Living in place

Surrounded by Alberto Rey's Biological Regionalism, Trout, Catskills, series, I am permeated with the idea of living in place, so much so that I need to adopt/steal the concept for this gallery as a whole. Indeed, if each of our artists did not live in the place of their light, subject matter, intellect, technique and emotion, the work on these walls would not sing true (and would not be so highly sought after, by collectors and museums, alike). For the artists at Chace-Randall, however, it is bigger than the Catskills. Our street photographers, Keith Cardwell and Ira McCrudden, for example, could not render--what did Vince Aletti say about McCrudden: worthy of Lisette Model...?--such brilliance without living in place, be it Havana, Cuba, NYC or Hong Kong.

Living in the place of my tiny garden today, digging at the nondescript bush that had to go (I have poppies and want more flowers in my only spot in the sun), I fell back, for a moment, into living in my so different place of 20 years ago. I loosened the bush, and tied it to the tow bar on my Volvo. I pulled it across the street. A NYC firefighter watched the rope break. He dug for me: Tom, now retired to Margaretville.

Tom retired from the 25 ladder truck, W. 77th Street, where my children slid the pole, set the siren, and whirled with the lights within the firehouse. I had a school girl's crush on one of the men. "Dead," Tom told me: World Trade Center.

I moved to another place momentarily. I watched the towers fall and remembered my flight to the mountains. Yet, this living in place, always mindful of past places, builds. It allowed me to build this gallery.

I still mourn the lives lost.