The Girl in the Zigzag Dress

Part One: A Decisive Moment

When choosing topics to write about for this blog, my ideas come from various sources.  Sometimes there’s an idea that’s interested me for a long time and I think about it for months before I write about it.  Sometimes I find an idea and write the post quickly.  I choose the topics, they don’t choose me.  That was not the case for this post, however.   One unexpected image, found at a time I was not expecting it, catapulted me into months of research and discovery that now culminate here.   To begin, some background is in order.

My own artwork requires me to research art history quite frequently, so that’s where this post begins.  I was at my campus library, researching a topic completely unrelated to what I’m discussing here.  Specifically, I was researching the infamous Terracotta Warriors that were once believed to be stellar examples of ancient Etruscan art.  It turned out they were forgeries, though, and the case gave the Metropolitan Museum of Art (who bought them believing them to be authentic) a curatorial black eye.  I was hunting through old books looking for color photos of the sculptures, focusing on books about the Metropolitan Museum’s collection.  I was having no luck when I saw Thomas Hoving’s Making the Mummies Dance on the library shelf.

Hoving was the Met’s outspoken director for many years, and he also wrote an excellent book on art forgery called False Impressions, so I knew he was well versed in the Etruscan warrior case.  Even though Mummies is more about his time running the Met in the 60s and 70s (the sculptures had been exposed as forgeries years earlier) I figured it was worth a shot.  I quickly flipped through the photos included in the middle of the text and saw a picture that literally stopped me in my tracks.  All thoughts of forged antiquities evaporated as I glimpsed a shockingly familiar face in a grainy photo.  My immediate reaction was “I know that woman”.  The photo in question (reproduced below) was taken by Leonard Freed:

I was not able to find a clear reproduction, but even at this resolution the dress in pretty distinct.

The reproduction was of low quality but there was no mistaking that I had seen her (and her zigzag dress) before.  Not in a vague, half-remembered sort of way, either.  I could remember exactly where and when I had first seen her.  Namely, here:

 This photo is by Garry Winogrand and clearly shows the same woman wearing the same dress (the same man is next to her in both photos too, by the way). It was taken during the Centennial Ball held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (it’s one of several photos from that event that Winogrand made).  The photo has gone by different titles (from the descriptive Centennial Ball, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, to simply Untitled), but almost every source I found, both in print and on-line, date the picture to 1969 (something I take issue with, but more on that later in the post).

Keep reading after the jump

Modernist Playgrounds of my Youth, Part 2

In my previous post (it’s been a while, I know) I started discussing the design of playground equipment of the past.  Specifically, I was thinking about the large concrete turtle that was a fixture in many playgrounds across the U.S. throughout the 50s, 60s, and 70s.  Manufactured by a company called Creative Playthings, the turtle was just one of several playground elements I remember from my childhood.  All of these things, I discovered while researching this article, were made by the same company.

The playground I specifically reference here was the Hilery Park playground in South Buffalo, New York, but I suspect there were dozens, if not hundreds, of playgrounds across the country stocked with Creative Playthings items.  Since they were all made of concrete (seen as unsafe nowadays) many of these amazing mid-century designs have been torn down and replaced with presumably safer (but definitely blander) playground equipment.  Finding evidence of its existence is hard, and that’s probably most evident with the playground construction known as the Fantastic Village.

Before delving into the Fantastic Village, however, a short history of Creative Playthings will help to establish their artistic pedigree.  It was a company invested in art and design as much as childhood development.  (I must start by giving credit where credit is due.  Much of the info I was able to find on the company came from the article entitled “Creative Playthings: Educational Toys and Postwar American Culture” by Amy F. Ogata.  Read the original here).  The company was started by Frank and Theresa Caplan.  Frank Caplan was an educator who truly believed that toys could stimulate childhood development and imagination.  Creative Playthings creations were intentionally stark and non-specific.  This helped spark creativity in a child’s developing mind.  One of the company’s first mass-produced products were a set of simple hollow wooden blocks.  These could be stacked and arranged any way the child chose.  They were fort, dollhouse, and bookcase all in one.  Really, they could be anything the child wanted them to be.  They also epitomized the simple and elegant designs of the company.  Just maple boxes open on one end, they were simple constructions that could become complex in the mind of the child playing with them. 

Virginia Dortch Dorazio

Caplan later started working with Victor D’Amico, who was in charge of educational programming at the Museum of Modern Art.  This partnership eventually led to the creation of the Fantastic Village.  In 1953, Creative Playthings, MoMA, and Parent’s Magazine co-sponsored a competition to find designs that met the company’s standards of inventive design paired with childhood stimulation and exercise.  The winner was a 28 year old painter named Virginia Dortch Dorazio (sometimes written D’Orazio).  Her design consisted of concrete-walled rooms punctuated with holes of varying sizes that could be used as windows, doorways, or climbing grips.  The structures were held together with metal bars that could also be used for climbing.  This was the Fantastic Village.  After winning the competition, Dorazio’s design was put into full production by Creative Playthings and featured in their catalogue.  Below are some photos I was able to find of the design.

What’s interesting looking at these photos is that the configuration of the rooms is different in every photo.  Like Caplan’s maple boxes that could be arranged in many different combinations, it seems that the Fantastic Village had no set plan or scheme for the pieces.  I was unable to discover whether Creative Playthings sent multiple installation ideas with the set, or whether it was up to the purchaser to set it up how they chose.  Regardless, it perfectly fit the company’s ideas on open-ended play.  The Fantastic Village could be a playhouse, fortress, or castle.  Unfortunately, I was only able to find black and white photos of the piece, and the Fantastic Village was definitely colored.  I remember the concrete was yellow, blue, red, and green.  Also unfortunate was that all of the photos I could find seem to be promotional photos sent out by the company to promote the product.  I couldn’t find any pictures of a Fantastic Village in situ.  I was certainly not able to find any contemporary photos of one.  I have no idea of how many were sold.  That’s sad because it leads me to believe that every one of the Fantastic Villages sold in the 50s and 60s has by now been torn down.   It’s possible that they now exist only in the memories of children (now adults) who played on them many years ago. 

Of course, when I was a child I had no idea I was playing on a piece of cutting edge mid-century modern design endorsed by one of the most famous museums in the world.  I didn’t know the name “Fantastic Village” either.  We called it the “Swiss Cheese”.  Design concerns and child psychology and development didn’t interest us.  It was just fun.  Perhaps it also helped me become a more creative person.  As is turn out, I was being influenced by artists even before I truly know what art was. 

Next time, a new topic.  It may be something you've never heard of.

Modernist Playgrounds of My Youth, Part 1

As the upcoming holiday weekend approaches and the weather gets hot, I’m spending more time outside.  Now I’m mostly working around my house, but when I was younger the warmer summer months meant playing outside.  Playgrounds and play areas for kids are different from when I was growing up in the late 70s and early 80s, and I wanted to take some time to examine those differences by investigating one of the playgrounds I frequented as a child.  My research into the topic yielded more information than I expected, and I realized that as a child I was playing on important modernist designs (now lost, in more ways than one).

I’ll begin with a short explanation of how I got to this topic in the first place.   I started by trying to remember details of a playground I went to as a child.  The Hilery Park Playground in South Buffalo is not one of Buffalo’s most well-known parks (Frederick Law Olmstead’s much more respected Cazenovia Park is just a few blocks away).  It’s really just a glorified school playground, attached to the Hilery Park Academy (known as Public School 27 when I was a kid).  Thinking back, it really epitomizes the differences in children’s play spaces then and now.  Today safety is rightly a major concern.  Playgrounds are built on grass or mulch, and plastic is used for much of the construction.  The Hilery Park playground in the 70s was very different.  All of the play sculptures there were concrete, and everything was built over asphalt.  There weren’t many trees for shade.  This may seem strange to parents today, but I never felt at risk there.  Even though everything was made of rough concrete that got constantly blasted by the sun, I have only good memories of the place.  The hardness of the playground must not have concerned my mother much either, since she took me and my siblings there all the time.  I think safety concerns have trumped originality as of late, and all playgrounds today really look the same.  Spiral slides, a rock climbing wall, maybe some elevated walkways and passages are the norm.  Hilery Park stood out to me (even as a child) because it was different and special.  My research revealed to my how special it once was.

Sadly, the turtle I played on as a child was not built over sand.

What really started me down this path was researching one of the playground’s features.  I remembered that there were large concrete turtles that once stood there.  These turtles (there were two of them I think) could be climbed on or crawled under.  Doing a little digging on-line revealed that these turtles were popular across the country, and many are still left.  Those that are still in existence have at times been the focus of preservation efforts, so I’m not the only one who fondly remembers these rounded green beasts.  I won’t go into their history too much here, since they are much loved and there are several websites that track their history and locations throughout the US (including this map, which documents many existing and lost turtles.  It’s incomplete, though- Hilery Park isn’t on the list). 

Page from 1956 catalog

I soon discovered that the turtles were designed and produced by a company called Creative Playthings, and they first appeared in the 1950s.  The website Mondo Blogo posted an entire catalog of the company’s products (view it here) dating from 1956.  The turtle play sculpture is featured prominently in the section on play sculptures, indicating that it was popular even then, while it was still in production.  As I scrolled through the pages of the catalog, I noticed not only the turtles, but other features of the Hilery Park playground were apparently sold by Creative Playthings as well.  Triangular ramps that I remember running on as a child were featured, as was a large fort-like construction called The Fantastic Village.   These were a part of my childhood memories as well, and I wasn’t expecting to find them.  (more on those play sculptures in my next post).

Reading through the catalog, I realized one of the things that truly makes writing this blog enjoyable.  It’s really a form on time travel.  Seeing all these play sculptures in the same catalog, and knowing that they once all graced the same playground, puts this catalog in the hands of a Buffalo city planner over 50 years ago.  I can start to understand the decisions that were made that would impact generations of children in South Buffalo.  The catalog I found record of was from 1956 (according to the poster) and I am guessing that the Hilery Park playground must have been supplied with the Creative Plaything products at or around that date.  I played on them as a child in the late 70s and early 80s, so for at least 30 years these objects were a part of the neighborhood’s fabric.  Will the generic metal and plastic playgrounds of today hold up for another 30 years?  Possibly, but they certainly won’t be remembered for their unique designs.

For my next post, I’ll explore the Fantastic Village; kid tested, MoMA approved.

A Tragic Day on Genesee Street

As I probably mentioned on this blog before, I’m a native of Buffalo, New York.  I still live there and I find the history of the city fascinating.  I love finding old photos of Buffalo, and I’m always pleasantly surprised when I find an old picture of Buffalo in a mainstream publication.  While looking through a book on photographic history not long ago I came across this photograph taken by I. Russell Sorgi.  Taken on May 7, 1942 and called Suicide (also referred to as Genesee Hotel Suicide or The Despondant Divorcee), it is a disturbing photo that captures an event that no one would voluntarily choose to witness:

A little background information might be useful before I go on.  The photo was taken in front of the Genesee Hotel that stood on the corner of Genesee and Pearl Streets in downtown Buffalo (more on the building a little later on).  It shows a woman named Mary Miller falling to her death after jumping from an eighth story window.  Captured just a fraction of a second before Miller’s violent end, the photo made headlines and became well-known nationally after it was reprinted in Life magazine a few weeks after the incident.  The photographer was I(gnatius) Russell Sorgi, a staff photographer for Buffalo’s Courier Express newspaper.  Sorgi happened to be close by when the events at the Genesee Hotel were unfolding, and he explained the origins of the photo afterwards:

“I snatched my camera from the car and took two quick shots as she seemed to hesitate…As quickly as possible I shoved the exposed film into the case and reached for a fresh holder.  I no sooner had pulled the slide out and got set for another shot than she waved to the crowd below and pushed herself into space.  Screams and shouts burst from the horrified onlookers as her body plummeted toward the street.  I took a firm grip on myself, waited until the woman passed the second or third story, and then shot.”

Reading the quote over 70 years after the fact, Sorgi’s account can seem a little callous.  His description of the event seems indifferent to the plight of Mary Miller, but his words really underscore the difference between photography then and now.  People in the 1940s owned cameras, but they were used for special occasions.  They would take their cameras on vacations or to birthday parties, but didn’t take them to work with them.  There were other witnesses to this particular event (a woman in uniform, believed by some to be a meter maid, is rushing into the building, and the waiter in the coffee shop seems aware of a commotion outside) but none of them would have had cameras with them.  Sorgi was perhaps the only person in the immediate area with a camera at the ready, and he realized that the picture he took was different than other crime photos of the day.  Since photography was a more complicated process back then (through Sorgi’s description you can tell that his camera was definitely not point-and-shoot) and most photos of crimes or tragedies were taken after the event had already occurred.  This photo is a great example:

That photo, taken after a train accident at Montparnasse Station in Parisin 1895, really illustrates how documentary photos worked back then.  Photo could be a time-consuming process and cameras were bulky, so they were often brought in to document the aftermath of an event.  In the above photo, the event had already happened.  This makes it no less disturbing, for sure, but by the time the photo was taken the train was essentially debris waiting to be cleaned up.  Sorgi captured Murray’s tragic suicide while it was happening.  Catching something like this (however gruesome) was extremely rare and Sorgi was literally in the right place at the right time. He knew capturing this moment in this way was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.   We tend to take photography for granted and treat it as something that everyone has access to.  A recent tragedy that really illustrates the difference between then and now is the Boston Marathon bombing.  Literally hundreds of people were recording the finish line before and after the attack, creating an almost continuous record of the bombing and its aftermath.  Sorgi’s words may seem seem a little harsh, but perhaps we can forgive him a little for realizing that he was both witness to, and sole recorder of, a tragic event.

After discovering the photo, I was interested in finding out where it had taken place.  The sign for the Genesee Hotel is clearly visible in the photo, and Genesee Street is a major street in downtown Buffalo (although it’s been altered quite a bit since the photo was taken).  There’s a major hotel there today (the Hyatt) and I assumed that this is where the event had taken place.  But after studying the architecture of the Hyatt (originally called the Genesee Building) I know that wasn’t the place.  The first floors of the Hyatt are glass and bronze, not the brick and concrete visible in the Sorgi photo.  After doing a little digging I found this postcard reproduced on the Buffalo Police Department website:

Arrow added by the Buffalo Police Department

That image shows a building attached to the Buffalo YMCA building (on the left) that matches the lower floors of the building visible in the Sorgi photo.  There’s a ledge at the eighth floor (Miller was described as jumping from an eighth story ledge) and a different photo taken after Sorgi’s clearly shows the YMCA in the background.

I was able to find another old photo that shows where the building stood in relation to the surrounding buildings, some of which are still there.

This photo shows the Genesee Building (now the Buffalo Hyatt) on the right, the white Victor and Co. building in the center (since demolished) and the Genesee Hotel to the left (outlined in red).

The building doesn’t exist anymore.  The most recent photo I was able to find of the old Genesee Hotel (that was later used as the YMCA Men’s Hotel) was from 1978.  It looks as if the building is in the early stages of demolition here:

The low building blocking the YMCA is the Buffalo Convention Center.  The entrance to the Genesee Hotel (at this point the YMCA Men's Hotel) seems partially boarded up.

I visited the site recently and it’s changed quite a bit.  The YMCA is still there, but the grand entrance that once faced Genesee Street is now found crammed into an alley.  Genesee Street was removed during the construction of the much-maligned Buffalo Convention Center, and the north entrances to the convention center now sit where Genesee Street once did.  The spot where the Genesee Hotel stood it now occupied by a modern office building and courtyard, and it’s hard to get a sense of where exactly the tragedy took place.  The sidewalk has been widened, and the removal of Genesee Street (which ran diagonally across Pearl Street) makes it hard to get a sense of how the building sat in relation to the street. 

The once grand entrance to the YMCA is now banished to a narrow alley

The entrance to the Genesee Hotel visible in Sorgi's photo stood roughly where this courtyard is now.

 

The Genesee Hotel stood to the right from this viewpoint.  The elevated walkway to the left connects the Convention Center to the Hyatt across the street

This isn't and exact side-by-side comparison, but it really shows how much the street has changed since 1942.

We tend to take photos of every moment of our lives now.  New technology is being developed that will actually take photos of our surroundings constantly, so we never have to miss anything.  The problem with that is that most of our lives are pretty ordinary.  It’s the rare and special moments in our lives that we want to remember, and that’s what photo used to be saved for.  You brought out the camera to commemorate those special times.  Sorgi’s photo functions in that way too, but on a much darker scale.  Tragic moments in life occur as well, and sometimes these moments are over in an instant.  When captured at just the right time, they can serve as horrifying reminders of tragedy and loss.

Next time, a new (and hopefully happier) topic.  It might be something you've never heard of.

Montreal's Fleur de Lys Theare; Post Script

Wow.  I received quite a response for my last series of posts that I wasn't really expecting (but was definitely welcome).  This blog is still new and this was my first experience with crowd sourcing my research.  Normally when I begin one of my posts, I know at least a little bit about the topic I'm writing about, and have the basic facts straight.  In this case, I was missing the artist altogether.  Readers in Montreal found the story and ran with it, as the saying goes.  I still don't have a name, but I'm closer to the truth and have the on-line community to thank (read my previous post here and here and here).

Special thanks are due to Jim Forbes and Dominic Gascon.  Mr. Forbes commented on my post last week and identified himself as someone who worked on the building in the past.  He gave me quite a bit of useful information (more on that below).  Mr. Gascon is a current employee at Stereo Nightclub (the building's current tenant) and he posed my question to social media, generating dozens of comments and guesses in the process.  

Apparently the building is German in origin (not Canadian as I originally assumed).  According to Mr. Forbes, the mural was designed in Germany and meant to invoke Haida imagery.  The forms on the facade of the Fleur de Lys really don't capture the spirit of Haida art, but that can probably be expected from an artist working in another country, and not really fully aware of the iconography they're working with (or the region, Haida art originates in Western Canada).  I've got some good leads to go on, and once I can name a specific architectural firm or artist, I'll post an update (and perhaps be able to find another building designed by the same architect).

A true example of Haida art, much different than what appears on the Fleur de Lys

Thanks again to everyone who contributed to my search or just took a little time to think about something they might not have noticed in the past.  It is through you that the history of this building, as well as the history of Montreal, lives on.

Montreal's Fleur de Lys Theater, part 3

As I continue to search for the specific architect/artist who designed Montreal’s Fleur de Lys cinema, I continue to come up against dead ends.  Simple Google searches didn’t get me far, and I have only been able to find brief references through other sources.  I studied nearby architecture built around the same time, and that didn’t yield any results either.  I had been pointed in the direction of Montreal’s Place des Arts, but the architects who designed those various buildings didn’t seem like a stylistic match to the concrete frieze that decorates the Fleur de Lys.  I thought the next logical step would be to study the artists and sculptors whose work is displayed throughout the complex.  Perhaps that would lead to a solution.

"I will haunt you in your dreams" -Montreal's Fleur de Lys Cinema

 

I’ve sort of been doing this since this research began, really.  I couldn’t put an artist’s name to the Fleur de Lys decoration, so I tried researching artists who were working at the same time the cinema was built (the late 60s).  I might be able to find an artist working in the same style.  Because of the World’s Fair held in Montreal in 1967 (Expo 67) the city was overflowing with public art and monuments, and the task wouldn’t be easy.

I was able to find several artists who share stylistic elements with the frieze, but none seemed to be a good match.  Some of the artists I researched included:

Jordi Bonet

Bonet seemed promising for a while.  He produced large amounts of public art throughout Montreal (including a mural at the Place des Arts) and much of it takes the form of murals made out of various materials including concrete, ceramic, and metal.  But, his work doesn’t look exactly like what’s on the side of the Fleur de Lys.  Bonet’s work is often much more detailed and can tell a much more recognizable story (he created a lot of Christian-themed murals for churches).   I also discovered a fairly comprehensive list of Bonet’s work on the web, and the Fleur de Lys theater wasn’t part of it.  Strike one.

A Jordi Bonet mural

Charles Daudelin

Like Bonet, Daudelin also created several public art pieces that can be found all over Montreal (both artists created pieces for the city’s Metro system).  They were also both well-established artists in the late 60s.  A Daudelin sculpture is placed in the lobby of the Theatre Maisonneuve at the Place des Arts, and like much of Daudelin’s art it is composed of abstract forms that can vaguely resemble human or animal forms.  There seemed to be a slight connection to the Fleur de Lys mural, but just like with Bonet, the differences outweighed the similarities.  Daudelin was also fairly well established at the time, and I could find no documentation that listed the Fleur de Lys frieze as one of his artworks.  Strike two.

 

A free-standing Daudelin sculpture

 Sorel Etrog

Of all the artists I researched trying to find answers for this post, Etrog seemed to get me the closest.  His work is somewhat biomorphic, he was active in the 1960s, and would occasionally create murals or relief sculptures (although most of what I saw consisted of free-standing sculptures).  But, like with all the artists I researched, I was able to find no documentation linking Etrog to the sculpture in question.  Strike three (really something like strike 27 at this point – I have researched so many artists at this point I’ve lost count.  These three were just the closest matches I found).

Two figures by Etrog

So I must end this series of posts with a question mark.  I hate loose ends, but I’m afraid I must move on for the sake of my precious sanity.  I’ve wrapped my head around this thing dozens of different ways over the last few weeks and really feel I need to turn my attention to new things.  At least for now.  My research will continue, but in the background.  There are still some resources that I can turn to, and I'll post an update if I can ever find more specific information.  

At this point, one may ask why I even care.  The building and its decorated frieze obviously aren’t important enough to garner much attention, and thousands of people probably walk by everyday and don’t even bother looking up.  But it’s there just the same, and there are people who do care.  As an artist myself, I know how much time and energy goes into the creation of a work of art.  This piece was made by someone, and the last thing this artist wanted was to be forgotten.  

Next time, I (reluctantly) move on to a new topic.  It might be something you've never heard of.