Posts Tagged ‘cemetery’
Diagonal scuttling
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This scuttle began at St. Michael’s Catholic Cemetery on Pittsburgh’s South Side, up on the ‘slopes.’ This was going to be a ‘short walk’ of well under five miles, and Our Lady of the Pentacle came along for the effort.
As has been mentioned multitudinous times, downhill slopes offer the sort of exercise which my still gamey but recovering left ankle requires.
I do intend on returning to this cemetery at some point and walking the grounds. Interesting monuments here, with some dating back to before the First American Civil War (I’ve decided to just start calling it that, as I can read the writing on the wall at this point). I poked around a bit, and the earliest interment which I’ve seen mention of at this facility was back in 1849, during the short 16 month term of U.S. President Zachary Taylor.
German Catholics are the predominant group interred here, it seems.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The elevation which the cemetery is set upon offers commanding views of a section of the ‘Mon Valley,’ which is how the post industrial corridor along the Monongahela River gets referred to locally, here in Western Pennsylvania and the surroundings.
That prominent building pictured above is the University of Pittsburgh’s (PITT) 42 story Cathedral of Learning, and it’s over in the very urban Oakland section.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Up here on the south side, the buildings are a bit more modest.
It was a lovely day in Pittsburgh, with temperatures in the high 50’s and a steady breeze. We began our scuttling, and it was all downhill from here.
South 18th street’s curving path carried us down towards the flood plain of the Monongahela River, and the South Side Flats area.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It looks like someone experienced a residential fire since the last time I passed through here. My heart (as it were) really goes out to people who experience this sort of horror. Clothes on your back is all you’ve got afterwards. Everything is gone, all the mementos and the existential reality of the home – appliances, clothing, furniture, family photos, electronics, expensive possessions – all gone in a flash.
I’ve been told that the biggest problem after a fire is document related. Birth and marriage certificates, wills, licenses, passports etc. Replacing them is a pain in the neck, and not all that simple.
Sucks, that.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Our Lady became intrigued by my newfound interest in the City Steps of Pittsburgh, and wanted to check them out. Our route diverged from South 18th street and then we headed towards the ‘Church Route’ steps along Pius Street.
I cannot walk past this particular view without taking a photo of it. It’s a problem for me. I need help.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Just as we got to the top of the Church Route steps, a Norfolk Southern train thundered through the scene (bottom foreground) but was just out of view behind the verge. In the distance, that’s the Birmingham Bridge, which I walk over with some regularity.
Back tomorrow.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
doubtfully shaped
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
What with the crazy heat wave and other obligations last week, which included having to quarantine myself for 3 days until I could get tested for Covid – because an Anti-Vaccine idiot friend of mine decided that his freedom to avoid vaccination trumped mine to not be needlessly exposed to a plague – a humble narrator is a bit behind on his schedule. Accordingly, for today and tomorrow’s posts I’m reaching into the archives. Shot 1, above, is a modern shot from 2021.
Before you ask – yes, I’m vaccinated. The protocol offered by medical professionals indicates that despite the vaccination, you can still “Typhoid Mary” the virus to those who aren’t. Given that I don’t want to be the reason you get sick…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Shot 2 is from 2009, when on a trip to southwestern Vermont and some of its fine cemeteries, I encountered the graves of the Three Thralls. It’s my firmly held theory that a Mad Scientist, or perhaps a Supervillain, used to be a resident in this small New England town. His henchmen, or thralls, met an untimely end due to some heroic intervention, and ended up occupying the loam. Perhaps the Thralls died from a virus somebody selfishly exposed them to.
Thrall, it seems, was one of the three social classes one could expect to be born into during the Age of the Vikings. There were are also Kralls, and Earls, I’m told.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Closer to home, here in Astoria, one encountered a deceased Chicken lying on the side of the road one day. This is also from 2009. Given that I’m talking about a chicken who died 12 years ago, it’s time to end this archive post. I do wonder if the Chicken regretted crossing this particular road?
Back tomorrow.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
gray cottage
The night time is the right time, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The pedantic banality of my daily existence is occasionally punctuated by a series of rather dull events, and last weekend this included a trip to Greenwood Cemetery for Atlas Obscura’s “Into the Veil” party. It actually wasn’t that dull, as everybody else actually seemed to be having a good time, but the blackened callouses coating my psyche preclude one such as myself from feeling anything other numb.
I’m all ‘effed up.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Despite my best efforts at erecting emotional and behavioral barricades around myself, I do have a few friends and they were along for the excursion, and unfortunately my attempts at maintaining a social life got in the way of actuating the camera mechanisms with the anticipated and normal frequency.
Despite this, I did manage to crack out a few shots.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
“Into the Veil” is an Atlas Obscura signature event, and brings hundreds of people to Brooklyn’s Greenwood Cemetery (est. 1838) for what can best described as a decadent party. There are bands, and bars, and performances. Above, a group of fire dancers performing at the Crescent Lake found on the northwest side of the polyandrion. It’s a 30 second exposure, and the streaks of fire seem to forming an occult sigil.
It’s all so depressing, however.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On the far north western side of the cemetery is a rather large MTA facility which is both a train yard and a bus depot. The MTA uses harsh sodium based “stadium lights” to illuminate their property which throws an orange glow about for hundreds of yards in every direction, and it penetrates deeply into the fuligin shadows of Greenwood Cemetery where the night gaunts dance about in remembrance of the olden times.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
breathing marble
Greenwood Cemetery, at night, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Last weekend, Atlas Obscura produced the “Into the Veil” event which was hosted at Brooklyn’s Greenwood Cemetery. Your humble narrator wormed his way onto the guest list, packed up the whole camera kit in preparation for some night shooting, and headed on over.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Ethereal tones were pulsing out of several of the Mausolea, as Atlas Obscura had set up several performance spots. One particular tomb, the Morgan, had a familiar set of sounds pulsing out of it. When I hear musical saws playing, I know that I’ve found my pal and Astoria neighbor Natalia Paruz – the Saw Lady – at work. The shot above is a long exposure, which rendered Natalia in a ghostly blur of musical motion.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of my goals at the event was to “turn night into day.” I won’t bore you with all the technical details and camera settings, but suffice to say that the shots above and below are well beyond the range of human vision and that I was literally shooting blind. It was night time dark, with an overcast sky.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Tripods are a must for this sort of thing, as are remote releases for the shutter (have to minimize camera shake, after all). The funny thing is that people were wandering around in the dark, literally moving through the frame as the shot was being captured, but because of the length of time that the exposure required – they are rendered invisible unless they stood still as a statue for 20-30 seconds. Random hotspots and reflections on the monuments, as seen in the shots above, emanate from distant flash lights carried by the crowds.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
In situ, all I could see clearly were the monuments in the foreground, and even they were cloaked heavily in shadow. As mentioned, my goal was to “turn night into day” with these photos. The sky and tree line were barely visible to my eye when I set the exposure.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Physically speaking, these kind of shots are fairly arduous to capture, due to “the carry” of the amount of gear required. My normal “walk around” kit weighs about 6-8 pounds (depending on what I’m doing that day), but the full on night rig weighs closer to 20 pounds. Doesn’t sound like a lot, but Greenwood is a fairly “physical” environment with lots of steep hills. A light sheen of perspiration, combined with the cool night air, creates another set of circumstances to deal with – ensuring that the moisture on your skin doesn’t migrate to the glass and metal surfaces of the camera.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Being old, I didn’t stay till the bitter end, but was pretty satisfied with what I captured. Hand held, as is the first shot in this post, one last photo of the gates of Greenwood was captured as I left. Both of the bookend shots are “truer” to the eye, and representative of human perception. Personally, I really dig the “night into day” stuff. How about you, Lords and Ladies?
Note: Saturday will see Halloween occur here in Astoria. A humble narrators plan entails assuming my regular station at the Times Square of Astoria – 42nd and Broadway – at the Doyle’s Corner pub. I will be photographing all costumed comers who agree to pose, masked passerby, and of course – the alcoholic antics of the Burrachos.
My plan is to get there around 2 and stay until the early evening, so if you’re in the neighborhood and costumed, stop on by and get yourself photographed. Unless the weather is ungodly, I’ll be sitting at an outdoor table right by the door. If the shot turns out nice, you might just find yourself published at this – your Newtown Pentacle.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
intoning endless
A dream to some, a nightmare to others.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The shots in today’s post were gathered at an Atlas Obscura event in Green Wood Cemetery last weekend, which was a soirée of sorts. Cocktails in the Catacombs is how it was described, and an eager band of explorers responded. Your humble narrator wormed his way into the event, but did not partake or partay, I was too busy working. “How often do you get to photograph a cemetery in total darkness?”, after all. You’ll notice a crude bit of lighting in the shots above and below, which was barely visible during the image capture. A battery operated LED flashlight, if you must know.
It was late evening when I was shooting, the event started at ten and I left the cemetery for Astoria about one in the morning. These photos are long exposure, and tripod shots. To the human eye, there was naught but darkness framed against a brooding sky. Leaving the shutter open for 20-30 seconds at a pop, one can gather a range of color and tone which would otherwise be imperceptible. The small LED flashlight becomes a flood light in such circumstance.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Funny thing was that although you know that you’re “safe as houses,” the fact remains that you are standing in near total darkness in a cemetery and the slightest sound – a tree branch falling, for instance- is enough to trigger an irrational flight or fight response. Fear is so much fun, isn’t it?
The imagined stuff, I mean, not the sort that accompanies bad news from doctors or accountants, or lawyers, or the kind of existential angst that arises when you encounter drunk cops or pistol wielding teenagers.
Personally, my days are usually filled with horror of one stripe or another – although more often than not it’s of the “kafkaesque” type – and the wild hallucinations experienced during those daily intervals of fevered unconsciousness – that some may call “sleep” – consume a third of my life and they both terrify and inform.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A recently recurring hallucination of the nocturne has been a scenario in which your humble narrator is sitting at his desk and working, with Zuzu the dog lying at my feet. There’s a white flash, and suddenly everything is darkness and pain. Limbs are pinned by some unknowable weight, and there is a smell of copper as something begins dripping onto my face, and a certainty that one is completely helpless is realized. There is also pain, unknowable pain. Unable to wipe this unknown drip away from my eyes, immobilized in total darkness, a bit of light becomes visible and seems to be some distance away but it illuminates my situation. Surrounded by bloody concrete and rebar, the light grows brighter and begins to assume a hue as it intensifies. Orange yellow and growing brighter, the light illuminates clouds of dust which are picking up on an air current beginning to sweep through mounds of broken masonry and shattered bricks, as the ambient temperature begins to rise. The smell of cooking meat greets. My eyes begin to blister, and all vision perishes in fire just as the…
That’s when I wake up. At least this has replaced an older nightmare – one where I fall into an industrial carpet loom and am torn apart by clock works and bobbins of spinning yarn.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s also a series of “consigned to suffer” and “torn apart by sharks” ones, and a fantastic internal narrative that involves a rapid onset of Leprosy that completely disincorporates a humble narrator in the interval which it takes the R train to reach Manhattan’s 59th and Lex from the Steinway Street stop in Queens has emerged recently. When the Subway doors open in the city, my mortal remains gush out onto the tracks unnoticed. The last thing witnessed before waking, in this fantastic example of Freudian angst about Ebola, is a herd of rats licking up the crimson juice which once called itself a humble narrator.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Upcoming Walking Tours-
Saturday, November 8th, Poison Cauldron
Walking Tour with Atlas Obscura, click here for tickets and more info.
Note: This is the last Newtown Creek walking tour of 2014, and probably the last time this tour will be presented in its current form due to the Kosciuszko Bridge construction project.
The Newtown Pentacle 