What ever happened to Brian Ermanski?

Was editing my blog the other day and came across this long forgotten photo of Brian Ermanski  that I took during a shoot down on Elizabeth Street in 9/04 (see posting...) and got wondering how things turned out for him.

The photo was taken on the corner of Prince and Elizabeth Streets in the heart of SOHO on one of those magically warm early September mornings when you can feel the air, the streets are quiet, and all seems well with the world.  As we got talking, Brian introduced himself as the self proclaimed "Prince of Elizabeth Street" who appeared to be a passable artist and I think writer, still early in his career, with delusions of grandeur and a funny, playful manner that reminded me a lot of myself when I was young and a student in NYC.  He was lying on this discarded couch on Prince Street with his signature top hat on his knee.  When I asked if I could take his picture,  he said "sure, for a dollar" which I gladly gave him, saying it was a bargain at that.  After we talked for a while, he took me to some cafe to see a few of his paintings which were OK.  I bought us each a cup of coffee, we talked for a while longer, and that was that.

Googling him, I found that he has developed into a much better artist as well as a master of self promotion, which is no sin as Andy Warhol would be the first admit, and has done quite well for himself it would appear, especially in the area of performance art, his greatest creation being himself, although he might disagree.  Funny, but Prince and Elizabeth have always been a touchstone for me as well, a place I return to frequently and am always rewarded.  If nothing else there is always a great cup of coffee at Cafe Habana

or a slice at the Prince Street Pizzaria between Mott and Elizabeth, one of the few pizza places in New York still run by Italians who understand the concept.  Was there a few months ago and found a most extraordinary NYC tableau across the street from the cafe on Elizabeth, which has been waiting for a spot to be posted (but where?), so this posting has worked out quite well...

If not a prince, its always good to be at least a flaneur at the corner of Prince and Elizabeth.

                                                                       Pablo

Addendum:

12/1/14:

Spent Thanksgiving in a suite at 48 Lexington Ave. with Jackie's family who spent the morning shivering out on 5th Ave watching the parade.  Used that time to head downtown.  The subways were quiet, the streets almost empty, and there were few cars on the street to block the view.  Stopped in the Habana for a coffee or two and got a couple of good shots of the two meat markets across the street from each other on Elizabeth, a few doors north of Prince.  One still kind of active, the other in tact, but now being used as an art gallery, with the meat hooks still in place...

By the time I got back, Ben's Deli was delivering our Thanksgiving banquet.

209 Elizabeth St. South of Prince

   

While there is nothing intrinsically special about these last three photos beyond their location, they are important because places like that don't really exist much in NYC any more.

                                                                    

Its not me, its them....

                                                           
                                          As a younger man,
                                          New York filled me with wonder
                                          now, it tires me.

I wrote this haiku last December, or maybe the December before, sitting in a Crate and Barrel store or was it a Pier 1 next door to a Starbucks or something, who can remember, one shopping mall begins looking just like the next.  We were in the vicinity of Rockefeller Center and I was waiting for Jackie to look around after we had gone to see the tree and made the obligatory visit to Dean and DeLuca.  At the time I thought I was just getting old and cranky and NYC had just passed me by.  It was just not my city anymore, bequeathed to a new generation.  While this is true, of course, I have come to realize the I haven't changed that much, New York has, and as far as I'm concerned, not for the better.  Sure, it is now clean and cute, safe and family friendly, ordered and organized, sanitized and purged of the unwashed and unwanted, but in return it has become less interesting and lacking in intrigue and the dangerous edge that makes a city a city.  A city devoid of mystery, danger, decay, depravity, and the desperation that was once scrawled across the walls, the vagrantly ideocryncratic  characters that give a city life and inspire poetry appears banished.

                                       Its New York City man
                                       you've got to scream here to survive
                                       and poke yourself with needles
                                       to make sure your alive,
                                       its a plastic airbrushed heaven
                                       that drives little girls insane
                                       and fills their heads with strange ideas
                                       on how to play the game.

                                                       or

                                       I am a gutter rat...
                                       My ambitions take me
                                       no further than 42nd Street,
                                       My nightmares take me
                                       all the way to Harlem.

Every time I return to the city, I swear I will never return.  The Disney people have reimagined 42nd St and Times Square to death, the Bowery and the Lower East Side have been gentrified beyond recognition, much of Greenwich Village has been torn down by NYU and replaced with large university buildings and what's left is shops selling posters and/or pizza.  Not to worry though, Rocco's on Thompson Street and a few other hold outs from the 50's and 60's are still there, but are now islands of nostalgia, lacking in context.  I could go on and on and on about the half mile of nameless, faceless buildings on the west side built by Donald Trump that are as bland, lacking in character, and crass as he is, but what's the point.  They're there, I'm here, and he's on TV firing people, so you need to watch what you say and do, because there are cameras everywhere.  I'm beginning to rant.

What I really wanted to report on was the disorientation I experienced on a recent amble through the SoHo area, and particularly the area around Prince and Elizabeth Streets where I had done an interesting little photo shoot in 2004.  As I was walking around, I realized nothing looked the same and I was a stranger in my own town.  And indeed, nothing was the same, and not always for the better, although not everyone would agree with me.  After some inquiry, I was able to establish that I was in the right place, just at the wrong time.

This is a photograph of Brian taken in 9/04 on the corner of Prince and Elizabeth Streets.  Brian, the self proclaimed "Prince of Elizabeth Street" was a passable artist and I think writer, with delusions of grandeur and a funny, playful manner who reminded me a lot of myself when I was young.  He was lying in the sun on this discarded couch on Prince when I asked him if I could take his picture.  He said "sure, for a dollar" which I gave him gladly, saying that it was a bargain.  Afterward, he took me to a cafe down the block where some of his paintings were hanging.  They were ok, so we sat, I bought him a coffee, and we talked for a while.

When I was there last week, the building behind Brian just didn't look the same.  And indeed it wasn't.   When I went into the shop on the corner to enquire, they told me that the prior building, the one with all those nice words drifting up out of Brian's head, had been demolished a few years ago and this new one, which did look pretty darn authentically old and nice, had replaced it.  I was impressed, and no longer disoriented.  Walking down Elizabeth Street, where the next three black and white photos had been shot, I was surprised to see that they were all taken on the wall of one building marked 11 Spring Street, although the entrance seemed to be on Elizabeth, where I was standing watching people coming and going.  I was a little confused about that too.  The black and whites were taken in 9/04, the color ones of the same locations were taken last week.

                                                       

So that was 11 Spring Street then and now.  This window where the last photo was taken was bricked up at the time.  There's some good things happening here.  11 Spring Street looked great.  I wouldn't mind living there myself.  I guess its not all bad after all,  and I can no longer say...

                                                New York City is a tough town,

                                                if you don't believe me

                                                next time you are in Manhattan

                                                I can show you this little alley

                                                three or four blocks east of Carnegie Hall

                                                where you can still see

                                                remnants of Van Cliburn's smile

                                                smeared across the brickwork.

                                                           Pablo, the gutter rat