nonsite

Kirby Dick and went to New York to stay in the NSCAD loft over the Christmas holidays in 1975/76. We flew out on December 26th and got caught in a whiteout that shut down all the east coast airports and our flight had to turn and go back to Halifax after circling Kennedy. We were on the same flight as Richards Jarden and his wife Marcia and so we ended up going to their place and played Monopoly while we waited for Air Canada to phone and tell us when our flight was leaving again. We flew out later that day into Boston and then flew on to Manhattan at 8am the next day.

The NSCAD loft was in a four story building owned by David Rabinowich and his bother Royden and Carole Conde and Carl Beveridge, on East 1st near the Bowery. NSCAD had the top floor. It was a rough open space with a few foamies for sleeping. Robin Peck had been there in the fall and had left some of his stone carver carved pediments. Kirby and I were there for a week over that Christmas break.

I remember eating potato latkes and knishes at the local Jewish delicatessen on the Bowery. That part of New York was rough is those days. There was a overall atmosphere of poverty and weariness. We knew to move through the streets with purpose. It was cold.

I don’t remember what was on in the galleries in Soho, but I remember spending a lot of time at Jaap Reitman’s bookstore on the second floor of Spring and West Broadway. I was working for the NSCAD Press by that time and Jaap Reitman’s bookstore was the definitive contemporary art bookstore.  I wanted to make artist books.

Patti Smith had just released Horses, her first album with the Robert Maplethorpe cover. She was paying at the Bottom Line on the Village. There was a feature on her in the Village Voice and we got tickets. It was still the same club from the folk days in the ’60s and an amazing concert- electric. I can’t remember the songlist although I listened to that album endlessly over the next few years. John Cale came on stage and played bass for the encore- they did Gloria.

My only other vivid memory was Times Square to New Years!

We decided late that we would go to Times Square to celebrate New Years 1976. We caught he subway around 11:30 and headed uptown. Everyone was going tot he same place- 42nd Street/ Times Square. We got off around 11:50 and ran through the Times Square underground to get out on the street just before midnight. Thousands and thousands of people, hugging and kissing- it was  very exciting to be a part of that human experience. There was an amazing air of optimism. I was just about to turn 25 six days later.