Lost Soul

 

Taqueria coming soon was on the hand written sign taped to the window behind the gate. Pretty soon we’ll have as many Mexican food joints as pizzerias. I guess Mexican food is the comfort food of choice for the hipster crowd. I’m really starting to hate that word and all its connotations. Hipster. It’s currently synonymous with Gen Y, the post-Gen X gen whose childhoods coincided with the Reagan administration.

Seems to me the 80s saw the first massive wave of Mexican restaurants. Twas the decade when Benny Burrito’s was born.  

They began popping up all over, then I noticed in the 90s, Mexican food declined in popularity, or maybe I had lost my taste for it. I had a few trips to California by the early 90s for business and ate at the Mexican food joints and truly, it’s a whole different strata out west. Here in the east, we just couldn’t compete. That was my simplistic opinion. But when all is said and done, I’m not that into Mexican Food, east or west. More of a fad than a mainstay for me, now only a very occasional indulgence.

However, as this new generation takes over the world is the comfort take out food of their childhoods accompanying their sluggish world dominance?

Jersey City has lost its noveau southern food eatery. Jersey City has lost its Soul... flavors.

What is the difference between Soul Cooking and Southern Cooking I once asked a woman chef, who happened to be black and from the south, and she replied, it depends on who is doing the cooking.

Soul Flavors did a very credible version of this regional cuisine, I ate there a few times. I liked their black eye peas.

 Soul/Southern food had a real revival in the late 90s and 00s. Artisanal, farm to table, and locavore foodie trends all helped push this style back onto our tables. Look at all those pull-pork and rib vendors now ubiquitous at all the outdoor events up here in this Union stronghold.

Has the Mexican food resurgence gained so much momentum that the soul/southern food resurgence is now in retreat?

Who the hell knows. Food is firmly part of pop culture but I’m not quite sure what the trends within that segment say about overall culture. I’m not a foodie, nor do I watch the food network.  This post is not really about food trends, even in Jersey City. It’s about the whims and idiosyncrasies of the hyper-local restaurant business.

Jersey City was christened the Gold Coast somewhere in those optimistic go-go days of the 90s. Restaurant row was what they were calling the blocks around the Grove Street Path. Indeed, new places are opening all the time. But now as this area begins to mature, in order for the new ones to open, old restaurants now must close. It’s a tough business – discerning consumer tastes, consistently providing quality product that meets those tastes, and hoping those tastes do change so drastically that demand for your product does not decline so that your business can no longer be sustained.

Trying to guess what will take in Jersey City can be tough.

There’s other factors too, acts of landlord, acts of nature, your own personal life.  The turnover in the restaurant business in Jersey City is starting to resemble parts of New York, which is just another way of saying it is growing. A few seem to have become established contemporary landmarks, others close and are fallow until somebody else rolls the dice bringing their idea into physical space.

In the case of Soul Flavors,  Sandy finally claimed another victim a year later.

 

 

From the Soul Flavors Website:

OCTOBER 27^th 2013

 

After over 6 years of trading in Jersey City, it is with great sadness that on October 27th we've had to announce the closure of Soul Flavors. When Super-Storm Sandy hit last year, we lost all our food in the kitchen with the power outage, along with the whole of our inventory stored in the basement refrigerators and freezers and store cupboards due to the flooding. Although we have tried very hard for the last 11 months to get back on our feet, unfortunately we have not managed to do so. Although Soul Flavors restaurant is closed we will be continuing with our catering business . Thanksgiving is around the corner and we wanted JC to know that we are taking orders now and can be reached at INFO@SOULFLAVORS.COM. Thank you so very much for being our loyal patrons, we have appreciated your business and could not have come this far without you all. Would you please post this and forward to your database. Thanks so much for all your help now and in the past.

 

Best regards,

 

Wayne B Lyons

President Soul Flavors Inc.

Mobile 917 416-4854

web: www.soulflavors.com

 

 

New Mayor’s First Menorah

 

 

Jersey City’s first Jewish mayor lit his first municipal Menorah as mayor, kicking off the holiday season. Thanksgiving is more than a week away,  the fates have conspired to push Hanukah to mid-November and after a chilly couple of days where winter wear including thick coats and woolen accessories were necessary, the weather changed to a sudden Indian Sumer. The plastic snowflakes may be up on the poles, but nobody was in the holiday mood. They were happy to be here anyway.

There was a countdown and the switch was flipped and the lights of the Menorah and on the Christmas Tree went on simultaneously. Maybe not Rockefeller Center, but the glow was ours and that counts for something.

I asked the mayor how it felt to be Jersey City’s first Jewish Mayor lighting his first Menorah.

“It’s great,” he replied, utterly nonplussed.

That’s it?

He sort of shrugged and mentioned that his family were holocaust survivors. I recalled he cited a Talmud parable during his inauguration speech. The Jersey City mayor is always accessible and a good-natured man.  

The event was fun. There was a nice-sized crowd, lots of kids. Rabbi Debra Hachen from Temple Beth El, who wore a yarmulke (ultra-reformed)  gave a brief invocation, noting how strange and great that she was representing Jersey City’s religious community and thus was a rabbi wishing everybody their first merry Christmas of the year. A very Jersey City moment, our diversity and tolerance often results in idiosyncratic mash-ups that seem normal only to us.

 

It was a dual menorah and tree lighting, even though the latter is really a week-after Thanksgiving rather than a week-before event.

Why hold two separate events and risk outcry?  

There were cookies, an unusually brief playing of Christmas music that nobody sang along to. Everyone felt merry, but it was more just hanging out at the weekly green market merry than yuletide joy. The mayor mentioned there will be other holiday activities, something with Santa. Another old timer like myself remarked the well-worn refrain of how this sort of thing would never have happened years and years ago and how many more kids there are now. The thing about kids is they put everybody at their best behavior. Well, maybe not the best, but there’s less cussing or hostility when children are around. There’s more politeness. Guess that is at least a little bit of the old holiday spirit.

But no outcry and ironically, much outcry once accompanied Jersey City’s menorah. Our Menorah led to a case that was one of the first war on Christmas battlefields and is the reason why a city-sponsored Menorah  and holiday decorations in general are not viewed by our justice system as a violation of  the separation of Church and State.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anybody remember ACLU v. Schundler, 168 F.3d 92 (CA3: 1999)?

In 1995, the ACLU filed suit against our then Mayor Brett Schundler objecting to a holiday display at city hall of a Menorah, alongside a Christmas Tree and a manager-scene. Initially, a court of appeals ruled in favor of the ACLU, because the display violated the establishment of religion clause in the constitution by appearing to “advance, endorse, or disapprove.” Schundler appealed the ruling and erected a now legendary sign on the City Hall lawn: “Through this display and others throughout the year, the City of Jersey City is pleased to celebrate the diverse cultural and ethnic heritages of its peoples.”

The city then expanded the display  beyond Tree, Menorah and Nativity Scene. Schundler added Santa Claus, Frosty the Snowman, a sleigh and Kwanza symbols, motivating the ACLU to file for contempt of court. What an in your face counter-offensive move by ole Brett.

There was much interesting and sometimes intense discussion about these issues in the late 1990s and Jersey City had one of its occasional 15 minutes of fame. Some of the discussions form the basis of the annual war on Christmas blather, this years incarnation led by a new book by Sarah Palin, the right wing’s media-whore-in-chief.

How much of a religious symbol is a Christmas Tree? Why cannot a Menorah also be part of what is now also a secular celebration? Hey, if a Menorah, why not a crèche? Why not Kwanza?

It seemed like a never ending chain – well, it ended with Kwanza actually – there was back an forth in the courts and in the public sphere, a wide wielding debate was held at City Hall between the mayor and the ACLU.  The Federal District Court of New Jersey ruled in favor of the ACLU, but refused to rule on the contempt motion and the challenge was finally decided by the Court of Appeals For The Third Circuit.

In a ruling written by future Supreme Court member Samuel Alito: "None of these displays conveyed a message of government endorsement of Christianity, Judaism, or of religion in general but instead sent a message of pluralism and freedom to choose one's own beliefs."

Instead of following a court order to remove “religious” symbols from the city hall lawn, Schundler added more symbols.

What would be the alternative, how can you remove the Menorah and let the Christmas tree stand? I do not see how the court could have ruled against the Menorah without also banning the rest of our Christmas decorations.

By insisting that encouraging cheer, goodwill, and holiday rememberance is a proper function of city government, Schundler saved public displays of Christmas decorations. The ACLU wanted to be a Grinch, but the ruling showed that Christmas is bigger than religion. It no longer belongs exclusively to one religion.

Another outcome is that the Menorah has become accepted  as much a symbol of the Christmas Holiday as the crèche, candy canes, angels and elves.

 

 

 

And, a Menorah can be lit by the first Jewish Mayor with little acknowledgement of the significance. Instead kids ate cookies and the JCTV filmed the mayor and the downtown improvement honchos as they recycled platitudes about how great these events are for the city. The event was basically a photo-op – the official TV one man cameras and other members of the press out-douched themselves in terms of rudeness and shoving people out of the way to get their bland photo-op shot. The only one caring about the kids were their parents, there was no question and answer session so to speak, just boosterism for the camera. There was nothing more to the event. Guess you have to go to YouTube if you’re interested.

No one was ready for the holiday season. Who can feel the holiday Spirit when you still haven’t finished your Halloween candy? Alas… those  in need of joy and goodwill will have to wait or look elsewhere than private/public partnerships.

I have no idea what the official City Hall Holiday display will be this year. No worries about if this event had any religious endorsement.   I love the fact our token member of the clergy is a woman rabbi wearing what most conservative Jewish sects consider to be an exclusively patriarchal symbol. This Menorah lighting  was all abut promoting local business. Appropriate and worth applauding. The Grove Street Pavilion didn’t even exist during the Schundler regime, and yet Schundler is why a Menorah can be funded by the city and bring people together and encourage shared happiness.

As the crowd dispersed, the Mayor and his parents posed for a picture in front of the Menorah. Maybe history’s best achievement is when the social collective can take it for granted because the ultimate meaning of history is personal.  

 

New Heights

 

 

 

 

The Distillery is a “Gallery and Arts Space” in Jersey City in a section known as The Heights.

Presenting the Heights was the title of this group show, the somewhat flimsy connective tissue being these are all artists who live in a certain neighborhood.

Welcome to our own little corner of America seems to be main point.

The theme may have been lacking in depth, which not exactly rare as an organizational principal for an art show in Jersey City.

The Jersey City creative art scene may be maturing out of adolescence but its exhibition art scene is often womb-bound in terms of innovative presentation. But I don’t want to be a scold or just replay an old riff familiar to some long term readers. In fairness, the introductory and self-congratulatory nature of this group show was justified and while I am interested most in the viewing of art, organizers and artist need to focus on the selling of art. These two objectives are not mutually exclusive of course and commerce does not necessary dilute the experience of art.

Art Shows of any kind are rare in this neck of our woods, apparently new zoning laws now make the Heights more gallery and art space friendly. Due to rising rents and other factors, artists have migrated out of Downtown Jersey City to other hoods, like the Heights, and this show was a statement of a new identity for a growing coalition of artists, either distinguishing them from other Jersey City artists or at least broadening the definition and perception of what the arts are in town.

I can understand the sentiment. The confluence of the different strains of urban renewal trends as well as the random nature inherent in fate and change have conspired so that Downtown dominates the Jersey City arts spotlight. I tend to think of Jersey City as much a state of mind as it is an actual physical place, thus these arbitrary segments of cartography I tend to ignore. The reality of course contradicts my attitude.

 

 

 

 

 

What I worry and get annoyed about is this. Jersey City is a small town – on a very small M-Class planet in the delta quadrant – made smaller by Facebook – and it’s not that now dividing it into arbitrary Bedstys and Red Hooks only further shrinks the already small town – although that is an issue –it’s just that this provincial attitude means more art and art exhibits are not about using art to explore the human condition, but prone to endless self reflection and empty promotion. Why should art play the Real Estate development game?

What undermines the art strengthens the marketing, some may think. I guess I care more about art that happens to be in Jersey City than art whose sole reason to exist is that is in Jersey City.

Shouldn’t it be about the art, not about where the artist lives?

Both aspects are of interest and value, but sometimes the Jersey City art scene can seem like an endless high school pep rally and the thematic mission of this show implied that the Junior High now wants a separate bandwagon.

That said, the space is amazing and the art compelling. The turnout was robust – few Downtown art shows get these kind of attendance, especially at a non-city sanctioned event. A J.C. Fridays opening rarely garners such a plentiful response. The crowd seemed to include new faces in addition to the usual art scene suspects, either the scene continues to grow or the J.C. Heights location attracts a new cadre of adherents.

 

Kids were scampering throughout the event, and the two curators – Gabriel R. Pacheco and Kristin J. DeAngelis – explained the gallery is also an art school, the kids were students and presents other events, such as readings of original plays on some weekday evenings presented by the Speranza Theatre Company.

The community feel was abundant and infectious, perhaps I am too cortical about the purpose of the theme. Also, art shows and awareness of the artists here is indeed newly emerged, heralding that the Heights as the organizing principal of the event is a reasonable even virtuous decision.

 

 

 

 

 The Distillery is a former mechanic’s garage, spacious and airy, wide walls and tall ceiling, optimum for an art gallery. While far from a raw space, you still have the industrial feel, achieving a balance between the urban garage past and contemporary art space present. The walls are vast squares of white broken up by embedded column-like protrusions of brick. The track lighting is notably superb. Jersey City may be evolving from home of artists to arts destination, but there is a dearth of professional galleries.

Bars, restaurants and city hall have become make shift exhibition spaces, which is of course fun and funky, but these spaces are threatening to define Jersey City art exhibitions and their lighting is deplorable. Most lighting in most Jersey City art exhibition spaces simply SUCK! Seems more often than not, the lighting available in these spaces detracts rather than enhances the art on display. The Distillery’s lighting was deliberate and professional, an illumination quality found in Soho or Chelsea galleries. The light here let you both see and feel the art. I wanted to spend time with it and even found myself whishing the opening wasn’t so crowded. The turnout tended to dissuade lingering and reflection.

On the back wall was a video installation, projected images in a film flashed by. Three large wooden sculptures were situated throughout the gallery and accentuated the flow of visitors and formation of small groups, encouraging small talk and general schmoozing.

One sculpture looked like a rustic recreation of a cassette tape, really clever idea making an object from the more immediate past look like something from a rural era of a more distant incarnation, when we churned our own butter and had to talk on kerosene powered cellphones.

I wasn’t too sure of the Obama sketches on wall paper, although the commentary on the polarized nation seemed evident. One wall paper had two different crowns, indicating that he is some kind of monarchist I suppose but the reality is, he’s been a reluctant and uncertain King (he’s more Richard II than Richard III), frustrating many supporters with what seems to be a lack of courage to his convictions. But monarch? Or was that the purpose, the contrast, the human line heavy, etching-like sketch and the royal image backdrop, is this an argument that sets them apart or is this juxtaposition meant to reveal similarities?

 

Another pattern had a vertical row of the caduceus and a vertical row of the coiled rattle snake from the Don’t Tread On Me flag of the American Revolution. Was this some kind of commentary on the affordable care act controversies, which some say directly birthed the Tea Party (aided by plenty of Koch Brothers funding), who have been known to use the don’t tread on me serpent as a defining image. I dug the ambiguity of these pieces and also the echo of the image of our President, whose street art visage was so well known so early on in his first White House run that his image has become part of our visual lexicon, either transcending current events or as a reminder that we can never transcend our present day politics. The art expressed an ambivalence and my reaction was ambivalent and that ambivalence, in spite of the uneasy aftertaste, was interesting to contemplate.

 

Jill Kroproski is a potter, and showing clay masks that echoed Greek theater and aboriginal cultures. She said the masks were actually just an extension of her pottery and ceramic work.

 

Bojana Coklyat – Moody combination of stark, un-enameled colors – an Asian symbol, script that could be repeated texts on a screen or the desperate, isolated scrawl on a prison wall, the outline of a woman, realized by simple lines yet erotic, empowering, overcoming a sorrow all her own.

  

 

 Photographer John Crittenden with one of his larger prints. The shadow imprint cannot completely obscure the field of flowers bursting with color.

I got an a jitney bus, was home in about 10 minutes.

No one knows everything about Jersey City. No one knows everything about the arts in Jersey City. The Distillery is something else to know, but more importantly, something worth knowing. Maybe the trite-sounding Presenting the Heights theme is inevitable for a debut gallery show, but it was apparent The Distillery is not bound by the geographical limitations of either map or mind.

 

Artists featured at this show

 

• John Crittenden
• Daniel Guzman
• Christine Johanns
• Beth Whitney
• Sarah Johns
• Sarah Veloso
• Michael McNally
• Bojana Coklyat
• Olga Guerra
• Jerry Khan
• Ann LePore
• Edward Jose
• Jill Koproski
• Phillip A. Robinson, Jr.

Stephanie Riggi

Stephanie Riggi made a rare appearance at Creative Grove, a chance to meet the artist and snag some affordable prints of her ultra-radiant illustrations. The prints featured her stock-in-trade depictions of pop culture icons, ranging from John Lennon to John Waters alongside some of her idiosyncratic dreamscapes. She’s a local celebrity of sorts, her art seems everywhere. She’s a favorite feature among the curator set. I have seen and admired it at a few shows, such as Night Gallery exhibit at the Fish with Braids Gallery. But I’ve been a fan from afar, I’ve never met her until I recognized the art this slightly chilly Autumn evening.

Her pallet is colorful and beyond-bright, nearly neon but while most artists who dwell in Day-Glo glorify artifice, Riga discovers humanity. She has an obsession with John Waters and especially Devine, the famously obese cross-dressing actor, recreating what seems to be famous images. I love the way you see the Warhol image obsession, yet the folds of fat on his chin and jowls remind you of the lonely, misunderstood blue collar boy Waters turned into an icon.

 

I was most taken with her anthropomorphic felines, bawdy and erotic, burlesque Mae West types, with pronounced, Rubenesque buttocks, an R. Crumb naturalism to be sure, but also the bright colors seem closer to mainstream animation imagery. I loved this one where the sexy cats are on stage, some sort of imagined NC-17 stage burlesque show, risqué but getting out of hand while in the crowd are human beings – human males at least – and other human size felines and you see shock, awe and arousal mounting in the audience. The painting depicts the moment before inter-species sexual bedlam broke out. Should we call the vice squad now or should we have some fun first?

The original of this painting Stephanie insists will never be for sale. It is part of her permanent collection. In fact, many of the prints she was selling are copies of originals no longer available. They’re exclusive and are.

Stephanie applies a unique illustrative ability, rare outside the realm of commercial graphics, to a acrylic and oil painting. A colorful canvas guided by a more colorful imagination, always ready to surprise.

 

 

 

Where Can I Go? Follow the Mural

 

Jersey Strong, Stronger than Sandy… what is the silly sounding motto we’re all supposed to rallying around in the wake of the devastating super storm that Christie exploited into a reelection with the skill of a child prodigy turned political maestro?
 

Maybe the reason 60 + percent of Hoboken opposed the Christie Coronation is that while the Governor was out-front prominent our stronger than the storm beloved Jersey Shore, he was essentially a no show in Hoboken, which suffered worse than the 9^th ward in New Orleans during Katrina.  If the sluggish restoration of Hoboken, especially the transit hub, one of the most critical to the local economy, was actually covered by the news media, Christie’s hero status would be reduced to, “doing a heckuva job, Brownie.”

 

 

Most of the Hoboken Terminal, the historical and still charming Erie Lackawanna Terminal  remains closed – the bar just reopened, but the other food vendors and shops are closed. The ticket offices are still housed in temporary structures.

But the bathrooms reopened. In the summer, the bathrooms were closed but the waiting area had reopened. There were barriers and the main benches were still off-limits, but there new benches and places to sit and anticipate your next New Jersey adventure until your train arrived. Outdoor restroom facilities were set up at the waiting room exits, functional but the stench got worse every day. They were gross, but probably not the grossest thing you'll ever see in a lifetime.

 

So, now the waiting area is again closed but the bathrooms have reopened. Clean and functional as public bathrooms go.

The barriers have been moved to cordoned off the waiting area and to help guide commuters answering the call to nature, a temporary mural has been placed on the barriers.

Obviously some local students drew some local images on a large roll of wax or other drawing paper.  I do not not the story behidn this delightful project, you're on own for more details.

Every kid is an artist, drawing is innate in all of us. I love seeing familiar things – like an EMT vehicle – we all know reinterpreted through a child’s eyes. Its not art, although it is artful. But art is perception and these images are steeped in perception. We are highly aware of who did the drawing, which is why the work is so compelling, not the quality of the style.

Another layer of subtext: We all know the devastating storm is why most of the terminal remains closed, why the barriers are needed, why signs are needed to inform people that the restrooms are opened and remind them where they and show them how to get there given that the usual route – via the waiting area – is again quarantined.

 

The mural itself – the sequence of images – presents a diorama of Hudson County life, at least along the Hudson. Need to pee, images by children will lead you there and remind you of where you are.