20 year old, Albuquerque, New Mexico native, ZACH CONDON, now reputedly Brooklyn based, foreground, is BEIRUT, a 'one-man band' with a debut CD - that is a big Indie hit - Gulag Orkestar. at 16 he dropped out of school and travelled to Europe, where he first heard Balkan Gypsy music - the rest is history. He is the singer, lyricist and plays ukulele and horns. warming up with him, PAUL COLLINS, who plays keyboards as well as ukulele, in the BEIRUT tour band, just before an in-store concert at OTHER MUSIC, June 12, 2006

tour band musician, PAUL COLLINS (red shirt) with ZACH CONDON - who is BEIRUT (black shirt). most of the tour band musicians are from Santa Fe, meeting at the College of Santa Fe, New Mexico. BEIRUT in-store concert, OTHER MUSIC, June 12, 2006 - review of BEIRUT'S debut CD - Gulag Orkestar.

drummer - NICK PETREE, BEIRUT in-store concert, OTHER MUSIC, June 12, 2006

PERRIN CLOUTIER plays cello, horns & keyboards, BEIRUT in-store concert, OTHER MUSIC, June 12, 2006

KRISTIN FEREBEE plays violin, BEIRUT in-store concert, OTHER MUSIC, June 12, 2006

JASON, plays keyboards, as well as, is that a mandolin ? BEIRUT in-store concert, OTHER MUSIC, JUNE 12, 2006

ZACH CONDON, plays the (totally haunting) Balkan Gyspy Serb inspired horn refrains, from his debut Indie hit - Gulag Orkestar - BEIRUT in-store concert, OTHER MUSIC, June 12, 2006 - leaving high school at 16, & hitting the road to Europe - when he heard gypsy Balkan music coming from an apartment party - guess, he found - what had driven him to travel. he must have also touched base with Beirut, while it was still, just a few weeks ago, a renowned mideast playground, and burgeoning contemporary cultural scene - a kind of mideast 'Berlin' - instead of the current wartorn crossroads - Gulag Orkestar is melodic .. and resonant with passionate, sorrowful cultural roots, as opposed to strictly entertaining... though it is that too .. kind of music that sweeps you away ... in spite of where you might find yourself... & now in name, as well, now an ode to how destroyed our world is getting.. ..

ERIC SALL, with wife, sculptor Rachel Hayes, opens 'darkish', atm Gallery, June 1, 2006

ERIC SALL, 'Mt. Anomaly', oil on canvas, 96 x 78", 'darkish', atm Gallery, June 1, 2006

ERIC SALL, 'Futile Arch', oil on canvas, 48 x 33", 'darkish', atm Gallery, June 1, 2006

from left, Tooya and Leif Ritchey, and Leif's kid brother, Jack Ritchey at the ERIC SALL opening, 'darkish', atm Gallery, June 1, 2006 - word on the street, is that Leif and Tooya's Indie clothing line, leif and tooya is starting to do really well, they are also now represented by a big Indie designers' showcase, Soho based AGENT 011- Tooya is wearing one of their designs, the pink shirt.

Ports Bishop and girlfriend, Yu Yamaguchi. Ports is wearing a Leif Ritchey t-shirt. ERIC SALL opening, 'darkish', atm Gallery, June 1, 2006

graphic designer, Zee, with a photo realist tattoo of Buckminister Fuller, the hand waves as his neck moves. is that cool, or what. ERIC SALL opening, 'darkish', atm Gallery, June 1, 2006

close-up, Zee's photo realist tattoo of Buckminister Fuller, ERIC SALL opening, 'darkish', atm Gallery, June 1, 2006

real 'art stars' - from left, MICHAEL WILLIAMS, LEIF RITCHEY and JIM DRAIN, on 21st Street, Chelsea, June 1, 2006

PORTS BISHOP and JIM DRAIN - Jim was really sporting a mustache !!, 21st Street, Chelsea, June 1, 2006

... oh, oh, looks like Maura Haseltine (her dad, William Haseltine discovered the human genome) has found Alfredo Martinez, again. their last brief association, had disastrous results for both for them.. 21st St, Chelsea, June 1, 2006

RAMBO finds an abandoned 'love pool', a relic from the glory days of underground 'erotic/orgy/love' clubs - that were one of Chelsea's more notorious features, before the comparatively staid dance clubs and art galleries moved in. 21st St, Chelsea, June 1, 2006 - take that 'staid' word back !! - Chelsea's 27th Street has just been coined 'TEENAGE WASTELAND' - by the NYC tabloids - after the latest underage teen girl has been found in a dumpster, after a night of clubbing in Chelsea.. its equal opportunity gender disaster here - young men are getting maimed & killed by bouncers and violent confrontations, just as much as the girls are being picked off by violent sexual predators - our Chelsea is getting a bad name. too bad the galleries aren't hip enough to divert some of those booze $$ & raw energy towards art - the way TONY SHAFRAZI and KEITH HARING were able to attract the club kids, with such success, in the 80's.

RAMBO in the abandoned 'love' pool - you never know what's going to surface, in these huge industrial loft buildings as they get converted into highend condominiums, 21st St, Chelsea, June 1, 2006

the card for JUSTIN LOWE - 'HELTER SWELTER', an ambitious & hot, as in really hot & humid and steamy installation, and 'hot' as in, cool, wow and popular with alot of the in-crowd - running from June 1 - July 28, 2006, at OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY - it was a show that truly personified summer city heat - and as a creative powerhouse that coudln't be denied, garnished the whole gamut of reviews, from overwrought to completely wow!! - it was like a JEFFREY DEITCH installation on compression-steroids !

JUSTIN LOWE at the opening of 'HELTER SWELTER' - the small entry room of the gallery was meticulously transformed into a bodega, OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006 - adding to the 'heat' of the dense installation - intensified by the way, both this entry bodega and the 18 ft 'ice cream' truck re-constructed in the larger back room, were designed to go 'head-on' against the tight dynamics of the relatively small gallery - the actual night of the opening - was one, really, really, hot, humid 'sweltering' NYC - inner city night - for real !! it was hot in the gallery, and on the street, poeple, well, guys, had their shirts off.

entry bodega, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

this detailed bodega was crammed into a space that was barely big enough for one person to turn around in, yet had all the outfittings of an actual small sized shop. JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

entry bodega, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

entry bodega, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

real tabloid headlines of the day - what artist could ask for more - entry bodega, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE Gallery, June 1, 2006

one walked through the bodega into the interior of what was revealed to be, when you exited, (through that open door, above), into the gallery's back room, a 're-assembled' ice cream truck, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, JUNE 1, 2006 - P.S.> Jeffrey Deitch, look out! - your corporate branding's just been hi-jacked.

the re-assembled 18 foot KOOL MAN ICE CREAM TRUCK, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

if the fully realized mini-bodega and the 18 ft ice cream truck didn't do it - the detailing of the handcrafted floor - beneath the truck, and in fact, covering the entire back room, spelled it out: A-M-B-I-T-I-O-N .. in capital letters. JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006 - now, was it over-kill ?, or just really sock-it-to-them & blow them-away, in-your-face art, BIG PRODUCTION art ala BARRY McGEE ! - just we're not used to seeing this total gung-ho experience - in Chelsea where the style is usually quite under-the-wire and a little big A art dry- even in the galleries with bigger budgets. ... irregardless, the unexpected floor detail was gorgeous.

close-up, the floor beneath the KOOL MAN truck, seemingly made from lots and lots of thrift shop remnants, particularly crocheted and knitted goods. JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

the step-up into the KOOL MAN TRUCK, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006 - what does it say ....

ARUBA - ONE HAPPY ISLAND ... JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, JUNE 1, 2006 - someone ought to make a CHELSEA welcome mat - there could be 2 versions, 'WONDER THE WEST SIDE HIGHWAY AT YOUR OWN RISK' & 'BEWARE OF BOUNCER'.

inside the KOOL MAN truck, photographer JEN DeNIKE and artist/curator IZUMI CHIARALUCE, JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

inside the KOOL MAN truck, the man himself, OLIVER KAMM, opening night of: JUSTIN LOWE, 'HELTER SWELTER', OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

from left, artists: JONAH FREEMAN, JUSTIN LOWE, and JOHN TREMBLAY, at the opening of Justin Lowe's 'Helter Swelter', ... 'keeping it real', at OLIVER KAMM/5BE GALLERY, June 1, 2006

TYSON REEDER opens a show of new works at DANIEL REICH GALLERY, that ran from June 3 - July 1, 2006, opening June 3, 2006 - unlike the inner city heat & humidity of the OLIVER KAMM show, not only was Tyson's opening night, luckily for him, refreshingly cool & a little rainy, (note: everybody, including Tyson here, is wearing light weight jackets!) ... but the show itself .. had the ambience of a summer picnic on cool shady bank, where a canoe waits in a gently shimmering cold water creek, amid the summer haze.

'The Globe', 32 x 36", gouache, acrylic ballpoint pen and colored pencil on paper mounted on board, 2006 - in fact, Milwaukee based TYSON REEDER ... "has always used the inevitable run of paint on the surface of his work, evoking the persistent ebb and flow of tides on Lake Michigan on a rainy day, proposing that the landscape is an enduring vector for human life" - gallery press release. TYSON REEDER, DANIEL REICH GALLERY, June 3, 2006

summer heat, of a mid-Western nature radiates in this painting. 'Untitled', 2006, gouache, acrytlic, ballpoint pen, and colored pencil on paper mounted on board, 22 x 20" - TYSON REEDER, DANIEL REICH GALLERY, June 3, 2006

in retrospect, its almost otherworldly to reflect on how these 2 shows, JUSTIN LOWE'S 'HELTER SWELTER' & TYSON REEDER'S - with their differing 'worlds' of summer heat, had opening night weather conditions - that so completely mirrored the ambience/dynamic of their artwork. just goes to show, that, even in New York City - the huge competitive, hard marketing & bottom line, commercial hub of artistic endeavor - there is still a '5th element' to art - where magic and shamanistic vision .. apparently, can still make the physical world, resonant, as if on manmade cue, to the artist's creative vibe.

TYSON REEDER, 'Chief Shu'nuni'u', gouache, acrylic, ballpoint pen, and colored pencil on paper mounted on board, 22 x 20" - one of 2 portraits in the show of native American Milwaukee Menominee tribesmen. DANIEL REICH GALLERY, June 3, 2006

center, in green jacket, DANIEL REICH, and to his left, in the black jacket, JOHN CONNELLY - arguably 2 of the heaviest hitters in the young Chelsea artworld, TYSON REEDER opening, DANIEL REICH GALLERY, June 3, 2006

painters, NYC based LANE TWITCHEL, in the orange jacket, and, both Milwaukee based: Tyson's brother, SCOTT TYSON, in the black jacket, and JOHN RIEPENHOFF in the yellow windbreaker. TYSON REEDER opening, DANIEL REICH GALLERY, June 3, 2006 - TYSON REEDER'S painting, 'Pier', behind them.

TYSON REEDER, 'Sax', 24 x 18 x 6", glazed ceramic, lying on floor, just like that, in the midst of a show of small paintings, .. tell me summer in New York, isn't poetic, or mysterious ...TYSON REEDER opening, DANIEL REICH GALLERY, June 3, 2006.

.. what would an island be, a body of land, albeit teeming with people and buildings, surrounded by water, without its water muse - MARIE LORENZ, at the TYSON REEDER opening, DANIEL REICH GALLERY, June 3, 2006