I am pleased to be included in the Compound Gallery‘s exhibition Supertrata: 3D Printed Art in Oakland, California. I was sad not to have been able to make it out for the opening but if you are out near San Francisco, please check it out! Here’s a couple images of work of mine that went out to the show:
Category Archives: Coney Island
Remembering Harold Feinstein: April 17, 1931 – June 20, 2015
When I first came to Coney Island in the 1980’s, the photographer Harold Feinstein was a fixture there. He was everywhere with his camera, capturing the place’s unique melting pot of people in the array of moments that can occur no where else in the world. Dick Zigun was always chasing him away, not wanting to give away images of the sideshow cast, but I’m glad he caught us in our downtime. Those moments and many others would have disappeared if it weren’t for Harold’s persistence. I never got to see his photos back then- only years later.
A few years back, I supported his retrospective book on Kickstarter and began to learn of the breadth of his work, an impressive body of photographs of New York City street life covering 65+ years. Last year, I was able to meet him and his wife Judith as he returned to his Coney Island roots. I wanted to 3D scan him, but his health was not great and he seemed frail. I was glad to have had some time to talk. While he photographed other things, I think Coney Island was central to his voice was and he impeccably captured the neighborhood’s soul. His work is a celebration of the human condition and the American spirit. Coney Island is the place where all peoples come together and emotions of joy, laughter, love, loneliness, friendship and all of life are there for us to experience in his work. Its somehow fitting to know that he chose to leave this world on June 20th, the day of the Mermaid Parade.
Rest in peace Harold. You will be missed but your legacy lives on. Thank you for preserving the moments.
See more of Harold’s work at http://www.haroldfeinstein.com/
Scan-A-Rama 3D Portrait Studio Second Anniversary Mermaid Parade Portraits!
Can you believe it- Scan-A-Rama 3D Portrait Studio is two years old! I opened up for the first time at the Mermaid Parade in 2013 and made some great portraits (See here and here). Well this past Saturday was the Coney Island Mermaid Parade and again I was able to make 3D portraits of some of my favorite Coney Island characters and sea creatures. These have not yet been cleaned up but I think they look great. I’m very happy with the day. Its exciting to see the technology improving since I’ve started and I’m proud of all the advances and things I’ve learned in the last few years.
Enjoy!
Bay Area Maker Faire Talk: Fredini’s History of Technology as Entertainment
Its been a whirlwind ever since I went out to San Francisco for Maker Faire. I meant to post a recap of some of my favorite highlights of the weekend, but have been swamped with Scan-A-Rama and getting ready for this year’s fellowship at Wheaton Arts. This week I’m doing a quick visiting artist stint at the Pilchuck Glass School to get a 3D printing studio up and running. I’ll be teaching a course there next summer about methods of creating 3D printed models for glass casting… more on that later (but I’ll be looking for artistic teaching assistants with expertise in 3D printer building, 3D modeling and glass casting, so give me a shout if you’re interested!).
In the meantime, Maker Faire posted my talk on YouTube. Overall, I’m happy with it. I confess I was called out by a fan for screwing up the Arthur C. Clarke quote, which should read “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.“. Anyway, here’s the talk, and if you get a chance its just one of a playlist of a lot of great pieces, so check them all out!
3D Printed Luna Park’s Latest Addition is the Helter Skelter!
It’s been months in the making but I was able to update the installation at the Coney Island Museum today with the Helter Skelter Building. I plan to have a reception event at the museum on Memorial Day, so stay tuned!
Helter Skelter First Glimpses
Progress on the Helter Skelter
I’ve been done 3D printing this for a few weeks and finally just took a day off after Westport Makerfaire to spend a few hours starting to glue together the Helter Skelter. I can’t wait to add this to the installation. It’s considerably bigger than I originally realized it would be- it should look great when done.