Archive for the ‘Astoria’ Category
June 6th, Magic Lantern Show at Greater Astoria Historical Society
Metropolitan Avenue Bridge, English Kills – photo by Mitch Waxman
I’ve neglected to inform you all of the Magic Lantern Show which this, your Newtown Pentacle, is staging at the Greater Astoria Historical Society on Monday, June 6th at 7pm. There won’t be any archaic museum pieces in use, of course- my magic lantern is all digital and uses a standard and quite modern projector- but the concept is much the same. A photographer captures some hellish reality from the wild and shadowed corners of the world, and presents them with the intention of revealing hidden truths to a comfortable and otherwise wholesome audience who would never encounter this reality otherwise.
from a Newtown Pentacle post of April 13th, 2011
Just under an hour long, this Magic Lantern Show about Newtown Creek is personally narrated, and transports the viewer to every corner of the Newtown Creek- every tributary and street end, on the water and above it, and is presented in the idiosyncratic and off beat manner which has become familiar to regular readers of this- your Newtown Pentacle. It attempts to explain certain core questions in under an hour which have been repeatedly presented to me over the last couple of years, and the entire talk is illustrated with both my own photography and the product of my historical research:
- What exactly do you mean by the “Newtown Pentacle”?
- When did the Newtown Creek begin to matter?
- Why should I care, how does the Newtown Creek affect me, as I live in Manhattan?
- Where exactly is this place?
- Who is responsible for this mess, and exactly who is it that’s going to clean it up?
- How can I get involved and help my community revitalize and or restore the Newtown Creek?
Empire State Building rising over industrial Brooklyn and Newtown Creek – photo by Mitch Waxman
It would probably be “politique” to mention that this is not a Newtown Creek Alliance event, which is one of the many organizations which I’ve become affiliated and identified with. Instead this is purely a Newtown Pentacle show, which the studied philosophs who inhabit the upper echelons of the Greater Astoria Historical Society are allowing me to present in their convenient location on Astoria’s Broadway- stumbling distance from the R,M, and N trains. The efficacy of gambling their precious time and effort upon such a poor specimen as myself would be proven by the event being well attended, and the negligible $5 fee at the door should prove an easy burden for most to bear. Therefore, a narrator humbly invites and requests your support and attendance.
from astorialic.org
Mon Jun 6, 7:00 pm
Travel the length and breadth of Americas most polluted waterway, the Newtown Creek, with newtownpentacle.com‘s Mitch Waxman.
Breathtaking photography illustrates the journey, exploring the various tributaries and discussing the industrial history of New York City‘s least known waterway.
Witty and irreverent, the narration describes Waxman‘s own discovery of this place and the fantastic journey it has taken him on.
Question and Answer period follows.
DUKBO, Down Under the Kosciuszko Bridge Onramp – photo by Mitch Waxman
The actual presentation is just over a hour long, and during it, you’ll travel the length and breadth of the Newtown Creek- every tributary and bridge, each keystone of historical import will be illustrated with both personal experience and historical meaning. For those of you new to the story of the Newtown Creek (or the neighborhood) this will make a fine primer. Attempts will be made by your humble narrator to reveal this willfully hidden place, and introduce the uninitiated to the hellish flames of revelation which only the Newtown Creek can offer.
Greenpoint Avenue Bridge over Newtown Creek – photo by Mitch Waxman
The places I go, the things I see… often strain credulity. This is not the world you know, this 3.8 mile long waterway located directly across the East River from Manhattan’s Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital which provides the currently undefended border of Brooklyn and Queens. If it can happen, it has happened here, and if it happened here it happened worse and grander than anywhere else it ever happened. Come visit the night soil and offal dock, hear the stories of the great men- Bliss and Kingsland and Flowers and Degnon and Cooper. This is the place where the Industrial Revolution actually happened, where the death of nature itself was accomplished, and our modern world was born.
Welcome to the Newtown Creek, poison heart of the Newtown Pentacle…
haven of light
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Do not bring up the subject of sleep to your humble narrator, for even the thought of entering into that trance state- with it’s concurrently wild hallucinations- is enough to cause both physical and mental strain upon my delicate equilibrium. Just thinking about lying helpless in the dark waiting to slip into this inevitable oblivion is enough to make me breath rapidly and experience irregular cardiac rhythms while sweating profusely. The psychological effects of such inferences manifest as a confused, trembling, and amorphous fear which betrays a dread terror and malign panic.
I’m all ‘effed up.
from wikipedia
The fear of the dark is a common fear among children and to a varying degree is observed for adults. Fear of the dark is usually not fear of the darkness itself, but fear of possible or imagined dangers concealed by the darkness. Some degree of fear of the dark is natural, especially as a phase of child development. Most observers report that fear of the dark seldom appears before the age of 2 years. When fear of the dark reaches a degree that is severe enough to be considered pathological, it is sometimes called nyctophobia (from Greek νυξ, “night” and φοβια, phobia), scotophobia, from σκότος – “darkness”, or lygophobia, from λυγή – “twilight” and achluophobia.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Severe, my psychic pathologies demand isolation from others, easy to achieve by being awake while everyone else is asleep. Terrifying possibilities of what might lurk out there in the darkness torment my imagination, and I can only feel safe when blanketed in electronic light. There are stories of untoward and unexpected occurrences observed during the Great Astoria Blackout of 2006 whose meanings are only now beginning to coalesce into some sort of sensible shape, things that can exist only in the safe fuligin which no sensibly illumined skeptical New Yorker might expect. Thresholds throughout the ancient village knew lurkers, and odd shinings were described emanating from certain ruined or lightning cursed churches which dot the rolling hillocks of Astoria.
From beneath the streets an azure glow and acrid scent escaped, and rough havoc was unleashed, I’m sure.
from wikipedia
Panphobia, from the Greek ‘pan’ and ‘phobos,’ also called Omniphobia, Pantophobia, or Panophobia, is a medical condition known as a “non-specific fear” or “the fear of everything” and is described as “a vague and persistent dread of some unknown evil”, or only seeing the extremes to everything.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
To help pass the lonely hours of nocturnal hand wringing, tooth gnashing, and guilty self recrimination I have taken to long exposure photography which allows me to feel as if something had been accomplished before weakness and fatigue forced me into surrendering to that familiar cycle of deteriorating into unconsciousness, hallucination, and dazed awakening. Stumbling out into the streets the next and every day- into and beneath the direct gaze of the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself- emanations sting at my skin and if exposed to them for not so long a time, radiation burns will begin to manifest.
from wikipedia
Erythropoietic protoporphyria (EPP) is a relatively mild form of porphyria, although very painful, which arises from a deficiency in the enzyme ferrochelatase, leading to abnormally high levels of protoporphyrin in the tissue. The severity varies significantly from individual to individual…
EPP can be triggered through exposure to sun even though the patient is behind glass. Even the UV emissions from arc welding with the use of full protective mask have been known to trigger EPP.
Prolonged exposure to the sun can lead to edema and blistering. At times the immediate damage can be so severe that the individual can lose the skin in sheets.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Doctor friends have advised me that my aversion to this hideous biological malady is unavoidable, and described timetables which offer precise time periods during which the kidneys and liver may cleanse the blood of toxins, and the function of cellular growth and repair is based around sleep as well I am told. As well, psychiatric and psychological sources describe the chronic loss or avoidance of sleep as some sort of disorder.
Well, what do lettered academics know anyway? Have they rode with the tomb legions over the frozen steppes of nephren ka, or flown with the night gaunts through low hanging branches over the Lethe, or walked a mile in my moccasins?
from wikipedia
Sleep deprivation is the condition of not having enough sleep; it can be either chronic or acute. A chronic sleep-restricted state can cause fatigue, daytime sleepiness, clumsiness and weight loss or weight gain. It adversely affects the brain and cognitive function. Few studies have compared the effects of acute total sleep deprivation and chronic partial sleep restriction. Complete absence of sleep over long periods is impossible for humans to achieve (unless they suffer from fatal familial insomnia); brief microsleeps cannot be avoided. Long-term total sleep deprivation has caused death in lab animals.
without voice
– photo by Mitch Waxman
For the fullest sensation of joy, please check out this Newtown Pentacle post: “Weirdly Afar“, from March 25 of 2011.
Were it that just a day or two ago I hadn’t confessed publicly my fears of descending into some megalomaniacal state and an inevitable attempt to set myself up as a comic book villain, this new throne might have been the one. Black and silver are my personal colors, after all, and this would fit the macabre decor by which Newtown Pentacle HQ is known and remarked upon by the sturdy Croats which people this section of my beloved Astoria.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Illumined by a shaft of emerald light, this throne would sit in the middle of a large room cloaked by shadow, located somewhere deep below Newtown Creek. My lackeys and henchmen, whom I would call the WaxMen, would kneel before this throne awaiting my biddings which they would then do.
(my friend Chris, by the way, claims these are supposed to be Lions- I think they look like surprised Baboons. Any thoughts, Lords and Ladies?)
– photo by Mitch Waxman
From this lair of mine, a nexus of absolute intent and malediction of wholesomeness, would my gloved hand reach out- and were the world to have just one throat…
…Sheesh…
This is why I can’t ever be allowed to have a throne.
Funny thing is that a couple of days ago, somebody emailed me asking where the store was. I think it was a fashion industry thing.
nucleonic horrors
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Whilst happily ensconced amongst the wonders of two separate boat tours of NY Harbor on Tuesday, Our Lady of the Pentacle texted me with the news of great tumult nearby Newtown Pentacle HQ in my beloved Astoria. Breathless (she is a writer and can convey great levels of subtext, even within a 180 character message), Our Lady described the presence of vast numbers of NYPD specialist squads- Hazmat, Tactical, and Aviation were emphasized- at work on 28th Avenue near 45 street.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Upon returning home, she described message board chatter spinning wild rumors, and we instituted a Newtown Pentacle style inquiry into the matter. Basically, we googled it and found this:
Here’s the scoop, at least according to WABC TV news:
ASTORIA, Queens (WABC) — A hazardous material teams investigated a possible radiation scare at a house in Queens.
A box with a radiation symbol was found inside an apartment on 45th Street in Astoria Tuesday.
feeble horns
Hell Gate and Triborough bridges from Old Astoria – photo by Mitch Waxman
Loathsome memories of recent setbacks- and also of certain rebuffs- plague your humble narrator during these gloomy and sunless days, and always only solace can offer nepenthe. Thus, during a recent stroll by the pacific maelstrom of Hell Gate, nestled between two steel structures whose unearthly vibrations and omnipresent vocalizations form the aural environment- this series of shots were captured.
curiously scattered bones on sidewalk in Astoria – photo by Mitch Waxman
Vengeance and malice, indeed all of the seven deadly transgressions, populate the infernal dream world which has plagued me since childhood. Of late, a vivid character has typified these somnambulist hallucinations, and at least once during the night I’ll awaken in cold sweat grasping at the void of a curtain draped chamber. Surely, these negative humors are manifestations of another failing displayed by your humble narrator and least of all men, the inability to not bear grudges well beyond all sensible intervals.
sinister seeming bird at Hells Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
Having grown up in a lonely and isolated existence, in dusty rooms of sculptured green carpeting and vinyl covered couches with odd knick knacks that betrayed basic tenets of adherence to the Hebrew faith, family members carried a charge of eastern European distrust for outsiders. Don’t trust anyone, my mother used to tell me while still in the cradle. As such, your humble narrator has grown into a hostile and suspicious man, contemptuous of authority even when such authority is necessary to govern over and control chaos and anarchy.
Amtrak at Hellegat Hell Gate Bridge – photo by Mitch Waxman
Often I stand on a point of principle, in a combative and tenacious- and vastly unpopular- stand over small matters such as allowing a police officer the right to inspect my belongings on demand. Of course I realize the age we are living in is fraught with the consequences of living in a global military empire the likes of which even the Romans or Turks would gasp and genuflect at, and that to most “standard of living” trumps “individual rights” but the constables have to follow the rules too. That’s what our modern Metropolis operates on, and as the saying in Brooklyn used to go “if I gots to stands in lines, youse gotta stands in da line”.
Psychiatric Hospitals at Hell Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
Often, I fear that someday my darker impulses will take control of me, and I’ll spin off and become some comic book villain like parody of myself, the defeated antihero of a cosmic parable. Perhaps I will be remembered as a cautionary tale, your humble narrative of the man who looked under too many rocks. The Rumpelstiltskin of Newtown Creek, or perhaps just some old man in a shack who talks only to a collection of bottles?
Wards Island from Hell Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
Preoccupations with such bizarre concerns has led me to believe in and visualize conspiracy lurking behind every corner. The attentions of certain malign elements, teenage adherents to some form of the Hip Hop cult, have been noted milling about around headquarters of late. Additionally, strange vehicles not usually parked in the neighborhood have been observed, adorned with mysterious antennae and blacked out windows- even on the windshield, which is unusual in itself due to municipal regulation.
Such bizarre notions, undoubtedly the product of lonely studies and a massive workload, were what led me to seek the solace of Astoria Park. I had hoped (futilely as turns out) to photograph passing Tugboats, but instead grew focused on certain uluations which seemed to be emerging from the impossibly distant Psychiatric hospitals at Wards Island…
The President of the United States on Marine 1 over Hell Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
And that’s when the President of the United States flew by in Marine One on his way to the World Trade Center site to commemorate the death of his arch enemy.
In short, I’m all ‘effed up, and this post hits six points out of seven of the ICD-10 for paranoid personality type.
And the Newtown Pentacle is back in session.
The Newtown Pentacle 