from Argentina
Exhibition of works by David Salle at the Edward Hopper House Museum in Nyack, N.Y.
All of these works are painted on paper. They were produced in 2023. All paintings are untitled.
In addition to his painting, Salle is a printmaker, photographer and stage designer. He lives in Brooklyn and East Hampton, N.Y.
Who knew there was such a thing as a smart bird feeder?
Environmental Crisis Posters, 1970-2000
Poster House, New York
Art Deco as a style was popular primarily in the 1920’s, but it wasn’t given the name Art Deco until the 1960’s. The Poster House exhibit demonstrates how it became “the visual language of capitalism.”
Poster House is a hidden gem of a museum in New York City. It is not in a fashionable area (23rd St. and 6th Ave.) and does not seem to have made it onto any tourist agenda. It is lightly attended seemingly mostly by locals. It has two gallery spaces, a small area for kids and corridors and hallways covered with additonal posters. The gift shop has a large and unique collection of books and there is a small cafe. They have a super friendly staff and it is inexpensive. If you are visiting New York and looking for an off the beaten path destination, you won’t be disappointed in Poster House.
Night Forms, an interactive light show produced by Kip Collective of Philadelphia, on display at the Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton Township, N.J.
Gennifer Flowers was an unknown Arkansas state employee and former TV reporter before 1992. That was the year Bill Clinton, a former Arkansas governor, was running for President. And Flowers launched herself front and center into that campaign by claiming she had a 12-year affair with Clinton and that furthermore, he helped her get her state job. Clinton denied the affair, at first, but years later would admit to a one-time tryst with Flowers. I wouldn’t vouch for the credibility of either of them on this issue so I assume the truth lies somewhere in between.
Flowers was once quoted as saying “If that man becomes President, I’ll never have to work again.” (New York Times, Jan. 27, 1993) If she was referring to her state job, she didn’t have to wait for the election for that prophecy to be fulfilled. UPI reported on Jan. 29, 1992:
“Gennifer Flowers, the former cabaret singer who alleges she had a 12-year affair with Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, was fired from her state job Wednesday for being absent without leave for three days.
“Don Barnes, chairman of the State Board of Review, said he followed state disciplinary rules that are routine in such cases of unexplained absence from work. He said Flowers would be informed by registered letter.
“’Gennifer Flowers has abandoned her job with the Arkansas Appeal Tribunal by failing to report for work or call in for three days. This is pursuant to the agency’s disciplinary rules,’ he said in a statement.”
Flowers, however, had found ways to surpass her $17,000 a year gig at the Arkansas Appeal Tribunal. We would later learn about this during a deposition in the Paula Jones (another of Clinton’s other women) suit against Clinton.
“Under questioning in a deposition last Nov. 14, by Mr. Clinton’s lawyer Robert S. Bennett, Ms. Flowers seemed almost to lose track of her earnings: $150,000 from The Star, a supermarket tabloid, for telling her story; $250,000 from Penthouse magazine for her story and pictures, san clothes.
“Then there was $25,000 to appear on ‘A Current Affair’ and $15,000 to appear on television in Spain. There was also a fee of $5,000 to $7,500 (‘something in there,’ as Ms. Flowers put it) to appear on a German television program, several hundred dollars to appear as a Marilyn Monroe look-alike on a cable television show, and so on. And so on.” (New York Times, March 21, 1998)
In 1996, Flowers was briefly involved in a traveling show called “Gennifer Flowers in Oh! Calcutta.” Richard Landsberg of the AP offered this review (May, 15, 1996):
“By the time it played in Reading last Tuesday night, the production of ‘Gennifer Flowers in Oh! Calcutta!’ was missing Ms. Flowers, who had walked out of the theater during intermission in Dayton the week before, complaining she hadn’t been paid. This seemed not to bother the audience in Reading a bit. The biggest cheers of the evening, in fact, were reserved for the announcement that Ms. Flowers wouldn’t be performing. Which isn’t exactly the way it was said.
“Actually, what cast member Scott Baker announced to the audience about Ms. Flowers cannot, in its entirety, be repeated here. But then, neither can much else that was said from the stage that night. Let’s put it this way: After announcing that Ms. Flowers’ parts were being performed by Melissa McGovern, Dawn Monaco and ‘yours truly.’ Baker brought down the house by adding: ‘Let me reassure you that not one of us had to (graphic reference to a common sex act) the president to get the job.’ Cheers.”
Flowers had another brief venture into musical theater in 2004 when she joined the cast of “Boobs: The Musical.” Joyce Walter, writing in the New York Times (Jan. 25, 2004), interviewed Flowers about that role:
“She is scheduled to open in ‘Boobs’ this Wednesday. The show, which originally opened last May, features the songs of Ruth Wallis, who in the 1940’s, 50’s and 60’s wrote and sang what were known as party songs. Songs like ‘She’s Got Freckles on Her But She Is Nice’ and ‘Johnny Had a Yo-Yo,’ in which, Ms. Flowers explains, she and another actress come out dressed like little girls and discuss, well, Johnny’s yo-yo.
”’My boobs’ — oh, and did we mention that ‘Boobs: The Musical’ is the name of the revue in which she’s starring — ‘which are large, by the way, are real,’ Ms. Flowers offers. ‘Large is not always good. For this show, they had to make me my own corsets. Some of the gowns are held up with a string.’”
With the backing of her wealthy stockbroker husband, a man with the unlikely name of Finis D. Shelnutt, Flowers purchased and operated a club in New Orleans’ French Quarter named the Kelsto Club. Writing in the Washington Post 11/29/2012, Suzy Parker describes her visit to the Kelsto Club:
“In 2003, I visited her night club ‘Gennifer Flowers Kelsto Club,’ which was housed in a former brothel, during research for my book ‘Sex in the South: Unbuckling The Bible Belt.’ Flowers hosted a night of erotic literature readings at the bar, which was adorned with plenty of pictures of her, including the cover of Penthouse. She sold white T-shirts with her image and a red lip print that she had branded as her logo. A sign on the bar stated, ‘No photographs of Gennifer Flowers may be taken by customers.’”
Los Angeles Times reporter Hillary E. MacGregor (Dec. 8, 2002) also caught her act:
“Flowers wears a white tuxedo jacket and a lace camisole. Her bottle-blond hair is piled atop her head in her trademark up-do. Her eyes are turquoise. Her lips are red, luscious, always freshly painted. When she receives a business card from a patron she smiles, then tucks it into her cleavage. ‘I don’t have anywhere else, baby,’ she drawls.
“She sings jazz, blues and R&B. She sings Billie Holiday and some Patsy Cline. Always, she sings about love gone wrong.”
But Flowers wasn’t done playing the Clinton card. She would claim that in 2005 he tried to contact her.
“‘I was at home by myself, and the phone rings, it said unavailable, and I picked up the phone and it was him,’ Flowers told WGNO reporter Susan Roesgen over a glass of red wine while the cameras were rolling. ‘And he wanted to come by my house and talk to me…. I said, No, you can’t come over here, no way. And he said, I’ll put on a hoodie and I’ll jog up there. I said no… And that was it. That would have been 2005.’” ABC News, Nov. 29, 2012.
Sometime later Flowers teamed up with Paula Jones to offer the public a souvenir, a piece of this sordid history.
“Gennifer Flowers and Paula Jones are offering Internet viewers the lurid details of encounters they claim they had with former President Clinton — for $1.99 a pop. The women, who gained notoriety in the early 1990s after claiming to have had sexual encounters with Clinton when he was governor of Arkansas, have created a Web site offering videos of their thoughts on Clinton, his wife Hillary and other matters. Each video segment is available for $1.99. ‘It’s a way we can get our story out there in our own words, without someone making their own interpretations or corrections,’ Jones said.” (Newport News Daily Press June 11, 2008)
Sorry folks, the genniferandpaula.com web site is no longer available. But the Kelsto Club is still around. It closed after Hurricane Katrina, but Flowers reopened the club in the past year.
And 24 years after Flowers became a talking point in the 1992 Presidential election, she made something of a cameo in the 2016 election. Ever the one to make a classy move, Donald Trump suggested he would bring Flowers in as his guest and sit her in the front row during his debate with Hillary Clinton. Flowers seemed ready to go but either the invitation was rescinded or never in fact offered.
Looking over Flowers career I can’t help but think of the lede to the Washington Post story I cited earlier by Suzy Parker. “It’s sometimes best to fade into history. That’s especially true if your claim to fame has been an affair with a famous politician who later became president.”
(Photos are from genniferflowers.com web site.)
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Whatever Happened To?
Paterson NJ
Jan. 21, 2024
On Jan. 1, 2007, Eliot Spitzer was sworn in as governor of New York State. He had previously been state attorney general and had earned the nickname “sheriff of Wall Street’ for his crackdown on white collar crime. A little more than 14 months later the New York Times (March 10, 2008) broke this story:
“Governor Eliot Spitzer of New York has been caught on a federal wiretap arranging to meet with a high-priced prostitute at a Washington hotel last month, according to a person briefed on the federal investigation.
“An affidavit in the federal investigation into a prostitution ring said that a wiretap recording captured a man identified as Client 9 on a telephone call confirming plans to have a woman travel from New York to Washington, where he had reserved a hotel room. The person briefed on the case identified Spitzer as Client 9.”
Follow up news stories had further details of Spitzer’s patronage of the Emperors’ Club VIP escort service and the amount of money he dropped on $1,000-an-hour call girls. Two days after the story broke, Spitzer resigned.
Spritzer never faced charges for his activities. ABC News (Nov. 6 2008) quoted U.S. attorney Michael J. Garcia: “After a thorough investigation, this office has uncovered no evidence of misuse of public or campaign funds. In addition we have determined that there is insufficient evidence to bring charges against Mr. Spitzer for any offense related to the withdrawal of funds for, and his payment to, the Emperors’ Club VIP.”
You would think being disgraced publicly would cause you to lay low for a bit. Not Spitzer. He headed for the TV cameras. He made some guest appearances on CNN and showed up as a substitute anchor on MSNBC. In October 2010, CNN paired him with conservative commentator Kathleen Parker in a show named Parker Spitzer. Parker’s name came off the marquee in February when she quit. The renamed show, “Arena,” lasted until it was canceled in July 2011. So Spitzer’s TV show didn’t even last as long as his spell as governor.
During his resignation, Spitzer’s wife, Silda Wall Spitzer, stood with him on the podium. Five years later, she was out. “We regret that our marital relationship has come to an end, and we have agreed not to make any other public statement on this subject,” Spitzer spokeswoman Lisa Linden said in a statement released on behalf of the couple. (CNN Dec. 24, 2013)
Like several other politicians in his situation (see for example Richard Weiner), Spitzer thought he could make a comeback. In 2013 he ran for state controller. He told CNN (July 7, 2013): “I accepted responsibility for what I did. I spent five years of working, doing useful things, and I hope the public will offer me an opportunity.” He got the thumbs down, losing the Democratic primary to Scott Stringer by a 52-48 margin.
Erratic behavior has seemed to follow Spitzer. This report is from NBC News on Feb. 14, 2016:
“Authorities are investigating allegations that disgraced former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer assaulted a woman at a Manhattan hotel, sources told NBC News. A spokeswoman for Spitzer denied the report.
“Spitzer, who resigned from office in 2008 following revelations of his involvement in a prostitution ring, is accused of choking a woman in her mid-20s at the Plaza Hotel.”
There was a surprising twist to this story.
“A Russian woman who was accused of blackmailing the former New York governor Eliot Spitzer over an affair was released from jail on Monday after she pleaded guilty to defrauding a second man.
“The plea in State Supreme Court in Manhattan brought to a close a case that began when the woman, Svetlana Travis Zakharova, 27, called the police in February 2016 and said Mr. Spitzer had choked her during a meeting at the Plaza Hotel.
“Five months later, the former governor sued her, claiming she had threatened to ‘ruin his life’ by revealing their relationship if he did not pay her thousands of dollars.
“She was arrested in October 2016 during a visit to the United States and charged with forgery and grand larceny. Prosecutors said she engaged in a ‘systematic and protracted extortion scheme’ against Mr. Spitzer, squeezing $400,000 from him over a year and a half to keep their relationship a secret.” (New York Times, Oct. 2, 2017)
Wow! She was more expensive than the Emperors’ Club VIP.
Three months later came this report on NBC News (Jan 15 2018):
“Detectives with the New York Police Department are looking into a man’s claim that disgraced former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer threatened to stab him during an irate interaction in a Manhattan restaurant, police said Sunday.
“Authorities said Jamie Antolini filed a complaint on Friday regarding an argument earlier in the month.
“Antolini said in his complaint that he was having dinner Jan. 2 when Spitzer came in the Upper East Side restaurant and became angry at hearing Antolini loudly praise someone Spitzer had publicly fought with during his years in the public sector.
“The NYPD said Antolini accused Spitzer of threatening him with bodily harm, including stabbing him with a knife, and making statements that he would kill him.”
No information about whether Spitzer was having an affair with someone in the restaurant.
So where is all this money coming from? Spitzer’s father Bernard was a New York real estate tycoon. He grew up in Riverdale, an affluent section of the Bronx. Eventually he turned to his father’s business.
“Mr. Spitzer has found himself unexpectedly embracing a role he has largely sought to avoid all his life: assuming stewardship of Spitzer Enterprises, the family real estate business.
“Politics is in ‘my rearview mirror,’ Mr. Spitzer said in an interview on June 10, his 56th birthday. ‘This,’ he said after a pause, ‘is exciting.’ (New York Times, June 15, 2015)
One of his first projects was on the Williamsburg waterfront. Three residential towers were designed to look like an asymmetrical stock of boxes. Just last year he received approval to replace a Upper East Side residential tower his father built in 1970 with a new 19-story building.
When you read the story of Eliot Spitzer it is hard not to think of the comparison with another New York real estate developer. Shouldn’t we not use the world disgraced in front of Donald Trump’s name the way it is used with Spitzer? Trump has paid off a porn star to hush up an affair, been caught on tape admitting to be a sexual abuser and was found by a judge to be a rapist.
How does that compare with dropping a few thousand as Client #9?
off the leash 