Category Archives: xcludefromhome

Manhattan’s Last Home for Artists Weathers Another Storm

Wikimedia photo

Excerpts from the article in Bedford and Bowery
by Sarah Krolewski
January 12, 2021

…“Westbeth was very concerned about everything” related to COVID-19, said Walter, a sentiment echoed by many other residents. “People here are vulnerable, but I feel very taken care of.”

Residents still stop for conversations with each other, standing six feet apart, and banter with staff at the front desk. Younger Westbethers feel compassion for their older counterparts, and disputes have died down. Most of the building’s usual events have moved online, attracting a steady stream of participants. Cominskie says he feels optimistic about the current board’s ability to meet future challenges. Westbeth appointed a new CEO, Ellen Salpeter, in 2019, a change that even long-time residents, accustomed to administrative shuffling, find promising. These are hazy signs that Westbeth may continue to survive, not fade away, and that it may at last be doing something right.”

” Months into the pandemic, masks are now mandatory in every part of Westbeth, and volunteers have continued to help the building’s most vulnerable residents with errands. The work of people like Dowling and Cominskie—a coterie of advocates fiercely committed to Westbeth—has helped to bring this community back from the brink.

“The collective energy of the building has been phenomenal,” said Cominskie, reached over the phone in October. “You’re going through this horrible period, and then somebody does something incredibly sweet—and you want to cry, it’s that wonderful.”

Even in the midst of so much grief and fear, Westbeth’s artists are continuing to make art, channeling these emotions into new and compelling work.”

““Our artists are the most important thing,” said Cominskie. “Without them, it’s just another apartment complex.”

Read the entire article which features interviews with Charles Seplowin, Karen Santry, Kate Walter, and George Cominskie.

“Our artists are the most important thing,” said Cominskie. “Without them, it’s just another apartment complex.”

Read the entire article which features interviews with George Cominskie, Karen Santry, Jack Dowling, Kate Walter and Charles Seplowin.
Bedfordl and Bowery about Westbeth

Debra Rapoport
A Chat with the Style Icon

Live from NYC
Enjoy a fresh start to the New Year with revolutionary fashion designer Debra Rapoport, Advanced Style icon, and wearable art innovator.

On Saturday, January 16th, 10:30 AM EST

A free event, but you must register:
GET TICKETS

Debra Rapoport represents the best of the Big Apple with her immense humor, vibrancy and eclectic style, and she’s brimming with wisdom to share. The first of our new monthly series – featuring conversations that inspire us to live bravely, aligned with our purpose and passions, and deep human connection. We will dive into her colorful world and the many lessons she can teach seekers and creatives.

If you are not in EST time zone, be sure to convert the time.

This is a free event, but your donations to Debra’s chosen charity – God’s Love We Deliver – are welcomed.
God’s Love We Deliver cooks and home-delivers nutritious, medically tailored meals for people too sick to shop or cook for themselves. To support the health of their clients, they also provide ongoing nutrition assessment, education, and counselling. God’s Love is a non-sectarian organization serving people in need and their children and caregivers.

What to expect
Listen to Debra’s stories of iconic style and playful exploration – from age 3 to 75!
A look at her hats, creative process and unique relationship to found objects.
Learn about her mantra – the 4Ts – to live a life that really matters.
Aging with attitude.
The environmental, social and political significance of her unique approach.

Lucille Rhodes’ film on Alice Neel at Met Museum with interview of filmmakers

Lucille Rhodes’ documentary on Alice Neel, portrait painter, owned by the Metropolitan Museum, is being featured online for the month of January as part of the Met 150 birthday celebration.

Watch free with the link below:

Lucille Rhodes on Alice Neel

A self-proclaimed “collector of souls,” the American painter Alice Neel (1900–1984) is known today for her powerful, psychologically rich portraiture. She depicted a wide range of subjects, from her family and friends to prominent critics, artists, activists, and strangers she met on the street. In this rarely seen documentary, Neel’s signature candor and wit are on full display. Providing a brief biographical sketch from her early marriage and the Great Depression through her later years in Spanish Harlem, the film also shows the artist at work on a portrait of Lucille Rhodes, who co-directed with Margaret Murphy. Excerpted from Rhodes and Murphy’s “They Are Their Own Gifts” (1978), a triptych of “film portraits” about women artists that also includes chapters on the poet and activist Muriel Rukeyser as well as the dancer and choreographer Anna Sokolow. Cinematography by the legendary Babette Mangolte.

PICTURING ALICE NEEL
Met Perspectives Interview with filmmakers Margaret Murphy and Lucille Rhodes by Met Museum on the making of the film.
https://www.metmuseum.org/perspectives

Lucille Rhodes chaired and taught film at C.W Post College (LIU) for 25 years. She has won awards internationally for her independent documentaries and produced films for Sesame Street and Bravo. As a film editor, she worked with Norman Mailer on Maidstone and on Peter Gimbel’s Blue Water, White Death. Her screenplay Nealy Hollow was invited to Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute thanks to residencies at the MacDowell Colony and Yaddo .She has filmed/lectured in China, Turkey, Israel, Finland and Mexico and served as a Fulbright Media Specialist in Latvia.

Prior to her career in film, she was Assistant Director of Visual Arts at the New York State Council on the Arts and Assistant Director of the Kentucky Arts Commission which she helped found. She has served on numerous documentary film juries including the Emmys.

Currently she is a juror for the Guanajuato International Film Festival, and is working with Photoshop on her cellphone photo archives.

Blood Drive
Westbeth Gallery

Healthy blood donors are urgently needed as local blood supply drops to dangerously low levels.

PLEASE JOIN US IN OUR EFFORTS TO SAVE LIVES.
DONATE BLOOD FOR THOSE WHO CANNOT.

Tuesday, January 12, 2021
1:00pm to 7:00 pm

Westbeth Gallery
57 Bethune Street, NYC, 10014
Main Gallery

Due to the current public health crisis and social distancing rules, DONORS MUST MAKE AN APPOINTMENT (walk-ins only if room capacity and appointment scheduling permits.)

CLICK HERE to schedule an appointment

For eligibility information visit Can I donate or call 800-688-0900

For those that are ineligible to donate please understand you can be supportive by asking others to donate for you

The Need is Constant in All Communities and Every Donation Can Save Three Lives!

Don’t forget to bring photo ID or NYBC donor card. Face covering is required before entering the blood drive. Eat well and drink plenty of fluids before donating.

We look forward to seeing you!

January is National Blood Donor Month

Haig Papazian
Safe Haven Residency
at Westbeth

Haig Papazian is a Lebanese Armenian artist, composer, and architect born in Beirut. He is a founding member and violinist Mashrou’ Leila, the Lebanese pop band whose electro-pop anthems about political freedoms, race, and modern Arabic identity have challenged the status quo of the Middle-Eastern music industry. Their politically-charged lyrics have led to the band experiencing censorship and persecution in many countries, brought on by religious and state authorities, as well as popular outcry. Many of the band’s appearances, including concerts and speaking engagements, have been forcibly canceled by the regulating authorities.

An architect by training, Haig has participated in the inaugural edition of the Home Workspace program in Beirut, and has completed his graduate studies in Architectural history at the Bartlett school of Architecture in London. Papazian’s visual work, which explores the intersections between city-making processes, cultural productions and undocumented historical narratives, has been shown in Sharjah at SB11 March Meeting 2013, at Homeworks 6 in Beirut, Videonale15 in Germany, and at Gallery Kit in Trondheim Academy of Fine Art, Norway.

Alongside Mashrou’ Leila, Haig has performed at sold out venues and festivals across the Arab region, Europe, and North America. He’s been an artist in residence at NYU; has campaigned with Greenpeace in an initiative to promote solar energy across the Mediterranean, and has participated in the BLOCK 9 & BANKSY Creative Retreat alongside Brian Eno, Roisin Murphy and more. He has held public talks at NYU, Columbia University, Concordia, Darmouth College, Sciences Po, and has recently performed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York as part of Oliver Beer’s Vessel Orchestra. Haig has recently published an op-Ed in the New York Times on the cost of being queer and Arab and for France Culture, a love letter in the form of an essay to “Beyrouth et Beyrouth, travail en cours.”

SHIM:NYC (“Safe Haven Incubator for Music NYC”) is a six month creative and professional residency and mentorship program for international musicians who are persecuted or censored for their work. Hosted at Westbeth Artists Housing, SHIM:NYC was launched by AFI and Tamizdat, and is part of our New York City Artist Safe Haven Residency Program. Haig will be the first SHIM:NYC musician-in-residence to benefit from our new partnership with New York Voices, a program of Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater.

New York Voices is the artist commissioning program of Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater. As part of The Public Theater’s long history of cultivating the country’s most celebrated artists, this program supports the creation of new works by critically-acclaimed musicians and performers.

New York Voices encourages artists to explore their storytelling, narratives and songwriting processes, and includes a variety of developmental and practical resources. Each commission culminates with a run of live shows on the Joe’s Pub stage. The program successfully connects artists with their contemporaries and significantly expands their ability to reach wider audiences. Many of the commissioned works have toured nationally and internationally. We are honored to welcome Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater and New York Voices to SHIM:NYC!

Susan Berger
Feminist Art Museum

FEMINIST ART MUSEUM

The Feminist Art Museum is a digital art Museum featuring the best in intersectional art. We showcase works that embrace the nuances of all feminisms. We aim to raise awareness of societal inequities and positive ways to disrupt them through visual art.

The exhibition is called: “PROTEST & PROTECT

The site is www.feministartmuseum.com

SUSAN BERGER

These works explore the interests of women in our society and how women sacrificed and had to take the abuses that came with their way.
Direct link is: feministartmuseum.com/#9 and then follows by arrow #10 and #11

“Let it be clear that our democracy is that fragile” 30″(w) x 20″(h)

“Judy Blume – Blubber Banned Books — OnCensorship” 18″(h) x 36″(w)

“Dignity of work: UAW on Strike- Women Protesting” 36″(w) x 36″(h)

Kate Walter
Middle Collegiate Church
Village Sun article

My beloved church burned down

Dec 11, 2020
By Kate Walter
As if this year could not get any worse, my house of worship burned down early Saturday morning, December 5. My friend who has the Citizen app texted, saying she hoped it was not my church. It was.

I started crying when I saw the videos of the flames roaring through the roof of Middle Collegiate Church on Second Avenue. I’ve been a member of Middle Church for 12 years.
I joined after I went through a devastating gay breakup. Attending services at Middle helped me rebuild my life and get back in touch with my spiritual side. I felt so calm in the sanctuary with its beautiful Tiffany stained-glass windows. The sanctuary was destroyed, all the windows blown out….

What always struck me about the congregation was its diversity. It is racially, ethnically, culturally and economically diverse. Someone wrote on Facebook that one time when she went to services at Middle Church, a homeless person sat to her left and a celebrity was on her right.

I think it’s fair to say there is no other congregation in New York City like Middle Collegiate Church. Its motto is “Welcoming, Artistic, Inclusive, Bold.” As a recovering Catholic, who fled a homophobic church, I felt at home and embraced.

Read the entire article published in The Village Sun HERE

Bob Gruen
Right Place Right Time

Cameras, Chaos And Cognac: How Bob Gruen Photographed The Spirit Of Rock ‘N’ Roll

December 8, 202012:24 PM ET
Heard on Fresh Air

“Photographer Bob Gruen spent decades capturing the lives and performances of rock stars of the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s, including John Lennon, the Rolling Stones, Chuck Berry, Tina Turner — and many more.

Gruen put in many hours backstage, in studios and on the road, sometimes doing drugs and drinking until dawn with his subjects.

“I carried a little flask of cognac in my camera case. It was part of my equipment. That’s the way it was in the ’70s,” he says. “I don’t know how I survived, because I crave peace and quiet — but I actually thrive in chaos.”

Gruen approached his subjects collaboratively, often soliciting their opinion about a photograph instead of trying to catch them off guard. He describes his work as an effort to capture the feeling and passion of music — not just the facts.

“For me, rock ‘n’ roll is all about freedom. It’s about the freedom to express your feelings very loudly in public,” he says. “I try to capture that moment of freedom, that moment when everybody’s yelling ‘Yay!’ and nobody’s thinking about paying the rent.”

-from Bob Gruen’s interview with David Davies
Transcript excerpt

For full transcript and to listen to broadcast, link to NPR Here

Bob Gruen interview