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Posts Tagged ‘Coney Island’

Lucille Fornasieri Gold’s Coney Island Photos from the 1970s

Posted in Photography, tagged 1970s, Chelsea Market, Coney Island, exhibition, Lucille Fornasieri-Gold on October 2, 2011| 3 Comments »

Shores of New York at Chelsea Market: Two Dog Taffy, Coney Island 1970s by Lucille Fornasieri-Gold. Installation photo by Amusing the Zillion

Passing through Chelsea Market last week, I happened to see the above photo of dogs napping in front of a Salt Water Taffy sign in 1970s Coney Island. Don’t know the dogs, but Philips Candy’s storefront is instantly recognizable and a delicious trip back in time for anyone who came and went to Coney via the old Stillwell Terminal. The image is part of “Shores of New York,” an exhibit of Lucille Fornasieri-Gold’s photographs of Coney Island, Brighton Beach, the Rockaways and other local seaside places in the 1970s and ’80s.

Shores of New York at Chelsea Market: Eating Under Handwriting, Coney Island 1970s by Lucille Fornasieri-Gold. Installation photo by Amusing the Zillion

Lucille Fornasieri-Gold’s Coney Island subjects include ticket sellers, musclemen, members of the Polar Bear Club and people hanging out in their favorite spot by the sea. The images also afford a glimpse of vanished attractions like the candy shop and a funhouse. “While I didn’t intend to document New York City, they allow us a comparison to today,” says the photographer, who is now 80.

Born in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, Fornasieri-Gold was first exposed to art through her father, a professor of architectural sculpture, according to her bio. “With the birth of her last child in 1969, she received her first camera and took pictures intensely for a ten-year period. In 2002 she retired to work only on her photography. She shoots frequently, and processes her negatives digitally.” Her photographs are in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn Historical Society and Brooklyn Public Library.

Shores of New York at Chelsea Market: Funhouse, Coney Island 1970s by Lucille Fornasieri-Gold. Installation photo by Amusing the Zillion

“Shores of New York,” Photographs by Lucille Foransieri-Gold, on view through ~~mid-October~~ October 6, 2011 at Chelsea Market, 75 Ninth Avenue, between 15th and 16th Streets, New York, NY 10011. Doors to the market are open Mon-Sat from 7am to 10pm, and Sun from 10am-8pm.

85th Birthday Party for Beloved Bartender at Ruby’s Bar

Posted in Events, Redevelopment, tagged birthday, Boardwalk, Coney Island, Coney Island 8, last call, Last Hurrah, party, Ruby's Bar on September 26, 2011| 2 Comments »

Sammy Rodriguez at Ruby's Bar, Coney Island. June 20, 2007. Photo © Kevin C Downs Photography

Last week a friend sent us this invite to Sammy Rodriguez’s 85th birthday party to be held on October 1st at Ruby’s Bar and Grill. Coney Island’s beloved dive bar, which will close forever at the end of October, is throwing a birthday bash for its beloved longtime bartender.

With all the changes the past few years it has been a while since we have all been out on a weekend and hung out for a few together. So let’s have a last gathering party with everyone ON SAM”S BIRTHDAY! This is our final year so — ONE LAST BIG HURRAH IS IN ORDER!!!!!!

Sat. Oct 1st 2pm til ???

This is a celebration for Sam and Ruby’s and the years they have had together in Coney. This is not a Save Coney Party or a Media party, this is a party of friends/summer family to celebrate our memories with Sam and Ruby’s.

Sam came from Puerto Rico and worked as a porter, fry cook and bartender in Coney Island for six decades. The story goes that he had a job at the spot “under the boardwalk” before Ruby Jacobs bought the place and kept him on. As one of my friends says, “He helped create Ruby’s as we know it.” Sam’s birthday is October 1st, which this year of all years luckily happens to fall on a weekend. Since he retired five years ago, it’s become a tradition for Sam to come up from Puerto Rico to celebrate his birthday at Ruby’s. We’ll be there to wish him a happy 85th birthday and many more to come, but the sad fact is it may be the last time for this get-together. Will Sam and friends make the trip to Coney Island once Ruby’s is gone? More than 450 attended the big bash when Sam turned 80.

Last call at Ruby’s Bar will be on ~~Saturday, October 29~~ Sunday, October 30, 2011. Along with seven other Mom-and-Pop businesses, including Paul’s Daughter and the Suh family’s souvenir shop next door, Ruby’s was kicked to the curb by New York City’s Economic Development Corporation and Zamperla’s Central Amusement International to make way for a corporatized, gentrified Boardwalk. This is of course last year’s news (“Out With the Old in Coney Island: Only 2 of 11 Boardwalk Businesses Invited Back,” ATZ, November 1, 2010). As Valerio Ferrari, CEO of Zamperla USA/CAI told us that day: “They didn’t have the vision that we have for the Boardwalk. It’s a business decision.”

What else is there to say? Come out on October 1st and October 29th, and anytime in between to raise a glass to Sammy and Ruby’s and yes, sentimentality –a word that is not in the playbook of the powers that be. On New Year’s Day and Opening Day, we’ll especially miss our old friends. Ironically, these small, family-owned businesses on the Boardwalk managed to keep Coney Island alive and thriving through tough times, even when real estate speculator Joe Sitt was their landlord. It was only after the Bloomberg administration “saved” the People’s Playground by buying the property from Sitt for an astounding $95.7 million dollars of taxpayer money that the Mom-and-Pops got evicted en masse. This is just wrong.

Ruby's, Coney Island. May 28, 2010. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i

Photography: Floating Above the Coney Island Boardwalk

Posted in Events, Photography, tagged ClampArt, Coney Island, New York City, Stephen Wilkes on September 7, 2011| 4 Comments »

On a sunny Saturday in July, we noticed a photographer with a large format camera perched in a cherry picker above the Boardwalk at West 12th Street. The Coney Island Rumor Mill had no idea what the photo shoot was for, but it was an unusual sight and we snapped a few photos. Our first guess was that Google had sent someone to do panoramic photos of Coney Island, but as the hours went by it became clear he was shooting from a fixed perspective all day and into the night.

Yesterday we realized the mystery photographer was Stephen Wilkes after coming across his stunning “Day to Night” photo of Coney Island’s beach, boardwalk and amusement rides. “That was indeed me in the cherry picker on July 16th,” wrote Wilkes in an email. “A perfect Saturday on Coney Island.”

Wilkes says that he photographs a scene continuously for up to 15 hours. “A select group of images are then digitally blended into one photograph, capturing the changing of time in a single frame.” In regard to the Coney Island photo, Wilkes told ATZ: “We will be launching a really cool time lapse video from that particular shoot, which will also be in the gallery exhibition.” The “Day to Night” series includes images of Times Square, the High Line and Central Park, among others, and will be on view at ClampArt Gallery in Chelsea from September 8 through October 29.

In an interview with Jen Doll in the Village Voice, Wilkes said his favorite photo of the series is the one of Coney Island:

The perspective is from floating above the boardwalk. The amusement park is night, the beach is day, and it’s full of activity. The level of detail — I’m working with a large-format camera, and it’s exciting that people can see the detail online, but in person, you can see it 60 inches big, and the photos look like windows, and you can actually see into people’s windows…

“Stephen Wilkes: Day to Night,” September 8-October 29, 2011. ClampArt, 521-531 West 25th Street, Ground Floor, New York, NY 10001, 646-230-0020. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 11-6. Opening reception: Thursday, September 8, 6-8pm