NEW YORK NEW YORK – A friend, Bill Beekman, has collected a treasure trove of Virginia Woolf first editions, letters, manuscripts, autographs and photos. It’s all on display at the Forbes Galleries, starting with an opening tonight. Here’s Bill and his wife, Bunny, being photographed by a friend, and the same friend trying to photograph me with a very pretty white Nikon point and shoot. Taken with my Ricoh GRD IV, aka the “party animal”.

Bill and Bunny

Good luck shooting me

On this day one year ago: Interior at St. John the Devine. One of my favorites from last year.

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NEW YORK NEW YORK – I met Francesca at Columbia for afternoon tea. I caught this image of the Italian Academy. Not a brilliant piece of work on my part. I struggle on overcast and rainy days. It’s a matter of disposition, I suppose.

The Italian Institute

On this day last year: A Sugimoto show at Pace.

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NEW YORK NEW YORK – Back home. I carried my little Ricoh GRD IV through the day, catching autumn foliage ending up on the sidewalk, and a new installation at Lever House, a salt water aquarium and plants by Paula Hayes. Very cool. Worth a look.

Streets of New York

Weird Science

On this day last year: on the Acela.

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NEW YORK NEW YORK – A pair of Bryan Hunt sculptures, Flume I and Flume II, have been installed on the island on Park Avenue between the Seagrams Building and the Racquet and Tennis Club. The look like gigantic gnarly metal cobras. Here’s one of them, captured with my ever-resent Ricoh GRD !V.

Cobra

Continuing on the theme of variations on the 24 hour self portrait series here’s one where I sliced the images into 24 slivers, and built a composite with a sliver from the earliest time starting on the left and reading hour by hour as you move to the right.

Slivers

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NEW YORK NEW YORK – This is the second day of the annual James Beard Foundation food policy conference, held (as noted yesterday) this year at Hearst’s offices in New York. I spent the breaks giving myself a tour of the very good art collection on the floor where we held the conference. Here’s a view of a Chuck Close self-portrait and of a conference room both taken with my Leica. The Close work is important to me – a while back I appropriated it in one of my 24 hours projects – I posted a typical image from that project below.

Chuck Close

Good Housekeeping

On this day last year: West Village.

West 12th Street

Here’s my homage to Chuck Close, one of 24 similar images of myself taken hourly over 24 hours (with an 8×10 Arca Swiss view camera):

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NEW YORK, NEW YORK – A couple of things happened today. We spent a while with Alexander and Laura, his fiancé, preparing for their wedding, which is next weekend. Here they are, with Maria, taken with my Leica M9 and a 50mm Summilux lens:

Last minute planning

My firm had an alumni reception at Morgan Library. We had free run of the collection, assisted by docents. It had been a while since I had been there – the overwhelming impression is admiration for J.P. Morgan. Today’s billionaires build superboats, buy 747s, and collect 100,000 square foot houses. Morgan assembled a treasure trove of illustrated manuscripts, drawing and rare books. What a difference.

Morgan Library

Morgan Library

On this day one year ago: St. John the Divine.

St. John the divine

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SHANGHAI – We have mostly finished our meetings so we spent part of the day as tourists. We went to the Shanghai Museem – Maria and I had been here in April. The collection is good but a little disappointing given Shanghai’s stature. In April we photographed the stairwell – it was the second photograph in my post for April 19. Here’s a link – scroll down to the second photo. stairway in Shanghai Museum. I shot the stairway again, this time a close up of the dragon-motifed banister.

I got bored with the Museum so I took a walk in the neighboring People’s Square. There were young couples with a single child everywhere, a result of China’s one child policy. The Chinese say that single children have six parents (including four grandparents) so they are seriously doted-upon. See the image below.

Finally the Shanghai municipal government’s building is located on the People’s Square. it was finished in the 1990s. It is clearly meant to be imposing but only succeeds at being tedious – typical of civic architecture everywhere in the world.

All images taken with my Panasonic GH2 and 1 14-140mm zoom lens.

Stylized dragon

One Child Policy

Government

On this day last year: East 51st Street.

East 51st Street

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SHANGHAI – We managed to tuck a trip to Spin, a shop that sells porcelain made using classic Chinese techniques but with a slight Japanese fusion feel. The artist-owner, Gary Wang, is actually based in Connecticut. Taken with my trusty Panasonic GH2.

Spin

On this day one year ago: a dullish exterior of Grand Central Terminal. What the hell – every image can’t be interesting – this is a daily photo project after all.

Grand Central Terminal

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NEW YORK NEW YORK – All day meetings. This evening I “appropriated” an image from our collection, shooting it with my Alpa TC. Wikipedia has a good article on appropriation in art. The original image is by Manuel Alvarez Bravo. Here’s a link to an uncropped version: Woman in shadows.

Appropriated!

On this day last year: the Seagrams Building again.

Seagrams Building

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NEW YORK, NEW YORK – I dropped by the Matthew Marks Gallery to catch up with a show on landscape called La Carte d’aprês Nature. It caught my attention because it included a dozen or so images by Luigi Ghirri, who we collect. Interesting show. I was there with my Leica M9 and 28mm Summicron lens.

Matthew Marks Gallery

From the street walking back from the gallery.

West 22nd Street

On this day one year ago: New Milford Connecticut. I said that this is a crap town a year ago and I’m sticking with my story.

Rugs & Carpets Simmons Bedding Fine Furniture

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