NYAB Event - “MUD OF MURK” Exhibition

“MUD OF MURK” Exhibition

3A Gallery

This event has ended.

I’ve known Asha Schechter since about 1991 and Patrick Jackson since about 2001. The three of us moved to New York in 2002 and lived in a carriage house across from Prospect Park Southwest. They had bedrooms on the third floor and I lived at the base of the stairs, on the second floor. My rent was slightly less. It worked out well, because I was a nightclub photographer working late and had the living room to myself during the day. Patrick had a studio at the Marie Walsh Sharpe Foundation and he let me use a wall to work on drawings. That was really cool of him. Asha worked at Jane Magazine as a photo editor and hooked me up with several freelance photo jobs. Sometimes I would go with a beauty editor to 34th Street or Bryant Park and ask random women if they had a pedicure, a tattoo, or a belly button piercing. I’d photograph them if they had one of these beauty trends. Sometimes we asked random people if they could point out who they thought was hot. I also photographed blind dates: there was one at a Mets game, another between Talib Kwali and Santi White, before she was Santogold. One photo job allowed me to pay an entire month’s rent. Jane Magazine went bankrupt, but it was a good run.

I recently introduced Asha and Patrick to Mieko, suggesting that they do a two-person show at 3A Gallery. Maybe this is a small way of returning their favors, but we’ll see how it goes. I don’t know too much about what they’re making for the show, but Asha has told me his video involves a barista championship, which sounds pretty incredible. I can relate since I was once a barista in Los Angeles, where both Patrick and Asha currently live and work. I often served coffee to Ryan Gosling.

Patrick emailed me this paragraph about his work: “I began these pieces by sitting at a large tray of clay and sculpting what came to mind. These final wall reliefs are casts of the originals, made of a reddish-brown plasticine often used in prototyping. So far, I’ve made twelve of these, and as they’ve grown in number I’ve come to see them as my subconscious iconography.”