building, was unveiled (finally) in late 2020...
Free fitness classes return to Avenue B
Via the EVG inbox...
The 14Y is proud to partner with Loisaida Open Streets Community Coalition (LOSCC) with support from NYC Departments of Transportation and Small Business Services this summer to expand our group fitness class offerings and support our vibrant downtown community!Join us on Wednesdays and Saturdays in August and September for Zumba, Masala Bhangra, and Heart and Soul Cardio Dance to stay active, enjoy some sunshine, and connect with your neighbors!All fitness levels are welcome!
Shinzo Omakase set to debut on 2nd Street
We haven't spotted a website or social media for the restaurant just yet.
There was also some debate in the EVG newsroom about the use of comic sans on the door signage...
We can't recall the last tenant here... Guaco Taco in 2017?
Tuesday, August 16, 2022
Tuesday's parting shot
A sticky situation this morning at the Keith Haring sculpture on Astor Place
Photo by Lola Sáenz
A new day dawned at the Keith Haring's "Self Portrait" on Astor Place at Third Avenue ... with stickers (featuring a QR code for some film project) all over the sculpture ...
[Updated with video of the crash] Another day, another car drives into Tompkins Square Park
Christopher J. Ryan took these photos at 5:48 a.m. ...
The working assumption is that the car entered the Park on Ninth Street and Avenue A ... and headed east before colliding with a fence just past the dog run.
At this point, we don't have any other details, such as the condition of the driver or the number of passengers.
On Sunday morning, a man drove into the Park after allegedly hitting a female companion and sparring with people who came to her aid.
Here's a look at the collision site... given the skid marks and impact at the benches, observers believe the driver was speeding...
Thank you to the folks at the Tompkins Square Dog Run for the photo.
A reader shared this surveillance footage of the car driving at a high rate of speed and smashing into the benches and fence...
Here's a second video from the reader... showing the aftermath of the crash. Several people in the Park confront the driver, the man in shorts and a ponytail, and take his keys... and wait for the NYPD... the video does not show what happened after the police arrived and what, if anything, may have happened to the driver...
VIDEO: Watch the Nissan Sentra drive through Tompkins Square Park on Sunday morning
Updated with comment from the NYPD below.
As previously reported, a man, possibly late 20s to early 30s, and a woman were seen arguing in the Park just before 11 a.m. Both the man and the woman are known to hang out near the chess tables in Tompkins.
According to witnesses, the man grabbed a shovel from a Parks maintenance truck and hit the woman multiple times. (It's not known the extent of her injuries.) One Park regular described this as "a crime of passion" to EVG contributor Stacie Joy. Per the regular: "I mean, she owed him money and whatever but like damn. A shovel?"
A group of men sitting nearby rushed to her defense and chased the shovel-wielding attacker from Tompkins.
Witnesses said the man returned in a few minutes driving a Nissan Sentra with Pennsylvania plates. (Our previous post has info about traffic citations associated with this vehicle.) He entered the Park, which was hosting the weekly Greenmarket, at Seventh Street and Avenue A, "going down different rows while everyone is diving out of the way," as one witness described it. Witnesses believe he was looking for the men who had confronted him.
The person who shared this video shot it from Temperance Fountain. The clip starts with the car slowing down (with the hazard lights flashing) before revving up and taking another lap.
Witness estimates put the driver in the Park between 1 and 2 minutes total. "Hard to describe how terrified people were for however short a time that was," one witness told us.
Before the man drove into Tompkins, he was seen — with a torn T-shirt and missing shoe — getting into the car with a woman who was also in the Park. (It's unclear if this was the same woman he allegedly hit with the shovel.) Witnesses said he drove the wrong way on St. Mark's Place toward First Avenue before turning around and making a right onto Avenue A, where he went in circles under the traffic light at Seventh Street before entering the Park.
The NYPD arrived (along with a truck from FDNY Engine 5 on 14th Street) after the man had driven through Tompkins. He was stopped on Avenue A near St. Mark's Place. There's speculation the car broke down.
To the disbelief of some onlookers, the man was not charged and walked away after spending some time talking with officers from the 9th Precinct. According to a resident who watched the police on the scene on Avenue A and St. Mark's Place: "One thing I noticed was that the police didn't seem interested in witness accounts."
We've talked with witnesses who saw the man allegedly hit the woman with the shovel... drive the car up St. Mark's Place and along Avenue A before entering the Park... and maneuver his way through the Park. No one we spoke with saw the entire incident from beginning to end.
Witnesses described a confusing, chaotic and scary few minutes in the Park. Witnesses who saw any part of this unfold said that there were amazed no one was injured and shocked that the driver wasn't arrested.
Updated 8 p.m.
EVG contributor Stacie Joy asked a source at the 9th Precinct for a comment on what happened in Tompkins Square Park on Sunday morning.
"The event in the Park was a result of a dispute between the car owner, who was with his female friend, and another group of men who robbed the car owner. The car owner tried to get back his belongings from the robbers but he was jumped ... The robbers chased him with a shovel and in the process, he got into the car to run away from them. He proceeded to drive into the Park — not knowing it is a Park because he is not from the neighborhood," the source said. "So far the owner of the car and his girlfriend were the victim of a crime and the complaint is still being worked on by the detectives. So there is still an ongoing investigation."
The current NYPD storyline is at odds with what multiple residents said they saw transpire. According to several witnesses, the driver of the car allegedly hit his girlfriend with a shovel before a group of men intervened. Witnesses said they also have seen the man in the Park on several occasions.
Love Thy Beast departing 5th Street for Brooklyn
There are many happy tears as I am looking back to all our photos. We put in so much hard work setting up the east village but after 5 years its time to move on. There are so many amazing surprises in store for our Brooklyn location that we know you'll be there on the regular.
Agnello, a former prop stylist, started selling her homemade creations online and in several pop-up locations back in 2012 ... before opening here in the spring of 2017.
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