El Bohio for Open House New York

Friends and neighbors,

El Bohio (formerly P.S.64) has been closed to the public for at least seven years now. In that time it's been landmarked, its terra cotta façade has been defaced and pigeons have moved in where artists, dancers and musicians once entertained audiences.

Open House New York for one weekend opens buildings and landmarks that are normally closed to the public. OHNY is looking for sites of architectural and historical significance to include in its weekend of public access.

I've suggested to OHNY that they ask Gregg Singer, the owner of former P.S.64, to open its doors so the public may once again see it. I doubt Mr. Singer will oblige them, but I believe he should be asked nonetheless.

Would you join me in recommending to Open House New York that the former P.S. 64 (El Bohio) be an Open House site? Let's raise the community voice together.

I think it's time that the public see how much damage has been done to the interior of the building. If Mr. Singer has protected the building from harm, as the landmark law requires, then he will have nothing to hide. If he has something to hide, he will find an excuse not to open the building.

We have a voice. Let's use it. Send a note to
info@ohny.org

For more info, visit their website
http://www.ohny.org/

The successes of elsewhere

Upright Citizens Brigade, presenting improvised comedy, will replace Pioneer Cinema at Two Boots. UCB cultivates new talent, providing experience and training as well as entertainment. It's applying for a beer & wine license.

In a neighborhood losing its performance spaces, UCB will serve the EV by preserving the Pioneer space as a theater. Entertainment thrives in a depression economy, especially affordable entertainment, and UCB shows, when not free, are only $5. Comedy, by nature subversive when not merely infantile, may hope to match a strand in the older East Village crazy fabric.

UCB has theaters in Los Angeles and in Chelsea (of all places); it is not a local outgrowth of the East Village. Its college-age singles inclinations, endorsed by the beer&wine license, may seem to have little relation to the kind of radical, experimental, countercultural, marginal theater most associated with the East Village. A bellwether of a new direction, a non local make-over, it's Comedy Central encamping in EV grounds once daunting with difference, fast turning harmlessly homogenous. UCB is setting up here in part because its audience is here.

Pioneer was closer to the historical local character. The neighborhood marginal alternative movie theater is an important element of EV's past and present, from the Charles in the 1960s to Cinema Classics until recently on 11th. Pioneer was a serious and significant contributor to that history.

Rents remain high here as EV arts struggle to stay where they are. I don't know how UCB will meld into the East Village arts scene, but its arrival signals a shift from a local, unique homegrown arts economy to economic dependence on the successes of elsewhere.

My friend and fellow community advocate Anna Sawaryn has an exhibit of her photography at the 4th Street Gallery, 67 East 4th Street.

Her technique is rare: she uses a pinhole box, not a camera. The resulting images are unique, haunting, immediate, timeless. Take a look at her image of St. Brigid's on her website and attached. Reception from 2-6. I'll be there around 4. Hope to see you --

Coney Island Through the Invisible Lens
February 2-15, 2008
The 4th Street Photo Gallery
67 East 4th Street
New York, New York 10003
Reception Sunday, February 3, 2-6pm

I am having an exhibit of limited-edition, original, color pinhole photographs. This is photography in it's simplest form, using a wooden box, NOT a camera. The box does not have a lens or automatic shutter. The exposure time ranges from several seconds up to a half hour. This gives the images an 'old world' almost ghostly, sometimes, distorted quality. Pinhole photography best captures the 'essence' of the subject being photographed.

I like to use pinhole photography to document places that are changing and are at risk of vanishing. These are my 'memories' of Coney Island and the East Village.

Anna Sawaryn

Gallery Hours Tuesday-Saturday 2-8 p.m.
Sunday by appointment call 212-673-1021

http://www.annasawaryn.com/

Documenting Loisaida since 1975

Marlis Momber
Umbrella House
21-23 Avenue C/Loisaida Avenue near Houston
Opening reception Feb 8, 6-10pm
Closing auction party Feb 16, 4-7pm

www.vivaloisaida.org