Uploads from SardineTea, tagged upperwestside

View: Corner of 77th Street and East Side of Broadway

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 12:48:44 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

In the background is an image uploaded in April, 2012. The insert was taken today, 12/10/12...same corner (diptych).

In eight shorts months another tower has been erected. Another tower demanding power...water, electricity and sewerage services. Each month development stretches the demands on the city's infrastructure and each summer the probability of a power outage grows. All these luxury high-rises demand power for their residents' computers and other gadgets; laundry room and in-house gym facilities; their high-tech security systems to keep out the riff-raff and maintenance of the building at large.

Every year, for the past few years during the summer, the power to my small building and others of the same stature is reduced (a/c blows hot air) to maintain "commercial properties" and the "high-rise luxury residents" in comfort. Do I resent this? You betcha!

NYC 12/10/12

Que Sera, Sera!

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 12:48:44 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

View of West side of Broadway, between 74th & 75th streets. That's the "Ansonia " in the upper left side of the screen. It's "Land Marked" and can't be demolished.

Since these are low-rise buildings, it's unlikely they'll survive into the next decade, but idk, so I thought it best to document them anyway, jic.

"Once upon a time"... there were chess houses, small pubs, cafes & restaurants, a bowling alley, billiards and even a Bingo Hall on the second floor of the center building in the image, now the second floor of the "Fairway Market" on the Upper West Side.

All, but the Dublin House (pub) on 79th street & Malachy's (pub) on 72nd street are GONE. Cafes replaced with "Starbucks", Mom & Pop restaurants replaced with restaurant chains and upscale, fine dining establishments, no one but the affluent and tourists with spending budgets can afford. Billiards & bowling considered too "low-brow" to be allowed to exist, lest it attract the "wrong kind" of people (Ralph Kramden might have had an opinion on this), replaced with upscale fitness centers and day-care establishments for kids and pups while moms and dads go to work. The Bingo Hall, entertainment for the many seniors once living here, replaced with a "gourmet cafe" above the "Fairway Market"... part of Fairway's approach to cater to the changing demographics.

The adjective "gourmet" seems to precede the name of every food vendor and a bank exists on almost "every" corner, since no small operator could afford the excessive rents asked by "equity group" landlords, of which there have been an explosion in the past twenty years...many of foreign origin. And no nail left unpolished by the numerous Nail Salons dotting the landscape.

So much has been demolished that I'm finding it very difficult to keep up documenting the neighborhood. I have numerous images I haven't uploaded because it would become overwhelming and boring to the viewer, but I'm secretly and privately lamenting the loss of the city in which I grew up. And this is just "one" neighborhood. The Village has been transformed into NYU's campus...wouldn't recognize it today.

NYC 12/10/12

Over-Development

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 12:48:44 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

And yet, "another" homogenized tower will dot the landscape on the UWS.

The excuse: needed housing for the masses pouring into the city everyday. Populations from all over the globe spill into NYC daily to escape political & financial tensions in their homelands... in addition to our own prodigal sons & daughters who abandoned the city during the 70's during the "White Flight" era. To that add...the exodus from middle America into the city (domestic transplants) seeking escape from their own parochial towns and chasing big bucks employment with diploma in hand.

How I perceive this and why I resent it: NYC is not the same city people view in movies. It's been transformed from a vibrant, mixed culture of ideas where everyone could co-exist and which embraced all classes within a society to a sanitized, homogenized, discriminating city which new people seek to segregate themselves from those who serve the city and gate themselves within private co-ops and condos behind a pretentious cloak of superiority. It's all about the $$$.

NYC 12/10/12

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:42 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

Sculpture: "Cope"
Artist: Damien Armondo Vera
Materials used: Steel, Stainless Steel & Winterstone
Exhibit: June 2012 - June 2013
Model to Monument (M2M) Project
By: The Art Students League of New York
Riverside Park, NYC 11/19/12

It's been a while since I've photographed any "public art" throughout the city. It seems redundant to me to photograph an object, icon or sculpture which has had so many lenses focused on it already, but there are a few that I, imho, think deserve closer examination and "Cope" is one of them.

From the distance, this piece looks like a cluster of steel pillars, but upon closer scrutiny it reveals a more profound statement. Had I not wandered over to examine it more closely, I would've missed this most important element. Within each of the steel pillars is encased a Winterstone sculpture suffocating (or so it seems to me) inside, but visit the artist to see his interpretation.
www.theartstudentsleague.org/ModeltoMonument/M2MYearTwo.aspx
Scroll down to view Vera's statement about this work.

Winterstone sculpture within steel pillar.

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:41 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:42 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:42 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:41 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:43 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:43 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

"Cope"...Damien Armondo Vera

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:56:41 -0800

SardineTea posted a photo:

Driftwood Delight

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 18:31:34 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Stewie...enjoying a gift left from Sandy.
Riverside Park, NYC 11/01/12

Caressing Breeze

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 18:31:35 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Stewie on Pier 1 @ Riverside Park, NYC 11/01/12

Stewie

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 18:31:36 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Stewie on Pier 1 @ Riverside Park, NYC 11/01/12

Is That Jersey?

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 18:31:35 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Stewie on Pier 1 @ Riverside Park, NYC 11/01/12

Driftwood Delight

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 18:31:34 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Stewie...enjoying a gift left from Sandy.
Riverside Park, NYC 11/01/12

Driftwood Delight

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 18:31:35 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Stewie...enjoying a gift left from Sandy.
Riverside Park, NYC 11/01/12

"Hurricane Sandy"...the aftermath

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 02:49:43 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Newspaper kiosks strewn everywhere.
10:30pm-1:30am
UWS, NYC 10/29/12

"Hurricane Sandy"...the aftermath

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 02:49:43 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

Useless umbrellas.
10:30pm-1:30am
Midtown, NYC 10/29/12

"Hurricane Sandy"...the aftermath

nobody@flickr.com (SardineTea) — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 02:49:47 -0700

SardineTea posted a photo:

View No. on Broadway.
10:30pm-1:30am
UWS, NYC 10/29/12