Mt. Sinai, SOAv

This "Church Sunday" at Newark USA I present a foto of a storefront church I pass often on South Orange Avenue, the main drag of Vailsburg (tho this is east of Vailsburg). I took this foto out the car window while stopped at a lite: Mount Sinai Church of God In Unity Pentecostal (498 South Orange Avenue, Newark 07103; (973) 371-6831). I looked for a website but didn't find one belonging to the church, only listings on business-directory websites. One of the church's tech-wise congregants should offer to create a website for the church on some free webhost. I can recommend Tripod.com, tho Google Sites is assuredly another to be considered. West Side High is not far from there. Maybe a student in a computer class could create a website for them for extra credit, or perhaps the schools should all encourage voluntarism in such matters (creating websites for small churches, nonprofits, and businesses, learning to confer with clients to produce something they like), which would give the kids an appreciation for the practical application of the things they learn, and help them link in to the community.

By the way, the street in the address was shown as "S Orange Ave". That is not exactly right, because it implies there is a(n) "N Orange Ave". I have actually seen some maps that call SOA "Orange Avenue South" (abbreviated or written out), which is entirely wrong. South Orange Avenue is the avenue that goes to South Orange, as Bloomfield Avenue is the avenue that goes to Bloomfield, and Springfield Avenue is the avenue that goes to Springfield. On this model, there wouldn't be a "North Orange Avenue" because (inexplicably) there is no such place as North Orange.

Sign giving info on services, zoomed and straightened in my graffics program.

Revolution '67 and Great Debaters

I couldn't get to sleep until very late last nite, and channel-surfed into the start of an airing of Marylou Tibaldo-Bongiorno's documentary on the Riots, Revolution '67, on Newark's stolen PBS station, WNET, as part of the "P.O.V." series. I had managed to avoid that film til then.

Fotos today, since I don't have any relevant to the Riots, are of one of the unifying forces in Newark life today, the arts. Specifically, today's fotos were taken at the Newark Arts Council's enormous group show at 33 Washington Street during Open Doors 2009. I showed others on November 19th (62 fotos) and December 5th (8 more).

The Riots happened 33 years before I moved to Newark, so I have absolutely no personal experience of them. In fact, I had moved out of NJ (Middletown, Monmouth County) entirely a bit more than two years earlier, to the Upper West Side of Manhattan and, tho I of course heard about the disturbances, I was already in that "New York state of mind", in which nothing that happens outside the Island of Manhattan means anything. There were no family occasions at the time of the Riots that would have required me to take the train thru Newark, so the tumult did not impinge upon my life.

There being essentially nothing else on TV that I would watch from 4:30-6:00am, I watched the whole documentary, and learned some things. It turns out I had actually seen a small chunk of it, I realized when a scene came on in which the odious Tom Hayden is shown riding in a car thru the streets in later days.

Some of the comparisons between 1967 and "today" (the film was made in 2007, for the 40th anniversary of the Riots/Rebellion/Revolution — a different kind of "three R's" from the term associated with education) made at the end of the film were misleading, as is often the case with statistics: "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics". The unemployment rate, for instance, was given without reference to the difference in the proportion of Newark's population then and 'now' that is black. If Newark was a lot whiter in 1967 than it was in 2007, it should hardly surprise that unemployment was higher in 2007, because blacks have historically had a higher unemployment rate than whites. What we'd really have to compare is black unemployment then and now. I don't have that information, and perhaps the producers didn't either. But they should have tried to compare apples and apples, not apples and oranges.

The Communist taint to the documentary was obvious. A lot of younger people will not detect it, and will not attribute it to its source in Communist anti-Americanism, but people my age, who lived thru all the lies of the entire Cold War period, see right thru it. Tom Hayden, for instance, who was for a while the husband of "Hanoi Jane" (Fonda), was not just an urban and civil-rights activist, working tirelessly and selflessly for economic justice for Newark's disadvantaged. That would have been wholly admirable. But Tom Hayden was actually a Communist sympathizer who showed his true colors in the so-called "antiwar" movement, which was not an antiwar movement at all but a pro-worldwide-Communist-revolution movement. It was opposed only to war fought to stop Communist takeover. Using deadly mass violence to achieve Communist revolution was just fine with Hayden and his ilk, and wouldn't be war unless people had the effrontery to fight back. Of course, surrendering to Communist takeover without a fite would not have saved conquered populations from mass murder by Communists intent on eradicating "counterrevolutionaries", any more than the Nazis stopped killing people once they had surrendered. The 110 million people killed by Communists, like the 1/10th that number (11M) killed by Nazis, had already been conquered. The 110M figure does not include people killed in wars trying to fend off Communist takeover. Kids today tend to think of Communism as a quaint, old, harmless anachronism rather than as the Mega-Holocaust it was.

Tom Hayden worked to bring all of Southeast Asia under Communist rule. Pol Pot was fine with him, and Hayden has never apologized for working to install Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, so they could kill 21% of the population. The Dana Library at Rutgers-Newark has a very large collection documenting the Khmer Rouge's crimes.

The film had two axes to grind: (1) the black Newarkers killed were all innocent victims of a vicious, racist, white power structure, and (2) conditions are ripe for another 'rebellion' (or whatever). I'm a little surprised at how one-sided and negative that documentary is, because the same woman, and her husband/brother(?) Jerome Bongiorno, made a wonderful, optimistic 6-minute movie for the Newark Museum, New Work: Newark in 3D in 2009, a mere two years later. I met them only very briefly at a NuMu function where the 3D film premiered, and did not talk to them long enuf to discover their biases.

I wasn't in Newark in 1967, but I have lived long enuf to tell the difference between a documentary and a propaganda piece. Revolution '67 is a propaganda piece that tries to appear balanced. But it comes off as unbalanced. In more ways than one.

One of the ways in which it was one-sided was its implicit insistence that black Newarkers were deliberately victimized by, among other things, an educational system that practically contrived to make blacks fail. I didn't go to school in Newark, but in Middletown Township, and our public schools were great. Public schools are still great, at least judging from the TV show Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? But no school can educate kids who drop out, and there's only so much a school can do to make up for chaos in the family and neighborhood.

This weekend, Newark Screens on Springfield Avenue is showing, free, the Denzel Washington-Forest Whitaker film The Great Debaters. In that film, 'based on a true story' — but falsified, substituting Harvard for the University of Southern California — a debate team at historically black Wiley College in the 1930s beats the best historically white college that participated in a debate competition. Revolution '67 made the fatuous claim that blacks in Newark were barred from rising in society as white immigrants had, by virtue of simpleminded racism. What it doesn't accept is that other minorities understood education to be the way out of poverty, and even blacks who did the same did manage to rise. R'67's implicit assertion that it wouldn't have made a difference if blacks had put the kinds of heavy pressures upon their children to get an education that other minorities did, is belied not just by The Great Debaters but also by the rise of black community and political leaders right here in Newark, including the Rhodes Scholar who had been elected mayor a year before Revolution '67 was released (Cory Booker).

For some reason, R'67 is not available for viewing on the P.O.V. website. I don't know why. I keep hearing PBS brag about how many complete shows are now available online, but tho R'67 is almost three years old and was just shown on WNET 'New York' (but actually Newark), the PBS station that reaches the largest audience in the Nation, it is not online, entire. Only three short clips are available from PBS. Perhaps, given R'67's bias, that's a good thing.
+
I did learn one thing I was glad to discover. The person lying on asphalt, with a stream of blood alongside him, in the infamous LIFE Magazine cover (who was not a man but a boy), did not die. Oddly, another PBS website says he did:

Newark, New Jersey has often been used to symbolize the very idea of urban blight. Some say Newark never recovered from the 1967 riots when LIFE MAGAZINE featured a dead child on its cover under the headline: "Shooting War in the Streets: Newark, The Predictable Insurrection." But Newark has a new mayor, Cory Booker, who wants to change the image and the reality of Newark.

(The Bill Moyers Journal video segment on Booker is still online.)

Here you can see some of the faces of Newark arts.
I don't see in them a recurrence of the Riots, do you?

As for the dead/not dead kid (Joey Bass, Jr.) I'm inclined to believe the fotografer (Bud Lee) who took the foto and said the kid survived. That kid would be 55 years old now. I wonder what happened to him.

Fatherhood and Family Fun, at NuMu

There are two special events at the Newark Museum in coming days. First, on Thursday, is the NJ premiere of a movie about devalued fatherhood, co-sponsored by the Museum, Fathers Now (a project of Newark Now), and Gradygirl Productions:

"Man Up: The Exploration of a Fatherless Nation" [is being screened] for FREE on Thursday, Feb. 25, 6:00pm at the Newark Museum auditorium. Fathers Now produced this FREE community program in an effort to encourage conversations that rebuild the bonds and responsibility of fatherhood in Newark. "It’s necessary for fathers to hear the hurt from their children as part of the healing process," adds LaVar Young[,] the director of Fathers Now. "Man-Up uncovers the fatherless epidemic that’s affecting the African American community." The post-screening program will include a panel discussion featuring film director and executive producer Tonia Grady[;] music industry executive and author of "Be A Father to Your Child", Bill Stephney[;] Fathers Now Director, LaVar Young[;] and UMDNJ Fatherhood Program Director, Charles Dixon.

Flyer for the film.

Location: The Newark Museum auditorium, 49 Washington Street, Newark, NJ 07102
Date: Thursday, February 25, 2010
6:00pm Doors Open for general public
7:00pm – 8:00pm Film Screening
8:00pm – 9:00pm Panel Discussion * * *

Directed and executive produced by Tonia Grady of Gradygirl Productions, Inc., Man-Up is an uncompromising look at the young lives that hang in the balance of "fatherlessness". To illustrate the magnitude of this social epidemic you will hear personal testimonies of triumph and devastation as Man-Up navigates through the experiences of growing up without a father and the effects thereof. The documentary gives a face to the voiceless children who suffer and ask themselves the unanswerable "why me?" Man-Up [was] featured in the 2009 Atlanta Gay Pride film festival and the 4th Annual WIFTI (Women In Film and Television International) Short Film Showcase.

The female origin of a film about fatherhood strikes me as odd, but the film must be judged on its own merits. I detest the misuse of the term "epidemic" to refer to things that are not passed from person to person in the fashion of an infection, but that's their choice of word, not mine. The issue of "baby daddies" who don't step up to their responsibilities but abandon their children to complete or part-time fatherlessness is enormously important to the black community in particular, but many fathers of other groups are also devalued by divorce courts and custody arrangements, as tho the only value of a father is what he can send in the way of cash. This social reality is feebly opposed by public-service advertising campaigns that try to persuade fathers whose children have been taken from them that 'child support is more than just money'. I hope the film deals with the obstacles placed in the way of fathers by courts, estranged wives and girlfriends, etc., and does not simply blame men for being unable to 'leap tall buildings with a single bound'. Superman's kids would probably be taken from him by the divorce courts of this country, whose prejudices against men when it comes to kids are enormous, and devastating to the men who are treated as criminals if they sever ties to children that society won't let them raise. A casual observer looking at the divorce and child-custody laws of this country might assume that all the legislatures of the Nation are dominated by women, whereas the anti-male bias of these institutions actually arises from laws passed by legislatures that are dominantly male. Is a puzzlement.
+
Circus Science. A happier occasion at the Museum is the annual "Circus Science" weekend this Saturday and Sunday.

Graffic from Newark Museum email. (If the Museum is unhappy with my using it here, I will of course remove it).

I showed 23 fotos of last year's event on March 10, 2009. I'm pretty sure that Circus Science (not just circus entertainment) is the Museum's biggest event each year, and the place is packed with happy kids and weary parents. So big is the crowd that the Museum (usually) has to erect a big white tent in the garden for the overflow crowd. It's quite an event. If you haven't yet been to it, and would like to see how busy and warm the Newark Museum can be, get thee to NuMu this Saturday and Sunday. Remember, Newark residents get in free. Just bring proof of residency, and you're in. Others, please see the Museum's website for standard admission, AAA two-for-one discount, etc. I'm a member, and a Newark resident, so I get in free twice!
+
P.S.: Ringling Bros. Barnum & Bailey's "Funundrum" circus show plays 8 performances at the Prudential Center from March 3-7, with tickets as cheap as $15. I haven't been to the circus since a Ringling Bros. show at the OLD Madison Square Garden on Eighth Avenue and 50th Street (unless my attendance at a small circus that actually played in a tent off Nut Swamp Road in Middletown was after that). Maybe it's time.

Public Art, J.C.

I went to the New Jersey Flower Show at Raritan Center on Sunday, and on the way back tried to dead reckon my way to the Walmart in Kearny. (I have lots of pix of the flower show, but the accompanying text is not ready yet.) I figured that since Route 1 goes all the way up to Maine, I should intersect Harrison Avenue or Newark Avenue (whichever it's called at that point) if I just stayed on 1-9 beyond where I would ordinarily turn off for 21/McCarter Highway. Unfortunately, it was dark by then, I couldn't see street signs, and I got lost. But I decided to regard it as exploring. I found myself at Paterson Plank Road and Central Avenue in J.C. What should I see there but this very large metal sculpture, some 15 feet or more in length.

I was startled,and delited, so found a parking place nearby and took some fotos. It reminded me of the sculpture outside the Rodino Federal Office Building in Downtown Newark. I didn't see a plaque by the Jersey City statue to compare artists. Then again, there was no plaque by the Rodino sculpture either. Still, maybe artist info about both sculptures is available online somewhere.

I tried flash to see if I could get more detail. It did show somewhat more detail, but looked very different. The first foto is more like what it looks like in the regular streetliting.

The sculpture is at a point at the northwestern end of Jersey City's Washington Park. I didn't know J.C. had a Washington Park, but do now.

Today, after tending to most of the things I have to do on the computer every day, I turned on TV and chanced upon an episode of State of the Arts, the New Jersey Network's program about NJ arts, called "Art in the Public Square" and watched it in hopes of seeing that sculpture and hearing the artist identified.
+
The program spent a couple of minutes at the beginning on the restoration of Cass Gilbert's Old Essex County Courthouse here in Newark, and some time later, on some works by Mac Adams, including his blue, metal ribbon sculpture on the wall of UMDNJ's Ambulatory Care Center on Bergen Street opposite the Pathmark. I have shown pix of that sculpture here, day (September 20, 2008) and nite (September 30th). But I hadn't heard it explained until that NJN show, which referred to its not having been unveiled to the public yet, as of 2005. So I realized that the program was produced in 2005. If the J.C. sculpture were installed after that, it couldn't have been included even if the producers admired it. In any case, Adams explained that the ribbon combined three ideas, the life line in palmistry, the double helix in DNA, and a river. Ah, so.

This is a wide view in available lite of the J.C. sculpture down its axis, from the north. The next was taken with flash, with less than satisfactory results.

The NJN program showed a number of other public art projects and spoke to some other artists about how they work. One of the projects is an Atlantic City monument to the national black civil-rights movement. Rutgers-Newark history professor Clement Price speaks to what seems to have been his role in the creation of that monument. Why it's in Atlantic City seems not to have been addressed.

In describing that monument, the female narrator refers to cooperation of an artist and "an historian". What an idiot. "An historian", "an historic", etc., are profoundly stupid, pretentious misuses of language. "An" is properly used ONLY before a vowel sound. In "an historian", the H is pronounced, and it is a consonant, so "an" is just plain wrong. I know a lot of people have been led to believe that in combination with "historic" or even "historian", "an" is permissible, even expected. But if you don't say "an history" — and nobody does — don't say "an historic". It's just stupid.
+
Another irritating feature of the State of the Arts program is that at some points, the background music became too much like foreground, nearly drowning out the things that various people were saying. Film schools have got to stop teaching documentarians to put music into everything, and assuredly must warn them to make sure that such music as is employed is never so loud that it competes with the words that convey the information at the heart of the documentary.

Then I adjusted the white balance to incandescent lite, with a much happier result.

The show mentions that the '1% program' — that is, dedication of 1% of the construction budget for government buildings to public art — originated in the City of Philadelphia in 1958, and the entire State of New Jersey followed suit 20 years later, 1978. I wonder if there's a Newark City citizens' commission that deals with such public art for construction in Newark. I might like to serve on that.

In any case, both the NJN website and TVGuide.com say that "Art in the Public Square" will be shown again this Thursday. It's worth seeing. If you haven't already seen it and will be available to watch for a half hour starting at 5pm on channel 50-2, you can see it on TV. Or you can watch either a preview or the entire show online.

By the way, I did eventually find Newark Avenue, but for some insane reason, it turned one-way eastbound just west of "India Square", so I couldn't take it to Kearny, much less to Newark, which the name of the street indicates you should be able to get to by following it. So I gave up and went home. This state does insane things with roads.

Snowshovels and Pigeons

I finally got to South Orange Tire (in Newark, on South Orange Avenue, at 11th Street) yesterday to get a tire fixed. I'd been running on the "donut" for weeks, but I don't generally cover much distance, so wasn't much concerned. I didn't want to wait around in the cold while the tire was being fixed, but Friday was finally warm and sunny enuf, so I tended to this. Besides, I want to go to the flower show at Raritan Center this weekend (on PSE&G's dime), and that's a 45-mile roundtrip, that I dare not make on the donut and no spare. While I was waiting, I looked around and saw this group of snowshovels, including two two-man shovels! I didn't know there was such a thing, but it seems to me a very good idea for small businesses that can't afford their own snowplow.

Naturally, I took a picture. Actually, I took two pictures, one with and one without flash, and framed slitely differently. Then I put the camera away and waited a while longer. The guy said that the tire is good, but if there's a slow leak, it's probably due to air escaping between the tire and the rim. I asked if they can fix that, if they had the time to do it then (because they close at 5:30, and it was already after 5pm), and how much it costs. Yes it can be fixed, by removing the tire and grinding away dirt and such from the rim; yes, they had time to do it then; and $5. So I asked to have that done, then returned to looking around.

I saw a bunch of birds on the roof of a building across the street. Pigeons. There is a concrete pad in my backyard that used to be the floor of a pigeon coop that the former owners had at some point in the past. And I have seen flocks of pigeons flying in sync, making coordinated turns like schools of fish, all of one mind. Considering how stupid birds and fish are in general, it amazes me that their little brains can adjust their movements so quickly and in close-rank lockstep. Before I could try to zoom closer, the whole flock, apparently including some deeper into the roof that I could not see, took off and made a few swooping circles in the air, like the flocks that pigeon racers in NYC have their birds do. In those contests, which I have heard described in some documentary, one object is to detach some birds from somebody else's flock and bring them back to their own coop.

I didn't see any human pigeonmaster ordering these pigeons out, tho. They seem to have just spontaneously decided it was time to fly awhile. And then they came back, just a few minutes later, to the same old and slitely decrepit building, as tho nothing had happened.

I'm glad I had to wait to have a tire fixed across the street.

TV Show Tonite; Fathers Graduate and W.O. Art Show Opens Saturday

TEAM Schools on TV. On August 6, 2006 I mentioned one of the TEAM Schools in the former parochial school of Newark's now-closed St. Charles Borromeo R.C. Church (which was merged into Blessed Sacrament). PlumTV, a cable network that serves some elite communities around the country, not including Newark, is broadcasting tonite at 7pm a program about educational innovation that includes mention of these Newark schools.

There's no more powerful path to an equitable and prosperous society than improving education. These citizen-driven organizations are taking matters into their own hands to reform and reimagine our failing education system. Spirit, innovation, and results guide their programs - from charter schools to afterschool, early education to arts and apprenticeships. Featured Organizations: Citizen Schools, Jumpstart, DreamYard Project, Team Charter Schools. * * *

TEAM Charter Schools - The mission of TEAM Charter Schools is to create a network of schools in Newark, New Jersey, that instill in their students the desire and ability to succeed in college, in order to change the world. TEAM was founded on the belief that Together Everyone Achieves More (TEAM). Both inside and outside of the classroom, students are consistently engaged in character-building teamwork with the motto: Team always beats individual.

PlumTV presently reaches only Aspen, the Hamptons, Martha’s Vineyard, Miami Beach, Nantucket, Sun Valley, Telluride, and Vail. I once passed Vail on the way to a whitewater rafting expedition in Colorado, but haven't actually been in it. The program can be seen in its entirety online, however. Their website also includes a video about the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program, something Newark should emulate. We've made a start, with cWOW's murals. (The two fotos of TEAM Academy from my 2006 post were erased from the Internet when AOL closed subscribers' online storage spaces, so I'm showing them again now.)

On October 2, 2008 I expressed my disapproval of the extreme program of the KIPP Schools, of which the TEAM Schools are part. NJ public schools did a great job when I was young, and I am very suspicious of assertions that they somehow no longer do. I am especially suspicious of attacks on regular public schools when I see the kinds of things kids know on the TV game show Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? The enslavement of our children is part of the destruction of our standard of living and way of life brought on by unfettered free trade, which is producing a race to the bottom, in which only the very rich will have a good quality of life, and everybody else will be progressively impoverished.

Valuing Newark Fathers. Mayor Booker is scheduled to speak at a graduation ceremony Saturday morning, for 75 men who have gone thru a program to help them reintegrate with their families. The program is called "Fathers Now", part of a larger initiative.

Fathers Now serves fathers in transition - men who have lost their jobs and homes, or who are re-entering the workforce following incarceration and who seek to assume greater responsibility for and contribute to the lives of their children. NCCF has successfully placed 70% of its graduates in gainful employment. In addition, men served by NCCF recidivate at a remarkably low rate of 3%. * * *

The Newark Comprehensive Center for Fathers is headquartered at Essex County College; it is a replication site of the Philadelphia-based National Comprehensive Center for Fathers. Newark Now administers NCCF and Fathers Now in partnership with the City of Newark, NewarkWorks, New Jersey Department of Labor, New Jersey Legal Services, and Relese Network. * * *

This Saturday, February 20, 2010, at 11AM, seventy-five men who have successfully completed the program at the Newark Comprehensive Center for Fathers (NCCF) will be honored in a graduation ceremony. The ceremony will feature performances from spoken word artist and Essex County College student, Elijah Brown, as well as the Newark Boys Chorus.

Logo of Fathers Now.

Newark Now is an organization founded by our present Mayor, Cory Booker, but now headed by Edgar C. Izurieta (Booker is busy with other things at the moment). I was amused to note that when pushed together in a URL, "Newark Now" becomes "newarknow", which could be seen as Newark Know, with the K doing double duty.
+
ReLeSe — Newark Reentry Legal Services (ReLeSe) Network — is explained thus at its website:

ReLeSe, a legal services program of the Volunteer Lawyers for Justice, is designed to help individuals with criminal records address civil legal matters that are barriers to successful community reintegration.

The key word there is "civil" matters, not criminal.
+
The Fathers Now graduation ceremony specifics are:

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 2010
10:30AM – DOORS OPEN
11:00AM until 12:30PM – GRADUATION – Open To All To Attend * * *
12:30PM until 1:30PM – RECEPTION – Open To All To Attend
Main Dining Hall – Pit Area
Essex County College, Smith Hall, Main Campus,
303 University Avenue, Newark, NJ 07102.

Moreover:

On February 25, 2010, Fathers Now will also host the screening premier for the documentary, Man-Up: The Exploration of a Fatherless Nation at the Newark Museum, the VIP reception begins at 5:00pm and the screening at 7:00pm.

I don't see mention of that event on the Newark Museum website, so perhaps it's closed to the general public and even regular Museum members. The issue of absent fathers is enormously important across society, as a result of the progressive destruction of marriage — by straight people, not gay — and the endless devaluing of fatherhood by media and government. Mayor Booker is right to promote responsible fatherhood. It's a little odd that he is not himself a father, but you don't have to be a father to understand the importance of a father's being present in a child's life.
+
"Terra" Art Show Opens in West Orange Saturday Evening. I'm not very familiar with West Orange, but it is an important Newark suburb. Tho I'd rather suburbanites come into Newark to immerse themselves in the arts, there are Newark-area artists who need more places to show. I have met three of the artists shown in the poster below. (I assume the sponsoring organization, Arts Incubator, won't mind my using their poster here but of course I will remove it if they object.)

NAC Benefit Thursday Evening

When I was out and about last Thursday, taking pix of, among other things, the vacant lot where the Schools Stadium had been and the Red Bull Arena, I swung by the McDonald's on 18th Avenue for a large strawberry shake (their very best thing, in my view) on my way home, and decided not to wait on the drivethru line. I generally prefer to go inside, and had never until several months ago ordered from a drivethru. I'm often impatient, and running my car's engine while standing still, wasting gas and contributing to pollution, bothers me. The counter service at Newark McDonald's(es) tends to be pretty fast, so I parked and walked in. On the way, I noticed that the adhesive sign on the glass door, showing hours, looked wrong. It said that the dining room is open 24 hours a day but the drivethru closes at different times in the course of the week. I decided to ask about that when I got to the counter. But there were people ahead of me, including a couple of Newark cops, and an(other) elderly man.
+
There was an animated sign claiming a service time of 88 seconds, but I wasn't sure if the old guy was waiting for something he'd already ordered, or had yet to be served. I looked at him to ask, and realized that it was Alonzo Kennerly, an artist I had met at his part of the Newark Arts Council (NAC)'s 33 Washington Street show. I discussed and showed some pix of some of his works here November 19th (2009). Startled, I said, "Kennerly!" (I'm not good with names, but better at last names than first). He didn't recognize me, so I introduced myself and he nodded (politely if not knowingly). It turns out he lives in my area, Vailsburg. He asked if I was going to cover the NAC's carnival event. I hadn't heard about it, and he said he could send me the notice, so I gave him my card (again). I don't know if everyone keeps good track of bizcards, since few of us have bizcard fileboxes. I asked if he would be there, and he said that a work of his was supposed to be exhibited there.
+
I did ask the young woman at the counter about the hours posted on the door, and she clarified that the drivethru is what is open 24 hours. I told her that that is not what the new sign says, and that needs to be fixed. On my way out, I saw that the hours shown on the sign going OUT were right, but those going IN were wrong. I will be interested to see if management fixes that, now that I have told them twice, once via a counterwoman and once via the Internet.

This is a foto of a few of Alonzo's works that I did not use earlier, in part because the liting was so dim (to let the "black lite" that makes the sculptures glow blue, do its thing) that the foto turned out grainy. Ignore that.

Sure enuf, Alonzo later that nite did send me an announcement (which I have slitely edited).

Join the Newark Arts Council for
"CARNIVALE NEWARK"
The Newark Arts Council's first fundraiser of the year.
Funds will benefit the activities of the Newark Arts Council.

Thursday, February 18th, 2010, 6-10pm
Theatre Square Grill [updated location]
One Center St.
Newark, NJ 07102

A Celebration of the Arts featuring Newark's Unique Vision of International Festivals - Carnival of Venice[,] Mardi Gras[,] Rio Carnaval[,] Trinidad & Tobago, and many more. You will enjoy Exquisite Foods, Authentic Live Music, Dance, Colorful Costumes and International Wines. As well as [a] Live performance by bossa nova and samba band, "Bossa5", which will perform the infectious rhythms and melodies of Brazilian Carnival .... The band will be joined by Marizete Browne, a dancer from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil who will show you the basic samba moves.

The band features Ivo Araujo, leader of the Manhattan samba school.

Bossa5 also spotlights the talents of Nanny Assis, an internationally renowned drummer and band leader in his own right.

Also, over 15 different visual artists will exhibit original, one of a kind masks created uniquely for "Carnivale Newark"; the masks will be selected by an esteemed independent juror and will be available for purchase. Fine Art paintings and sculptures reflecting the carnival theme by sculptor-Painter Santiago Misol Roche will be exhibited. Guests will dine on assorted International food delicacies representing world cuisines. Come join the fun and celebrate Carnival season in Newark!

This foto was sent out as part of the NAC's email notice of its fundraiser. I show it here on the supposition that the NAC won't mind my using it to attract more attention to its event. If NAC wants me to remove this foto from my blog, I will of course comply.

Admission Price $75 per person
Credit Cards Accepted and Paypal
Visit our website to buy your tickets online.

Carnival Attire Optional
Masks Provided

R.S.V.P to lpinzon@newarkarts.org
973-643-1625

Much tho I would love to give NAC $75 for such an event, that is not within the reach of this Social Security pensioner, but I hope they get a good crowd of people who are lucky enuf still to be bringing in the big bucks.
+
I have been to Rio, by the way, on a cheapo charter flite in 1984, but not during Carnaval. My brother Alan remarked that he was so tired of traveling when he was conducting his international consulting business in industrial psychology that he left Rio mere hours before 'the biggest party in the world' was to start. He just wanted to get home and get some rest. It wasn't until later that he decided that maybe he should have stayed in Rio a bit longer. (Rio has, or had in the 1980s, an astronomical crime rate. As a tourist, in the course of six days, I witnessed a purse snatching in Ipanema and an armed robbery of a car stuck in traffic between tunnels between Copacabana and Downtown, just ahead of our tourbus.)
+
I'd like to see a geodesic-domed, indoor Carnaval stadium, like Rio's outdoor stadium, built in the abandoned, former industrial area of eastern Newark, near the large Portuguese-Brazilian community of the Ironbound. Newark has the largest Lusophone (Portuguese-speaking) community outside a Lusophone country (there are seven, but I'm not telling). And there are lots of people from the Tristate Newark Metropolitan Area (alrite, NYC is generally regarded as the center of the Tristate Area) who now live in a place where Mardi Gras or Carnival is celebrated in the middle of winter. (Summer in Rio.) They can't all afford to fly to warmer climes. Let's build a samba/carnival stadium and bring two hundred thousand cold-weather Carnival tourists to a northern, Newark mardi gras. Built large enuf, it could also be used for world-class soccer championships, even Formula 1 auto races. It might, indeed, prove large enuf that even Bruce Springsteen might deign to perform in Newark.

Red Bull Arena Looking Good

After I took pix of the site of the former Schools Stadium (see yesterday's post), I continued down Bloomfield Avenue to check the state of construction of the Red Bull soccer stadium in Harrison and to see if parking has been restored to Frank E. Rodgers Boulevard near the PATH station. I got there as daylite was fading, so the edges in the foto below aren't crisp.

The stadium — or "Arena", as Red Bull calls it — appears at this distance to have a silvery exterior surface, which makes it look, in this picture, across a snow-covered field, something like a flying saucer. Perhaps that's a stadium version of Red Bull's advertised "wiiings".
+
But no, parking has not been restored to Rodgers Boulevard. Why not? Perhaps the Port Authority should shut down the Harrison PATH station until Harrison restores parking so commuters who have to drive to the station can use it.
+
Boycott WNET. PBS stations are in begathon mode again. You might think that with all the ads (passed off as acknowledgments of sponsoring corporations) that PBS stations carry nowadays, hitting up viewers for 'memberships' (not that you get to vote in the 'organization' you have to pay to 'join') would no longer be necessary. But every few weeks they harass viewers in aggressive panhandling anyway. I have mentioned that WNET is still assigned by the FCC to Newark, even tho all its operations have been moved to NYC, where the thieves who stole Newark's station live. WNET is thus not available to serve the interests of Newarkers first, and New Jerseyans more generally, second. Instead, all local promotion WNET does is for NYC. So please do not send money to WNET. Instead, if you wish to support public broadcasting, you can become a 'member' of the New Jersey Network (TV and radio) or WBGO (radio), both of which actually do have operations in Newark, and care about New Jerseyans.

Schools Stadium Gone

I mentioned here October 6, 2008 that the Newark Schools Stadium at Bloomfield and Roseville Avenues in the North Ward was to be demolished and replaced with a much better facility, but did not know if any work had been done to that end. I swung past the site a few days ago around dusk, and saw that the old stadium has been completely demolished. But the liting was not right for fotos. Yesterday I wanted to get there in time for pix.

But first, I had to clear a path one snow shovel wide across my entire 55-foot-wide frontage for pedestrians, plus two tracks one shovel wide for the tires of my car, up about 80 feet of my 100-foot driveway and around to the back of the car, to the right of the driveway. I couldn't even get to the sidewalk until I cleared part of my porch and the 16 steps down to the sidewalk level.

It took me over an hour and a half to do all this, taking my time and resting now and then to catch my breath. I didn't get down all the way to the asphalt the entire length but I'll have enuf traction on such snow as remains to get the car down my sloping driveway. Getting back up — now that's another story.

I had to go out today, and couldn't just wait for a thaw, because I had to send a fax from the Bank of America within the South Orange Pathmark in order to transfer enuf money from my IRA to checking to pay my mortgage. Once I was out, I kept going, to the (former site of the) Schools Stadium. I think the two things atop the pole in the picture above are fixtures for floodlites that once illuminated part of the Stadium structure.

The snow makes the great big hole in the cityscape more clearly a blank.

The only way you can tell this is the right place is this sign, formerly on wooden poles but now hanging from the chainlink fence, with the wide, empty lot below. I hope the City won't use budgetary pressures in a time of recession as an excuse not to build the promised new stadium. Where is Barringer High to play its football games?

I found odd the schedule announced by this sign elsewhere on the fence. Why is the "Final Date" for summer Little League February 19th?

Newark Predominantly White Again

We had about 12 inches of snow yesterday into today. People in this area will know that, but this blog reaches some people in the Newark Diaspora, who are scattered far and wide, so I thought I'd show some pix of what they're missing, from my house in Vailsburg (far western Newark).

Perhaps their own area also had snow — snow has been much more widespread this year than usual, as tho the gods are taunting the participants in the Copenhagen conference on "global warming" — but there are some areas that were spared the nuisance, but also the beauty, of a heavy snowfall. Here, I could just barely swing open my back stormdoor to reach my side yard, because the snow was up to the top of the step.

The timing of this week's snowfall didn't allow me to get to Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton during the free days (Tuesday-Thursday) to see what it looks like covered in snow. I'll have to hope for good conditions during the free period next week, because the worst of the winter should be over after that.

Ordinarily, the last two weeks of January and first week of February, or the last one week of January and the first two weeks of February, are the coldest of the year. By February 15th, temps usually start to moderate.

Snow can be very pretty, as long as you don't have to be out in it. In the foto above, my evergreen bamboo is bent down nearly horizontal under the weight of the snow. It's about 13 feet tall, ordinarily, and I had hoped for a Chinese-landscape look, with snow outlining the leaves and canes against each other, but I'd have had to take that picture in the middle of the nite, before the wet snow weighed it down. Drat.

I tried to take some pictures last nite, but the streetliting cast(ed) an orangy glow on everything.

So I took a few pix with flash, which illuminated more than flash ordinarily would, because of the high reflectivity of snow.

Here, you can see my birdfeeder covered in snow. It's quite a hassle to refill it when it's surrounded by snow, but doing so is especially important in that many other sources of seed are under the snow, tho some plant stalks might be accessible after winds have knocked snow off, as from parts of the wires in the foto above. The white dots are, as you might have guessed, falling snowflakes stopped in the flash.

And in the foto above, the black wrought-iron tracery of the supports for my porch roof is outlined in white. The outer sides of the twining wisteria vine are also coated in snow.
+
There is, alas, little for kids to enjoy snow in around here, since there's no safe hillside for sledding, due to city traffic on street hills, and to the area without traffic, Vailsburg Park, being flat.

Ravens 'Vessel' Closes Saturday

I have backfilled Tuesday, so if you have already seen this entry, scroll down to the blogpost about flower shows and convention centers.

The 24-artist show, "Vessel", at Rupert Ravens Contemporary art gallery ("RRC"), closes February 13th.

I've been to it twice, but couldn't take the time to look at everything closely. RRC is very large, and there are lots of wonderful things to see in this show, as in all RRC shows and most other shows in Newark's multiple arts venues.
+
Given the heavy snowfall, I may not make it to the show before it closes, to look at some of the things on the first floor to the middle left that I thought deserved more attention. But I was meeting artists and taking fotos both times I was there, so didn't have time to check wonderful small pieces that looked like detailed beadwork or enamelware in that area. I don't want to stand in the cold for the #1 bus. (People of "a certain age" may be nudged by that phrase into thinking of Charlie Chan's #1 son. Why don't we have Charlie Chan movies now, with real Orientals playing the major parts? Many of the old-time movie series were charming.) The #1 would take me right to the Ravens gallery. Even if I clear two tracks a snow-shovel wide for my car's tires down 80 feet of my driveway, plus several feet into the street to get my car out, will I find snow-free parking spaces Downtown? I don't know.

I actually do have to take the car out, to get to a fax at the Bank of America branch within the South Orange Pathmark (why not the Bergen Street Pathmark? the Subway sandwich shop there closed recently — just after I decided that a "$5 foot-long" was a good deal, but before I could buy even one — so there's plenty of room). I need to transfer funds from my IRA into my checking account to pay my mortgage. I do have a fax capability in my multifunction machine, but no longer have a landline phone into which to tie it. So I have to get to a fax unless (a) I can find a way to scan in the form I have to send, and then use an Internet fax service to send it to my contact — if he is able to get to work to make the transfer on time; or (b) I can create an online account for my BofA (now called "Merrill Lynch") IRA accounts and make an online transfer myself. But I don't know if that's even possible, and it would take some time to investigate this, when I am very short of time. Since I have some computer equipment problems and the page limit of the Internet fax program I signed up for years ago, but have never used, would not accommodate the full 5-page form, unless I send two faxes for an arbitrary first and second part, it would be simpler, but certainly not physically easier, just to clear the durned driveway. Snow is lite. I need exercise. A perfect match, no? Except I'm 65 years old. My friend Ingé urged me not to risk a heart attack — 'just hire the kids' who are offering to clear sidewalks and driveways for a fee. Do I look rich to you, Ingé? I'd rather risk death than pay somebody else to do something I (think I) can do myself! When my ancestors came to this continent in 1653, were there freelance kids walking down the streets with snow shovels? I don't think so. Of course, all my ancestors from that time are dead now, but not from shoveling snow (or snoveling show, as I sometimes put it).

This hyper-realistic statue was not part of the "Former Black Militant Golf and Country Club - PRO SHOP" area when the "Vessel" exhibit first opened, but was in place by the time of the artists' talks January 15th.

Arthur Negro ["black Art"], the founding member of the Former Black Militant Golf and Country Club, is considered a pioneering force of his time. He operated behind the scenes of many of the 20th century's most charged and politically divisive campaigns for racial equality. RRC is very proud to present the Former Black Militant Golf and Country Club Satellite Pro Shop in Newark.

This piece by Benjamin S. Jones seems to me to be a partially deconstructed or exploded view of Noah's Ark. I have no idea what it's actually supposed to be. But I like the architectural part of it.

I also don't know who did this other architectural work, nearby (Rupert puts things by different artists in interesting juxtapositions). But I liked it. My best friend for several years (until he worked himself away from all his friends, gave his two cats away, and committed suicide without telling anyone how desperately unhappy he had become; you often cannot prevent other people's suicides) was an architect, and I like architectural models and artist's renderings. In fact, there is or was a show of proposals and artist's renderings for a hypothetical Newark Visitors Center that I'd like to see. I have to look for the info in email.

In any case, the "Vessel" show occupies the gallery's three floors, totaling 30,000 square feet of exhibit space. (That is 15X the space in my house.) "Vessel" remains on view from 11am-6pm thru Saturday the 13th, at 85 Market Street (near the corner of Washington Street, in the building that still bears big letters that spell out "Furniture King" but is really Rupert Ravens Contemporary art gallery). If you like modern art and haven't gotten to the "Vessel" show yet, try to get there well before 6pm Saturday.