January | 2018 | Exile on Pain Street

I dragged my wife + daughters to Pioneer Works, a warehouse in Brooklyn, for Anthony McCall’s Solid Light Works; four light pieces oriented vertically in a large space and two shining horizontally in smaller spaces. A mist hangs in the air so the beams are visible.

These shapes are not static. They slowly expand and contract, but too slowly, imho. You can barely detect any movement.

Standing in the middle of a horizontally-oriented light cone produces stark, interesting shadows.

These pics aren’t great because iPhones still can’t handle low-light photography. Why don’t I just get a proper camera?

My girls think I’m eccentric. They tolerate these sojourns but are bored by them. No matter. As long as I have something to say about it, they’ll continue to see this stuff.

Light is my favorite medium. My all-time favorite installations are James Turrell at the Guggenheim and Duke Riley’s illuminated pigeons in New York Harbor.

bins

May 25, 1993

The final episode of Cheers was broadcast on Thursday. Apparently, all of America tuned in. Tens of millions of people. But I couldn’t think of anything drearier than sitting in an empty apartment with my broken heart watching TV alone, so Cindy and I walked up to Brownies on Avenue A and 11th to see Pete’s band. I had a few scotch and sodas and felt much better. I forgot to think about Laura for a few hours.

Afterwards, we hung outside and chatted with a big group of people. I made Cindy laugh, which I love. She’s got a beautiful laugh. Pete’s wife wants me to play on their kickball team. Cindy’s obnoxious friend, Ruth, kept trying to talk to me.

I needed to get my head and heart out of Manhattan for a day so I took a train to Philly. The Philadelphia Museum of Art has a Pissarro exhibit. It’s a gathering of his French urban paintings. First time this series has been seen together since his death. $8.50 admission! The Met is free!

I called Karen. [Note: An old girlfriend who lived there. She broke my heart, too. They all did.] She seemed genuinely happy to hear from me and said she could meet me for lunch because, “Someone is working all day.” I told Oswaldo I was meeting her and he couldn’t stop laughing. Then he called me a pussy.

She picked me up at the train station and drove to TGI Friday’s. TGI Friday’s. I think she’s getting a little soft around the middle but I liked it. She lives with a man and the gloss is off. All the usual reasons. Boredom. Financial strain. Diminished affections. When she spoke of her horrors, she would look at me dead center. Hard. Unblinking. She has the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen. It was hypnotizing and a little unsettling.

I told her the good and bad stuff happening to me. She spoke of mainly bad things. A night of drunken sex resulted in an abortion. Not surprisingly, things haven’t been the same since. She seemed deeply hurt so I told her what she needed to hear; that she’s clever, fun to be with and beautiful (two out of three truths). That her boyfriend is punching above his weight class and is lucky to have her. That he doesn’t deserve her and will be sorry when she’s gone. As I said these things, a sorrowful expression drew across her face like a shadow.

We finished eating and walked back to her car. She was dropping me off at the museum. I was glad she wasn’t joining me. She would’ve been bored and try to rush me through the exhibit. Once in her passenger seat, I pulled her towards me and kissed her. She responded. I still can’t believe that someone so pretty is willing to kiss me. After a bit she pushed me away and said she felt guilty kissing one man while living with another. She said she hasn’t been kissed like that in a long while. That makes two of us. Kissing her is interesting. Her mouth is soft and kind of wide.

I rested my hand on her leg as she drove to the museum. She was wearing shorts. Her legs were incredibly smooth, like she had just shaved them. She accidentally ran a red light and laughed about it. She pulled up in front of the museum and we kissed some more. I told her to keep in touch, let me know how things worked out and wished her well. I jumped out of the car, walked up the stone staircase and didn’t look back.

If you’re not from a wealthy family but would like to live in a beautiful Manhattan townhouse, one avenue you can explore is to become a U.N. diplomat. The Upper East Side is littered with sensational brownstones owned by foreign nationals as a residence for their attachés and staff. They fly the country’s flag and have brass placards on the façade declaring their country of origin. The property is considered a sovereign nation.

This is the Irish embassy. Don’t let that tatty scaffolding fool you. It’s a lovely building located on Fifth Avenue just a few blocks south of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

This is just ONE of the properties owned by France. They’re all have equal splendor. I like walking by at night so I can look inside the windows at the lighted rooms and steal decorating ideas.

This is my favorite. This is the Polish embassy. Why am I so surprised by its grandness? It’s not as though Poland is some backwards, broke-ass nation. I’m half Polish. Do you suppose I could get a tour?

Some consulates are more modest in scope.

Do you know what diplomatic immunity is? You get to live in a protective bubble where local laws do not apply to you. It’s been a thorn in the city’s side for decades. Misbehaving diplomats and, worse, their spoiled rotten sprog, can claim diplomatic immunity and get away with anything from parking violations to assault and, in one case, murder. They have special diplomat number plates for their cars and can park with impunity wherever they want. Many diplomats allow their status go to their heads and become raging assholes and repeat offenders.

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This is another collaboration between Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat. The reason I love these collaborative works so much (aside from my celebrity whoredom) is because their two styles play so well together. Their styles are distinct. You can easily tell who did what. It’s a whimsical pairing.

Andy Warhol & Jean-Michel Basquiat
Paramount Pictures
Est. $1,000,000-15,000,000
Sold for $2,772,500

The fun feature of this piece is a tube of paint that either fell or was thrown onto the upper left corner of the canvas and squeezed so that the paint oozed out. Fantastic. Jackson Pollock liked to drop debris onto his canvas as well.

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Philippe Parreno
My Room is Another Fish Bowl
Est. $250,000-350,000
Sold for $516,500

In this frivolity recently sold at Christie’s, a fan placed in the corner of a room circulates air while helium-filled Mylar fish balloons gently swim by. The number of fish in the installation is contingent upon the size of the room. The security guards had to chase escapees who swam into other galleries. This is one of two artist’s proofs. You really do get the sensation of walking in an aquarium. But a half mil? Methinks not.