Clayton Patterson | |
---|---|
Born | Canada | October 9, 1948
Known for | Photographer |
Website | claytonpattersonles |
Clayton Patterson (born October 9, 1948) is a Canadian-born artist, photographer, videographer and folk historian. [1] Since moving to New York City in 1979, his work has focused almost exclusively on documenting the art, life and times of the Lower East Side in Manhattan.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
Before moving to New York City in 1979, Clayton Patterson studied art at Alberta College of Art, University of Calgary, University of Alberta (Edmonton) and the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University. He taught printmaking at University of Alberta, etching at NSCAD, and high school art at Memorial Composite High School in Stony Plain, Alberta. He also worked for other artists as a freelance lithographer and print maker.
In 1972 he began living and collaborating with artist Elsa Rensaa; though never married, they have remained lifelong partners. Elsa was born in Norway and raised in Edmonton, Canada. Seeking a more experimental and avant garde art scene, Patterson and Rensaa left Canada and took up residence in lower Manhattan.[ when? ] In 2015, Mitch Corber created a short documentary video called Ludlow Street with Clayton that features Clayton Patterson walking down the street, discussing its cultural demise due to gentrification. [2]
Since 1999, Patterson and Dietmar Kirves have led NO!art. [3] The NO!Art movement was founded by the late Boris Lurie, Stanley Fisher and Sam Goodman at March gallery, in New York in 1960.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
Patterson has worked in a variety of mediums including etching, drawing, sculpture, lithography and photogravure. Though technically trained as an artist, Patterson's sculpture style is more akin to so-called outsider or folk art, often incorporating found objects, vibrantly painted and collaged in elaborate vitrines and decorated frames. His painting and drawing is heavily informed and influenced by tattoo and graffiti culture. Some of his large scale murals have appeared throughout the Lower East Side. From 1980-1982, Patterson's work was shown in a number of downtown galleries. As Patterson grew disenchanted with the SoHo art world, he distanced himself from the traditional gallery scene and moved deeper into the underground scene of Lower East Side.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
In 1983, Patterson and Rensaa bought a two-story former sewing factory and storefront at 161 Essex Street. The bottom floor paid the mortgage, and in 1986 he converted the small storefront into an art gallery and Clayton Cap store. From 1986 to 2003, they showcased a variety of New York artists, writers, neighborhood personalities including Quentin Crisp, Dash Snow, Angel "LA2" Ortiz, Boris Lurie, tattoo artist Spider Webb, Genesis P-Orridge, Peter Missing, Mary Beach, Taylor Mead, Agathe Snow, Manwoman, Swoon, Herbert Huncke and Elsa Rensaa.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
In 1986, Patterson and Rensaa began designing and fabricating custom baseball hats which they sold in the storefront at 161 Essex which they branded as Clayton Hats. The idea to make custom hats came from Clayton instructing Ben Booksinger, a cap maker on Avenue A, to embroider around the cap - off the peak. Clayton realized Ben could make a drawing on his old fashioned embroidery machine when he saw Ben make a copy of a Savage Skull Patch and duplicated it as an embroidered patch. Clayton got Booksinger to embroider Clayton designs on the front and on the sides of the cap. Thus the birth of the Clayton cap- the first designer branded baseball cap. The Clayton cap was the first baseball cap to have the embroidery all around the cap, and had the first signature and label on the outside of the cap. An embroidered signature on a repeated design, and a hand signed label for the custom one-of-a-kind designed caps.
As Booksinger gradually retired from manufacturing, Patterson and Rensaa took up the business of embroidering their own designs on hand made hats with a 100-year-old Bonis embroidery machine. The hats, designed by Patterson and made by Rensaa, were immediately popular with artists and were picked up by Elle and GQ. The GQ article by Richard Merkin, named Clayton Hats as one of the two best baseball hats made in America. Some of Clayton Hats' notable customers included artists Jim Dine and David Hockney, actor Matt Dillon, directors Gus Van Sant and Rob Reiner, the Pet Shop Boys, and Mick Jagger, for whom they designed a custom jacket back piece.
In 1986 Patterson and Ari Roussimoff created the Tattoo Society of New York with the assistance of Elsa Rensaa.[ citation needed ] Roussimoff left the Society in 1989, and its leadership was carried on by Patterson and Rensaa.[ citation needed ] In 1997, Wes Wood, L.E.S. City Councilwoman Kathryn Freed, and Patterson worked successfully to make tattooing once again legal in NYC. [4] After tattooing was made legal in 1997, Steve Bonge, Wes Wood, Butch Garcia became the founders and owners of the NYC International Tattoo Convention, held in the historic Roseland Ballroom; [ citation needed ] from the start, Patterson was hired as an organizer and manager. For the first 10 years of the convention, Rensaa, who had tattooed at 161 Essex since 1986 (retired[ when? ]), designed and printed the invitation cards and posters.[ citation needed ]
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
In 1972, Rensaa gave Patterson his first camera and in 1980 he began photographing life in the Lower East Side of New York City. In 1985, Patterson began photographing kids from the neighborhood in front of his front door. Over the years, he has taken hundreds of photos, and displaying them on his "Hall of Fame" in his storefront window. As more photographs appeared in the window, more kids demanded their photo be taken in front the graffiti covered door. Says Patterson:
The window was active 24 hours a day. You could hear tapping on the window and excited voices, 'Mira! Mira! Mira!' The majority of the Front Door people were Hispanics. Anglos, for the most part, just did not get the concept, but the locals sure did. … I was out to make everyone who wanted fame famous in the hood. And famous they became.[ attribution needed ]
The photos were later collected in "Clayton Patterson's Front Door Book" (2009, O.H.W.O.W. Press, Miami).
People who talk about photography as stealing souls are elitist. My Question for them is, 'Why is it that only the kings get memorialized?' I cannot tell you how many times I have been the only one in possession a picture of a family member. Life on the Lowa Deck could be treacherous and I have more than once witnessed families who lost everything for one reason or another. And often one of the first things to go would be the family picture. So my answer to the knuckleheads who say taking pictures is stealing souls is, go back to your middle or upper class existence and stay out of my life. Since much of my time is spent on the street I would probably say it less politely. Another way I look at the photographs is that we are one-we are the LES. I am them and they are me. And nobody is going to steal my soul.[ attribution needed ]
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
On August 6 and 7, 1988, police clashed with the young anarchist squatter population in Tompkins Square Park in the Lower East Side causing a massive riot. Patterson had initially gone out to video tape a performance at the Pyramid Club, but noticed a lot of activity around the park as well as a sizable police presence. The restless, anarchistic, politically active, squatter population was gathering in protest over the newly enforced 1am curfew. When the riot broke out, Patterson began taping the incident in full detail. His footage from the night's events (some 3+ hours) became instrumental in exposing police brutality in New York City that was often reported but never videotaped. As a result, New York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau ordered Patterson to surrender his tapes and camera. Patterson refused the order and was sentenced to 90 days in jail. After a 10-day hunger strike, Patterson's lawyers William Kunstler, Lyn Stewart, and Ron Kuby negotiated a deal that would allow the city to get a copy of the tape while allowing Patterson the right to keep the original.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
Patterson's collection of photography, video, art, press clippings, and books comprise a vast archive of Lower East Side history. The collection includes approximately half a million print photos, hundreds of thousands of digital photos, thousands of hours of video tape in multiple formats and numerous artworks by Patterson and Rensaa as well as other New York artists. The archive also consists of various ephemera from the streets of New York City including brand stamped glassine heroin bags, protest banners and fliers, graffiti stickers and art.
In addition to the hours of Tompkins Square Park footage, the video archive contains a large number of interviews, concerts, and street protests (including the ACT UP AIDS protest). Patterson's documentation of the NYC hardcore punk scene of the 1980s and early 1990s includes footage of Bad Brains, Murphy's Law, Sick of it All, Side by Side, Reagan Youth, Sheer Terror and G.G. Allin. His videos interviews with artists Richard Kern, Nick Zedd, Joe Coleman, Annie Sprinkle, H.R. Giger, Kembra Pfahler (of the Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black), Ira Cohen, Pyramid Club dancers Phoebe Legere, Dee Finley, folk historian and ethnomusicologist Harry Smith and numerous tattoo artists, colorful characters and NYC community leaders comprise an extensive historical document of the city.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(April 2014) |
In 2008, Clayton Patterson's life and work were the subject of the documentary film Captured. The film was directed by Ben Solomon and Daniel Levin and produced by Jenner Furst. Marc Levin was the executive producer. The New York noise-rock band A.R.E. Weapons contributed original music to the film.
In a relatively history-rich report on Patterson, 65 years old as of April 2014, The New York Times ' Alan Feuer reported the imminent departure of the artist from New York city for the Austrian spa town, Bad Ischl, on the Traun River in the center of the Salzkammergut region of Upper Austria; [5] Patterson is quoted as saying of NYC, that "[t]here’s nothing left for me… The energy is gone. My community is gone. I’m getting out… I didn’t really leave the Lower East Side. It left me." [6] In the same report, Alan Kaufman, a writer and a friend of Patterson, suggested his departure was akin to "Atget quitting Paris".[ citation needed ]
The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Historically, it was understood to encompass a much larger area, from Broadway to the East River and from East 14th Street to Fulton and Franklin Streets.
Richard "Richie" Mirando, known as Seen UA is an American graffiti artist. He is one of the best known graffiti artists in the world and has been referred to as the Godfather of Graffiti.
Rivington Street is a street in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which runs across the Lower East Side neighborhood, between the Bowery and Pitt Street, with a break between Chrystie and Forsyth for Sara D. Roosevelt Park. Vehicular traffic runs west on this one-way street.
8th Street is a street in the New York City borough of Manhattan that runs from Sixth Avenue to Third Avenue, and also from Avenue B to Avenue D; its addresses switch from West to East as it crosses Fifth Avenue. Between Third Avenue and Avenue A, it is named St. Mark's Place, after the nearby St. Mark's Church in-the-Bowery on 10th Street at Second Avenue.
Fashion in the period 1550–1600 in European clothing was characterized by increased opulence. Contrasting fabrics, slashes, embroidery, applied trims, and other forms of surface ornamentation remained prominent. The wide silhouette, conical for women with breadth at the hips and broadly square for men with width at the shoulders had reached its peak in the 1530s, and by mid-century a tall, narrow line with a V-lined waist was back in fashion. Sleeves and women's skirts then began to widen again, with emphasis at the shoulder that would continue into the next century. The characteristic garment of the period was the ruff, which began as a modest ruffle attached to the neckband of a shirt or smock and grew into a separate garment of fine linen, trimmed with lace, cutwork or embroidery, and shaped into crisp, precise folds with starch and heated irons.
Fashion in the period 1600–1650 in Western clothing is characterized by the disappearance of the ruff in favour of broad lace or linen collars. Waistlines rose through the period for both men and women. Other notable fashions included full, slashed sleeves and tall or broad hats with brims. For men, hose disappeared in favour of breeches.
Harold Atkins Hunter was an American professional skateboarder and actor. He played the role of Harold in Larry Clark's 1995 film Kids.
Fashion in the period 1500–1550 in Europe is marked by very thick, big and voluminous clothing worn in an abundance of layers. Contrasting fabrics, slashes, embroidery, applied trims, and other forms of surface ornamentation became prominent. The tall, narrow lines of the late Medieval period were replaced with a wide silhouette, conical for women with breadth at the hips and broadly square for men with width at the shoulders. Sleeves were a center of attention, and were puffed, slashed, cuffed, and turned back to reveal contrasting linings.
The Millennium Film Workshop is a non-profit media arts center located in New York City. It is dedicated to the exhibition, study, and practice of avant-garde and experimental cinema. It was also where the St. Mark's Poetry Project began. Ken Jacobs stated in 2013 that he chose the name Millennium "...because it would have to be that to actually give out equipment, education, space to work in, etc. for free. Dictionary definition: 'A hoped for period of joy, serenity, prosperity and justice.' "
Arleen Schloss is an American performance artist, video/film artist, sound poet, director and curator of the lower Manhattan art, video, performance art and music scenes. Schloss began through A's – an interdisciplinary loft space that became a hub for music, exhibitions, performance art, films and videos. In the 1990s A's became A's Wave where website works and other forms of digital media were shown.
East Broadway is a two-way east–west street in the Chinatown, Two Bridges, and Lower East Side neighborhoods of the New York City borough of Manhattan in the U.S. state of New York.
Mitch Corber is a New York City neo-Beat poet, an eccentric performance artist, and no wave videographer known for his rapid whimsically comical montage and collage style. He has been associated with Collaborative Projects, Inc., participated in Public Arts International/Free Speech and The Times Square Show, and is creator-director of cable TV long-running weekly series Poetry Thin Air in New York City and its on-line poetry/video archive. He has worked closely with ABC No Rio, Colab TV and the MWF Video Club and his audio art have been published on Tellus Audio Cassette Magazine three times. He is a recipient of a NY Foundation for the Arts Fellowship grant (1987) in the field of emerging artforms.
Charles Robert Gatewood was an American photographer, writer, videographer, artist and educator, who lived and worked in San Francisco, California.
The Real Estate Show was a squatted exhibition by New York artists' group Colab, on the subject of landlord speculation in real estate held on New Year's Day in a vacant city-owned building at 123 Delancey Street in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York City.
Suzhou embroidery, Su embroidery or Su xiu is the embroidery created around the city of Suzhou, Jiangsu, China. It is one of the oldest embroidery techniques in the world and is the most representative type of art in Chinese embroidery. One of the well-known "four great embroideries of China" along with Cantonese embroidery, Sichuan embroidery and Xiang embroidery, Suzhou embroidery already has a history more than 2,000 years and is an important form of handicraft in the history of Chinese art and folk custom, representative of Chinese traditional folk arts. It is famous for its variety of stitches, beautiful patterns, elegant colors, and consummate craftsmanship.
James and Karla Murray are American photographers. The husband and wife duo have photographed storefronts of small businesses in New York City and elsewhere. They have also constructed a sculptural installation based on their photographic work.
Angel Ortiz, known publicly as LA II or LA2, is an American graffiti artist and visual artist of Puerto Rican descent from the Lower East Side who is known for his collaborations with Keith Haring. Ortiz's contributions to Haring's work, including his trademark graffiti infill squiggles, have notably been obscured by the art establishment, which has prompted Ortiz's supporters, including artist, photographer, and videographer Clayton Patterson, to publicly uplift Ortiz's work and ask for credit to be given.
Bradley Eros is an experimental film director, actor, curator, poet, and performance artist who also makes Musique concrète sound collages, music videos, photographs, live projection performances, works on paper and art objects.
Paula Grimaldi-Reardon was an American photographer who primarily documented the motorcycle, tattoo, and outlaw subcultures. She was a self-taught photographer known for her black-and-white film images portraying the 1980s and 1990s counterculture.