We Are Relocating!

Dear Followers and Fans,

This blog has moved from Blogger to join the Aficionado blog network, so please keep following me at

http://aficionado.co.za/editoratlarge/

I look forward to hearing from you over there. And you'll find me on Twitter @editoratlrg

Let me know what you think!

Love,

Nadine

Rolling, Williamsburg-Style

You may be in Brooklyn once you cross the Williamsburg Bridge from Clinton and Delancey to South 4th and Bedford, but this isn't kid-obsessed Park Slope, at least when it comes to the transport. Yesterday I happened past this Mini Cooper with its Austin Powers roof and one of the most hilarious personalized plates I've seen: "Diet SUV." Oh yeah, baby.

Stars and Stripes

It's Independence Day in the United States and that means that Stars and Stripes abound on everything from flags to patriotic pedicures. Even this fire hydrant got some love of country love...




Happy 4th!

The Art of Appropriating Andy Warhol: Q & A with Mike Bidlo

Last Thursday I met the artist Mike Bidlo in the lobby of the Lever House to discuss the latest addition to the building's art collection: His stack of "Not Warhol Brillo Boxes." Instead of the provocateur I was expecting, Bidlo was a soft-spoken intellectual who is more interesting in teaching others about the masters than criticizing them. Read all about it on T Magazine's "The Moment."

World Cup Mania at Monkeybiz

I love this amazing beaded Bafana Bafana soccer player, made for Monkeybiz by women in the townships of Langa, Nyanga and Gugulethu.

The height of the doll is almost one meter high (about 3ft).

If you want it, you'll find it the Carrol Boyes Store in the Waterfront in Cape Town.

I'm not convinced, though, that Monkeybiz should part with this museum-worthy piece too quickly...

Sag Harbor's Sustainable Living Emporium

Donna Karan's Urban Zen has some serious competition: Down the road on Main Street in Sag Harbor is Well Nest, a serene haven for cold-pressed juices, super vitamins, delicious mood-enhancing chocolates, terrariums filled with orchid plants and even wooden ipod covers. Basically, all things sustainable, especially if they're also chic.
I especially loved the Japanese recyclable picnic gear which includes square paper plates (genius) and wooden flatware that looks Victorian in design.

For more info head to 125 Main Street, Sag Harbor or www.wellnest.us

Most Wanted (even during World Cup): Jenny Holzer Tees

My interview with Jenny Holzer about her t-shirt intervention in Johannesburg and Soweto was published on T Magazine's web site (T, for those outside of the U.S. is the New York Times Style Magazine).

Have a read here.

And learn more about the In Context project, curated by Liza Essers the owner and director of the Goodman Gallery, here.

Essers had the following to add: “The Goodman gallery is committed to social responsibility. Hundreds of millions have been spent on soccer stadiums and we wanted Jenny's truisms on t-shirts -- not LED screens -- to highlight the very real issues and abject poverty surrounding them.”


If you're in Johannesburg on Thursday, head to Melrose Arch to watch the 90 minute film Zidane: A 21st-Century Portrait, by artists Philippe Parreno and Douglas Gordon, also part of Incontext. And look out for Kara Walker's films at the Apartheid Museum and Hank Willis Thomas's work on show at the Goodman Gallery space at Arts on Main and in Parkwood.

Missing Marina

New York is just not the same without the knowledge that Marina Abramovic is sitting serenely up at MoMA while we rush around her like chickens who have lost our heads. It's been a week since she moved out of the museum and I'm not sure if, without her unwavering gaze, we exist at all.



I went to MoMA to bid my farewell just four days before her vigil ended. And although photography wasn't permitted I snapped these two cheeky pics with my iphone. Hey, Peter Magubane used a milk carton and a loaf of bread when he had to.

Love Your Hair? Let the World Know

Kissa Thompson, the founder and creative director of Buttaflyunltd has made a t-shirt that tells it like it is.

It certainly inspired me to start thinking about going back to my naturally curly hair instead of throwing hundreds of dollars away on straightening treatments. Kissa's next move is to make her t-shirt in girls sizes and give talks on the importance of learning to love the hair you were born with. Hair, hear.

Calling all Renegade Crafters

McCarren Park in Williamsburg is a live manifestation of Etsy.com this weekend. If you missed the first day (today), you've still got all of tomorrow to catch up on some crafty finds.

Here, some items that made me smile.

1. Onesies by neighborhood. Babes who hail from the Jersey Shore, don't need to wait until they can walk to get ripped.

While Williamsburg tots get instant hipster mustache-cred. Go to www.handsomehoward.com for more info.

2. I have a serious soft spot for homemade dolls, especially when they come in all the same colors as real little girls.


4. Inknjoy's animated bracelets are so cute, I vote for an armful of friends who all look like they'd get on well with Daria.

A Not So Simple Salad

Caffe Falai on Lafayette Street in Soho is one of my favorite New York eateries. Today I tried a new salad there for the first time and fell head over heels for the presentation before I'd even tasted the delicious mix of trumpet, shitake and portobello mushrooms under that canopy of parmeggiano.

Street Boners: Having a laugh at your crazy get-ups

If you're a fan of The Sartorialist, you'll love Street Boners, a tongue-in-cheek version by Gavin McInnes, the former top dog at Vice. He has created an entire lexicon of looks from pocahipsters to the nerdy slut and rated them with a kitten rating system.
Read more about it here and here.

Jedis!

Last Saturday night, as we were walking home through the Lower East Side, we stumbled on a park filled with lightsaber wielding Jedis. I kid you not.
It was all the work of Newmindspace, the same masterminds behind International Pillow Fight Day. Read more about it here.

Summer Highs...and Lows

It's Memorial Day on Monday -- the official start of summer in America. And in New York, that means that more bikers will take advantage of the lovely warm weather and hit the streets and bike paths in the coming months.

There's one memento mori that always stops me in my tracks on the streets of Manhattan and Brooklyn. It looks like any other bicycle at first, tied to a street pole or bike rack, but on closer inspection one realizes that it has been crudely sprayed white and sometimes it has flowers on the handle bars and a note explaining that it stands there to mark the spot where a cyclist was killed.

They are called "Ghost Bikes" and described here as "quiet and somber memorials for bicyclists who are killed or hit on the street...They serve as reminders of the tragedy that took place on an otherwise anonymous street corner, and as quiet statements in support of cyclists' right to safe travel."

According to GhostBikes.org, these aren't a New York invention at all. "The first ghost bikes were created in St. Louis, Missouri in 2003, and they have since appeared in over 100 locations throughout the world. For those who create and install the memorials, the death of a fellow bicyclist hits home. We all travel the same unsafe streets and face the same risks; it could just as easily be any one of us." *Shiver*

Above, is a minimal ghost bike that I spotted just off the Williamsburg Bridge, a fantastic bike path between the Lower East Side and Williamsburg. It may not have a plaque or flowers, but it's a stark reminder, nonetheless.

Crying for Art's Sake

"Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present" is on at MoMA only until May 31. If you need any further inspiration to get there and sit with the artist, take a look at this blog called "Marina Abramovic Made Me Cry" featuring sitters who became emotional in her gaze.

Cuba on Her Mind

Mexican born photographer, Alinka Echeverria's sensitive work in progress is titled Cuba 1959: The Second Front. Echeverria (above), an ICP graduate, is concerned with collective memory. Editor At Large spotted her work yesterday in the Latin American Pavilion at the New York Photo Festival in Dumbo. For these portraits of men in their homes, she encourages veterans of the Cuban Revolution to reminisce. "The process of being photographed wearing their military uniforms and medals provoked in many an emotional journey into their past and created a space for self-reflection of their identity as veterans of a war that changed their nation forever," she writes. See her work below and here.

South Africa at the NY Photo Festival

Editor at Large went over to Dumbo to listen to Jodi Bieber talk about her new book on Soweto. It is quite an honor to be asked to give a talk at the festival and Bieber's work is certainly strong, interesting and even groundbreaking (though some photos made me think of Zwelethu Mthethwa's shack portraits and also of Lolo Veleko's "Smarties"). But we think Bieber could have been more prepared for the talk and more conscious of the fact that she was talking to Americans who have only the scantest knowledge of what life in South Africa was like during apartheid and what it's like now. For example, showing a photograph of black South Africans swimming in a public pool and commenting: "Before black people didn't swim," is not really enough information. Same goes for the amazing photo of the women with the boa constrictor wrapped around her body and the photo of the gay couple. Most speakers suffer from TMI (too much info). Bieber made us yearn to understand the context better and to know more.

Meanwhile, at the Tobacco Warehouse, I spotted the work of one South African photographer and one Swiss/Lebanese photographer who did a documentary in South Africa:

1. I loved Market Photo Workshop student, Simangele Kalisa's "Clothed" project. Kalisa grew up in Soweto. She says that she's using the title "Clothed" for a number of reasons. I like this one: "In most traditionally black Christian churches and movements in South Africa -- with most having their own uniform and therefore a particular semiotic system associated with dress and identity -- uniforms are called Izambatho (Zulu) or diaparo (Sotho) which translates into English simply as 'clothes'. Looking at the history of colonialism, and in particular how Africans were referred to as 'the naked'and colonisers 'the clothed,' it becomes apparent how identity can literally be fashioned by dress."




2. Mariella Furrer's hard-hitting black and white photographs document the realities of child sexual abuse beyond the headlines that are so hideous to read but also so easy to forget. "South Africa records one of the highest rates of child sexual abuse in the world," says her artist's statement. "Because the sexual abuse of children remains taboo, it is not spoken about openly and is, in a sense, invisible." This heartbreaking photo shows a child being examined for signs of abuse.

Pullino's Public Patio

Word on the Bowery is this: Pullino's, Keith McNally's new Nolita hotspot, opened its "patio" last night by placing chairs and tables on the sidewalk at the corner of Bowery and Houston. Thing is, that corner is extremely popular with hipsters, but also with the homeless. And, sure enough, a homeless man came around and began asking Pullino's patio patrons for donations. When a security guard asked him to move on, he became angry and began throwing his body against the nearby busstop. Needless to say, the two patrons he'd been plaguing decided against dessert and called for their check. Talk about a turf war!

Death for Dieters: Artisinal Ice Cream Truck

Van Leeuwen's artisinal ice cream truck is testing the willpower of New Yorkers from Williamsburg to the East Village. One source on the Lower East Side told Editor At Large: "Every night I come home and it's parked outside my apartment. It's ruining my diet!" Well, at least if said source does succumb, she should feel better about the fact that Van Leeuwen uses hormone-free milk in their flavors. Read more about them here.

Better than Magnolia: Butter Lane

Last night was a carb-fest: I cooked rigatoni with gorgonzola, artichoke hearts, asparagus and cream and my guests brought over organic cupcakes from Butter Lane in the East Village.

Seriously, if Carrie wasn't frozen in a certain New York minute, she'd dump Magnolia Bakery's overly sweet offerings in a heartbeat for these organic culinary orgasms.

Butter Lane owners Pam Nelson, Maria Baugh, and Linda Lea offer up frosting flavors like key lime, pumpkin, raspberry, or blueberry. We had popcorn flavor adorned with a couple of popped kernels, dark chocolate, chocolate with raspberry frosting (topped with a fresh raspberry), and vanilla with cherry frosting (crowned with a fresh cherry). I also hear that the banana cake with cream-cheese frosting and the grapefruit ginger is divine.

123 E. 7th St. (near Ave A)
Tel: 212-677-2880