World Trade Center

six months on the 91st flr of the North tower

  • looking down, lithograph and collage, 1997
  • Manhattan, northward, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • 58th st (Queensborough) Bridge, northward, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • HudsonRiver at sunset, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • Wallstreet 1, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • City Hall, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • downtown Manhattan, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • Manhattan, northward - clear day, oil on wood panel, 1997
  • Manhattan, northward - foggy day, oil on wood panel, 1997

My experience working for six months in a studio on the 91st floor of the World Trade Centre changed the way I look at most of my life and of course most noticeably the way I approach my work.

The paintings I made while inhabiting the space were scribbles, annotations and ideas while I was chewing over various painting problems and issues that had become intensified by the extremeness of that situation.

I experimented with photographs and collage and especially the way I started to use photographs as a part of my painting process was an interesting departure.

The view, which was always stunning, was truncated by the divides between the narrow slot like windows made me become much more aware of the abstract, geometric and formal side of my work.

I built up an incredible affection for those crazy views from so high up and also for the two intense buildings which I could see from any point of my daily life in New York.  I miss them still.