Saturday - a brief musing Italian film of the 60s and 70s

Beginning when I re-watched films by Antonioni a few years ago, I began to notice the geometry of the settings. Important scenes were framed by buildings within the frame of the film itself. Sometimes this gave a feeling of severe confinement or claustrophobia to the scene, other times enhanced the focus or created a contrast between the organic forms of the actors and the hard, angular forms of their setting.

When I took a walk yesterday at the Kensico Dam Plaza in Valhalla, NY I looked at the dam, at the deep rustication of the blocks in its face, of the ornamentation at the top of the dam, at the pavilions at the corners of the walkway, and so on. It is a setting against which most of the activity has to do with exercise or casual recreation but I can imagine it becoming the stage for drama as well.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/saturday-musings-on-some-italian-films.html

Friday - another week of social distancing

It's Friday, it's Good Friday and the second day of Passover. It's spring and fruit trees are blossoming, the narcissus and forsythia are everywhere, but so is Covid-19. Here in Westchester County, there are a lot of cases it not as many as in NYC.

I want to see my friends again, in person if you don't mind.

Are these in keeping with the season, with the holidays and the flowers in bloom?
No, they are part of another series yet to be compiled called "Minor Crimes Against Humanity".

As always, it's in the details.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/friday-another-week-of-social-distancing.html

Thursday - two more

One high, one low.

The first one has a title: Satellite Dish. The second one does not .

Both shot in and around NYC. There was a time when those rooflines were more common. Corridors around Grand Central Terminal seem to have been of equal age.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/thursday-two-more.html

Wednesday - under construction

Continuing the series of posts withou t people, here are two construction scenes at night. The first could be a bit of bubbling lava, the light casting an eerie glow on the dumpster cover. The other looks like a scene of utter and total desolation and ruin, which is sort of what the world feels like right now. Appropriate for this moment in time.

If you are interested in fine prints of any of these, email me at artk at jommelli dot org.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/continuing-series-of-posts-withou-t.html

Tuesday evening's post - two more photos without people

I went to the supermarket to pick up some things we needed. The store was enforcing strong social distancing. There was a line of about eight people waiting to go shopping. The signs outside the store requested only one person per family - no groups. They let us in one at a time - as one person left from the other side of the store, they let another person in.

On the positive side, toilet paper was back in stock. On the negative side, they still didn't have any Vita Herring in wine sauce in the one pound size. On the plus side, there were no lines to check out. On the negative side, hell, there really is no negative to surviving and in small ways thriving.

Here's two more photos, no people included.

I think they are both apt and beautiful In this era of social distancing, we all want to make our mark but at the same time, we order in advance and then we pickup wherever the hell the tell us to.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/tuesday-evenings-post-two-more-photos.html

Monday - the day after Palm Sunday

I will leave these two for you to contemplate today.

Both seem in their own way to offer a sense of loss and possible redemption. Both were photographed on the streets of NYC late in 2014. The upper one reveals itself when you click on it to magnify it so you can view the details better.

The second is a very sad bear in the trash. 

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/monday.html

Sunday - early Monday abstract images

You might know what it is you might not. It doesn't matter. I see what I see, you see what you see. Did I put those things there, did I superimpose them or did I find them? That's for you to decide.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/sunday-early-monday-abstract-images.html

Saturday - is posting a pair getting to be a habit?

No reason not to post two more, plenty of time to kill when you can't go out to a show, a reading or even a movie.

Here's two from a deserted Grand Central Terminal, though not recent. I took these a couple of years ago.

As always, hi resolution high quality prints are available. Contact me at artk at jommelli dot org for details or comments.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/saturday-is-posting-pair-getting-to-be.htm

Two more- One with a discarded Corona empty

One seems oddly appropriate. The other, lonesome where there are normally people.

Both bring out the geometry of a constructed world.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/two-more-friday.html

Thursday's pair - Momento mori

Today, I need to do something different.

If you've followed me for years, or explored my posts across several years, you know I am a first generation American and a second generation Holocaust survivor.

The first generation of Holocaust survivors is now quite old - there aren't many left and I fear that this new danger, the Covid-19 virus, will be the end for this generation.

In the past week two died. I knew them both well, one for my whole life. I am sad, I am grieving but I go on. Look upon their aged faces and recognize that one day, we all share this fate.

RIP Karl Birenbaum and Teddy Weisbord.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/thursdays-pair-momento-mori.html

What two today?

The self-imposed Covid19 isolation continues.

There are signs it will get worse before it gets better.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/04/what-two-today.html

Two for Tuesday

The isolation continues. Even when I go out for a walk, I stay distant from others walking near, but not close to me.

And from the archives I dig up photos of things but not people and I post them here.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/03/two-for-tuesday.html

Two for Monday - the virus is everywhere

Somehow these seemed appropriate for today.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/03/two-for-monday-virus-is-everywhere.html

Two photos for today

Continuing to browse through photos I've never posted for ones in which there are no people visible or present.

We are living in the era of the Pandemic and social distancing, empty city streets seem to be the new and hopefully temporary norm.

To celebrate, to commemorate, to participate in  a form of extreme social distancing I present a couple more photos.

High quality, hi-res prints are available - art at jommelli.org

Any comments or thoughts are also welcome.

 A lost kerchief, a spring day, Madison Square Park. It was just lying there sort of bereft.

A rather nice pair of shoes left by themselves on the sidewalk outside of a playground in Soho, on Spring St. What happened? Was the party so hot that when their owner changed they were too euphoric to pack them away?

Gotta wonder sometimes.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/03/two-photos-for-today.html

Two photos - the world I live in

I usually take photos of people, but in this rather odd time of social distancing, I am revisiting photos I've taken in which there are no people. The objects we make, the things I see, the accidents that form an image I want to save, are as valuable to me as the pictures of the people walking the streets of wherever I happen to be.

When we get back to a more normal life, where we don't stand six feet away from the person we are speaking with, where we don't scrub our hands for 30 seconds after touching things outside the home, where we no longer thing about whether to wear those latex gloves, I will look at pictures of people.

I don't go in for a lot of self-promotion, just a little, but I will mention on my own behalf that prints of these, and all the photos I've posted, are available. They are printed from hi-resolution digital negatives on photo paper, signed by me, in limited editions.

You can ask for more information if you are interested by writing to me at artk at jommelli.org.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/03/two-photos-world-i-live-in.html

Two photos - plumbing

Nothing much to say here.

Social distancing, avoiding getting or spreading the covid19 virus.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2020/03/two-photos-plumbing.html

Steve Dalachinsky Memorial - Parkside Lounge NYC - 10/19/2019

A batch  of photos of the readers and performers remembering the late departed Steve Dalachinsky.

Too many people to name. If you want to add names in the comments, please do. It was an afternoon  of sharing memories, of consoling the bereaved and grieving together.

Steve, you are missed.

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https://kayester.blogspot.com/2019/11/steve-dalachinsky-memorial-parkside.html