Painting Pyramid

Most people spend time at Lake Tahoe when they visit Reno. Well that's probably a good thing because Nevada's real stash lay further out in it's geologic center.

If Lake Tahoe is turtlenecks, Pyramid Lake is cut offs. Or maybe it's firearms. Hell, it could be any concoction of wild west activities meets Native American mysticism to be honest. But of all, Pyramid Lake is nature at its best.

We headed out on State Route 445, the 42-mile hwy known as Pyramid HWY and made a day of it. Hot springs, target practice, cooking, ice-cold swimming, a dash of juvenile vandalism. I'll just get to the pictures now for the sake of illiteracy in America.

After the first dozen or so miles the rocks start becoming something more than rocks.

Keep it simple like two lanes.

Or even more simple like dirt. The Pinnacles off to the right

A small Sierra Wave-like cloud over Pyramid.

Smoke in the hills.

Steeper than it looks.

Good company getting stacked.

You're on Paiute land now.

Good location for a horror movie.

Americana.

A green lantern crawler.

What comes around goes around with a Pinnacle rooftop.

Insanoman being Insanoman.

Tegether. It's like when people get tethered together. Tegether.

Mr. Deed Goes to Washington

Pictures by Rachel Eisley

NDA going the distance with poetic license.

When you spill paint on the floor make the most of it.

Shadows are important but not as much as light.

You gotta love 6 inch brushstrokes.

Waters Rising

What better way to spend a rainy day than in the decaying warmth of an abandoned nursing home. Including the flooded basement there are 3 floors with a 4th addition on the street-facing side.

A live Miles Davis cassette tape paperweights a 'Get Well' card. The message in pencil is smeared while the real lead lies in the chipping walls. Floral wallpaper over lavendar paint. Black-eyed susans on baby blue. Flipped over patient beds and boxes of disposable gloves. Pigeons add gradients of grey. It's all at work.

Overhead you can hear the M line, better yet, you can see it. Clues be done.

Beautiful Losers, people and places

Coming back i've noticed so many burnt out, shot up, squatted in, boarded up buildings. Especially as I explore my new neighborhood of Bed Stuy, one can't help but find the abandoned lots and homes. What happened to these places? What's still inside? Rats, that's for sure. But what type of shit went down in these haunts.

I just went and saw the new Aaron Rose doc, 'Beautiful Losers' and it's funny when Espo describes his first time coming to Manhattan. He said he just got off the JMZ in the Lower East Side and a cop car was on fire. Then he said by the time he got to Tompkins Square there were tons of garbage cans on fire. He then goes on to say that he knew he was in a place he loved. Even Cheryl Dunn goes on to say that tons of artists moved to NY in the early 90's because you could squat about anywhere. She says this as she sits in front of a photo of the AMAZE and REVS roller on Wooster where at one point tons of artists lived, but now SOHO is one of the poshest digs in NYC.