What The Dilly-Tante
OCTOBER 18, 2009
Deborah and I made the mistake of driving at rush hour in the rain to Dieu Donne in Midtown Manhattan for an art opening by our friend EV Day. After driving around in circles for what seemed like hours, cursing the traffic, arguing about where to park, we finally settled on a lot near the gallery that charged $20 for two hours. Oh well, we said, it would’ve cost a combined nine dollars for us to take our usual bus/subway combo into Manhattan and we would’ve had to stand around in the cold rain, waiting for the bus, so what the hell.
I’d never heard of Dieu Donne and went online ahead of time to read about it. “Founded in 1976, Dieu Donné Papermill is a non-profit artist workspace dedicated to the creation, promotion, and preservation of contemporary art in the hand paper-making process. In support of this mission, Dieu Donné collaborates with artists and partners with the professional visual arts community.”
EV was showing a selection of work that she made during a Lab Grant residency there — “vibrant pieces created using an innovative technique of embossing pigmented fishnets into thick casting paper pulp.”
I found the pieces fascinating and was equally fascinated by the facilities — giant mixing bowls, paper presses, and drying racks. EV told us about putting shredded fabric into the mixing bowls to make pulp. “It’s great,” she said, “You could put a whole dress in there if you wanted to.”
“What’s the deal with this place?” I said. “Do they offer classes?”
She said they did, and she introduced me to a woman who then handed me a class schedule. “Are you an artist, too?” the woman asked.
“Yes,” I said, scanning the schedule for prices.
“What sort of things do you do? What kinds of media do you work in?”
My brain futzed and fizzled for a moment. I panicked and said, “I’m what you call a dilettante.”
She laughed. “Well, that’s an honest answer.”
I put the class schedule in my back pocket, both literally and figuratively, knowing that’s probably where it will stay. It does sound fun, though. Reminds me of art school, where my career as a dilettante first began.
I had a very difficult time deciding on a major. RISD offered a lot of interesting programs and I wanted to take advantage of all of it. Four years just wasn’t enough time. Painting, Photography, Film/Video, I even considered Graphic Design. A lot has happened in the world of Graphic Design since then, and these days it doesn’t sound so far-fetched, but at the time it was a rather staid and stodgy program, and my freshman advisor didn’t think it was a good fit. “Graphic Design?” he said, “Really? No.”
“I dunno.”
“Who’s your favorite graphic designer?” he said, knowing I wouldn’t be able to name any. I thought for a minute before answering: “Andy Warhol.”
He convinced me that Illustration was a better bet because it was the most all-encompassing department, offering classes in all of it: Painting, Drawing, Animation, Photography, and so on. As it turned out, my senior thesis consisted of designing fabric (in collaboration with my girlfriend at the time, who was an Apparel Design major.) “Illustrated Fabrics” is how I sold the idea to my Department Head, who, despite the department’s broad scope, would’ve rather my thesis involve paint and paper. I remember presenting the final pieces to three Illustration professors for a final critique, and although they passed me, none of them had any idea how to approach the work or what to say about it. Seems silly in retrospect.
“You should’ve presented this for your Senior Thesis,” the head of the Illustration Department said to me at an end-of-the-year student exhibition where I was showing, among other things, three-dimensional mixed-media photographic constructions. “I like this stuff.”
The pieces were from an Independent Study with my photography professor, Henry Horenstein. It was funny to me that the Department Head found the constructions so much easier to swallow than the “Illustrated Fabrics” because, although the constructions consisted of photographs, they were perverted way beyond any classical sense of the word and during the Independent Study Henry Horenstein’s reaction to the work had been much like the Department Head’s reaction to the fabric. That is: “I don’t quite know how to critique this.”
That’s not to say Henry didn’t like the work, but we probably spent as much time at our periodic meetings talking about Henry’s work as my own, which was fine with me since I probably learned as much, if not more, that way, anyway.
After graduating, I stayed in touch with Henry, and he continued to be supportive, answering letters I’d send him from New York — a little fish drowning in a massive ocean — with words of encouragement. At the time, a simple “Hang in there” went a long way.
Occasionally, he’d come to New York and we’d grab a drink somewhere, to talk about photography, music, art, life, but slowly, as the years passed, we fell out of touch.
About two years ago, I sent him an email to tell him I’d recently purchased another copy of his popular instruction manual, “Basic Black and White Photography,” to replace the one from college that was long gone. Continuing my pattern of unfocused dabbling, I began developing film in my bathtub again, and I needed to brush up on my technique. (Re-discovering the fun lasted about a month at best.) He wrote back, “Good to hear from you,” et cetera, and we traded a few messages back and forth before losing touch again. But last week, I received an invitation to an exhibition and book signing at Clic Gallery and Bookstore, where Henry was exhibiting photos and signing copies of his books. (He’s published a zillion of them.)
It was great to see him again and, after catching up, I decided to buy a copy of his book Honky Tonk, which features photos of Country Music performers and their fans taken between 1972 and 1981 (including a great one of Dolly Parton and, perhaps my favorite of the bunch, Waylon Jennings).
Before switching to photography, Henry had been a History major, and so, not surprisingly, the book works not just as a collection of stunning photographs, but as a history book, too, brilliantly capturing a fading era in a changing world. (Henry told us about his decision to switch from History to Photography. “Photography got me out of the library and out with the people,” he said. “And besides, a camera is a lot sexier, it got me more dates.”)
Deborah fell in love with Henry’s other featured book, Animalia, and decided we needed a copy of that, too.
We purchased the books and brought them to Henry to sign. “This one is mine said Deborah, meaning she wanted it inscribed to her alone.
“She’s hedging her bets in case of divorce,” I said.
“A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do,” said Henry.
When he finished signing Deborah’s book, I handed him mine. “You can sign this one to both of us,” I said. “I’m still a fool for love.”
