Speaking of the Barclays…

This above photo illustration of the Chrysler Building Spire sells the most for me, by far. It’s not hard to see why. It pops through the fog of the internet; it’s classic and simple. Safe, but with edges.

People sometimes ask how I took it and I have no idea how to answer except saying, ‘with a camera, from the street.’

Most creatives can’t make a living unless they sell out in some way. It’s just a matter of how far you’re willing to take it to allow yourself enough time to do the fun stuff.

Yes, I have a photo of the Empire State Building through the Manhattan Bridge both during the day and at night. I feel naked admitting this. But when you get asked enough, tell me you wouldn’t go out there at night to do the same?

I’ll do a piece one day about the variety of things I currently do and the very random things I have done in the past to make a living. “Everything but weddings” was an original mantra. Oh, I also don’t do Boudoir, not that I’ve ever been asked.

But this Chrysler graphic is promiscuous; it gets around. It doesn’t have morals. Why shouldn’t I let it fly to see all the dirty, interesting places it lands?

It’s in the executive suites of the Barclays Center (as a Knicks fan this was my biggest selling out), and for a paltry sum.

It had a 2-second cameo in a Tiffany & Co. video in 2015. That’s the only amount I’m not embarrassed to say here, $1,750 for a couple seconds was a good day.

It sits in “Melvyn’s office” in the New York Tiffany Store. (Back to paltry sums). I just Googled after looking back through my records, and apparently, Melvyn Kirtley is the chief gemologist and “secret weapon” of Tiffany & Co.

“Melvyn Kirtley has called Tiffany & Co. his home for 37 years. He is highly regarded at the 182-year-old New York City-based company and holds multiple roles that influence the creations and direction of the brand. Meet the chief gemologist who possibly has one of the best roles in the world of luxury.”

I guess the photo does look a bit like a diamond. Imagine the meetings it’s sat in on.

And speaking of sitting (and spurring the idea for this piece), I just recently sold the file again for a fairly paltry sum to be put in the bathrooms of executive suites in a luxury hotel.

They could have just told me it was for executive suites, right? They didn’t need to stress that it was for the bathrooms.

Although that may have aided their negotiations. (It wasn’t much of a negotiation.)

This wasn’t exactly the goal when I started, but it is fairly exciting thinking about how many slightly-powerful executives will stare at this photo while shitting after getting bored of their phones.

And speaking of shitting…

“A well-known feature of the New York skyline, this Art Deco skyscraper was the tallest in the world for a brief 11 months, before the nearby Empire State Building surpassed it in 1931. The Chrysler Building’s aesthetic stems from its original design objective to represent the Chrysler automobile and the machine age of the 1920s, since it was Walter Chrysler who commissioned the building. Part of Chrysler’s hubristic desire to build the tallest structure in the world was a request to have the highest toilet in Manhattan, so that he “could shit on Henry Ford and the rest of the world.”

And finally, a tip. If you want to get to the top of the Chrysler Building, go see a dentist. Yes, there’s one in the spire. It’s a good schtick for a dentist.

 

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Famous bathroom photo © Robert Frank.