Joy Malin Neo stands beside a portrait created by Joy Malin, an East Village painter who specializes in portraits of dogs. Below: Ms. Malin with Neo and Charlie.

Alexa Tsoulis-Reay

Joy Malin can’t conceal her love of dogs, even over the phone. “When you arrive, come to apartment D, as in dog” she announced when I called to schedule a meeting. This was a fitting introduction to the East Village-based artist who estimates that she has painted oil portraits of more than 120 dogs in the last three years.

Her animal portrait business started when she did an oil painting of her daughter’s Doxie, Neo. Her daughter was delighted with the result and Ms. Malin decided it would be a fulfilling way to supplement her art brokering business which had suffered during the recession.

She began to advertise on Craigslist, with signs in Washington Square Park and through the gossip networks that connect East Village dog lovers. She’s a regular at Tompkins Square Park where she walks her Yorkie Charlie with a team of dog owners who call themselves the “Housewives of Tompkins Square Park,” because their lives are so intertwined.

While Ms. Malin’s process varies from dog to dog, she usually paints from photos. That, she says, is the key to a successful portrait: turning the 11 × 14 inch oil paintings into more than generic portraits of a breed. “If you have a great photograph then it is easy to capture the soul of the dog,” Ms. Malin says. “It’s in the eyes.” She tends to work quickly noting “when you spend a lot of time on it, it gets stale.”
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Emily Armstrong Some of the tapes from the archive of around 200 punk and new wave performances that will soon be preserved by The Fales Collection at New York University. The collection’s director calls it “the very best.”

The Fales Collection at New York University will shortly begin the process of preserving and cataloging an extraordinary video archive of punk and new wave performances known as “Gonightclubbing, Ltd.,” mainly recorded in the nineteen seventies at East Village clubs like CBGB using reel-to-reel video.

The archive is the work of video artists Emily Armstrong and Pat Ivers, and until collected by a team from Fales last week it occupied significant cupboard space in Ms. Armstrong’s apartment. Although the material has been presented at museum and theater shows, it has never been commercially available. Almost 200 live shows by acts like the Dead Boys, the Heartbreakers, Iggy Pop and Suicide have remained largely unseen since the two young cable TV employees hauled their gear around downtown clubs more than 30 years ago.

Fales has been collecting documentation of the downtown art scene since 1994. Marvin Taylor, director of the archive, told The Local, “You can’t talk about the art scene without talking about the birth of punk rock.” He described the Armstrong-Ivers material as the “premiere collection” of live recordings from the period, with great sound quality because the makers were able to record directly from the soundboards at clubs. “It’s the very best. I have never seen anything like it,” he said.
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Tired of the traditional turkey and stuffing? Try an East Village restaurant that celebrates a post-Pilgrim immigrant cuisine.

Samantha Ku Brick Lane Curry House, 306 East Sixth Street.

Brick Lane Curry House
306 East Sixth Street
212-979-2900

Brick Lane Curry House on Curry Row will have all the elements of a traditional Thanksgiving meal, but with a twist. “What we’ve done is given it a little Indian kick, if you will,” said Vivek Deora, the general manager. “Robust flavors, robust spices.” Dishes include turkey seekh kabab, turkey biryani with cranberry chutney and raita and pumpkin halwa for dessert.

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The Quarterly Art Soiree began quietly on Sunday afternoon with sing-a-longs, button making and painting lessons. There were young performers, aspiring filmmakers, free popcorn and even a balloon artist all in the cellar space at Webster Hall on East 11th Street.

“They’re loving it, they’re loving it,” Pauline Vitale said of her two grandsons. “My little Cyrus has a speech delay so he’s really into the music. So he’s enjoying it. They’re having him play the squeezebox.”
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Hannah Thonet Miguel Algarín, founder of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, still delights in showcasing artists at the organization he established nearly 40 years ago.

On a gray August afternoon, walking through Tompkins Square Park, I saw dozens of poets huddled behind the bandstand, waiting to read from their own work or participate in an orchestrated performance of Allen Ginsberg’s iconic poem “Howl!” I joined the spectators, outnumbered by the poets, on seats scattered in front of the stage.

If the poets and visionaries of Ginsberg’s youth were “starving, hysterical, naked,” this sample of contemporary New York bards seemed calm and was fully dressed against the threat of light rain. As for starving, we all know there’s no money in the game. The audience for poetry sometimes seems to consist only of other poets, and almost nobody publishes a book of poetry expecting to make money. As one of the dedicated few who haunt poetry readings, and as an occasional poetry performer myself, I wondered how the poetry centers of the East Village were surviving this inhospitable economy.
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Toby Nathan Jerry Levy, one of last night’s few protesters.

Tompkins Square Park was more or less empty Sunday night, save for a few extra auxiliary police vehicles and a rag-tag bunch of seemingly bewildered protesters, all in search of a protest that did not happen, despite lively online previews and last-minute reminders.

“Jerry The Peddler,” the “Slum Goddess,” and one or two other local characters showed up to protest Community Board 3’s new policy designed to implement a “better management of scheduling” and control some “volume issues,” according to Susan Stetzer, the board’s district manager. She told The Local by e-mail that the repercussions of the policy have been “exaggerated greatly,” but Jerry Levy, 56, who’s lived in the East Village for 33 years, said Sunday night that he thinks the issue isn’t the volume, but the changing guard of the community.

“If people who live there” – on Seventh Street between Avenues A and B “have issues with the volume, then they shouldn’t have moved there,” he said. “The community overwhelmingly supports the concerts. This” – the noise proposal – “just comes from a few people who are speaking to a receptive ear of a few reactionary members of the community board.”

He says that the community wants “nice, quiet smiley-faced type of events that are geared toward children,” and that the community board “doesn’t represent the community.”

The community did not, however, turn out in overwhelming numbers to support that point of view. Indeed, John Penley, the longtime East Village activist and photojournalist who organized the protest, was nowhere to be found when the time came to demonstrate. Mr. Penley had not returned earlier calls from The Local about the event.

Sally LaucknerSugar skulls by Mano a Mano.

Over the weekend, Mano a Mano, a non-profit organization that promotes Mexican culture in the United States, held its eighth annual Dia de los Muertos celebrations at St. Mark’s Church-in-the-Bowery. Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, is a Mexican tradition that dates back to pre-Hispanic times and celebrates the annual return of the departed.

Although the actual holiday is on Nov. 2, East Villagers got a head start by enjoying Mexican food, shopping for knickknacks and attending bread-making workshops.
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For Dina Leor, this is the busiest week of the year.

Customers visit Ms. Leor’s Mexican folk art shop, La Sirena, to prepare for Dia de los Muertos, the Day of the Dead, on Nov. 2.

Ms. Leor has owned La Sirena for 11 years, and travels throughout Mexico to collect art. Although Ms. Leor is of Argentine descent, she says that she has a “Mexican heart,” which is clear to anyone entering her Third Street shop.

NYU Journalism’s Meredith Hoffman talks with Ms. Leor about the holiday and its spiritual and cultural significance.

Spencer Magloff Hundreds of participants munched their way through 15 eateries during the East Village Eats tour.

From sweet Maine shrimp rolls to Korean fried chicken, seitan dumplings to braised venison, the East Village was a food lover’s paradise on Saturday, as hundreds of participants and 15 eateries took part in the East Village Eats Tasting Tour.

With a map and complimentary spork in hand patrons trekked from one eatery to the next on a self-guided tour, sampling some of the best finger-licking foods the neighborhood has to offer from an assortment of varied restaurants. The event cost about $40.

“You walk by these places all the time, but never stop in,” said Zoe Lee-McDermott, a high school student and East Village resident. “This is definitely the best to way to learn what’s in your backyard.”

Saeju Jeong, 30, a tech entrepreneur, echoed the sentiment while gnawing on chicken wings. “Unless you spend $50, you don’t know if you’re going to like a restaurant. With this you can discover what you do and don’t like.”

Sponsored by the Fourth Arts Block, the tasting tour promoted local restaurants. Andy Song, manager of Mono+Mono, a Korean restaurant that opened in September on East Fourth Street, said he was hoping to garner new customers. “Since we just opened this is really a great way to advertise to new people in a new neighborhood. So far everyone has left happy,” he said.

Perhaps one of the most popular destinations was Luke’s Lobster, a little East Seventh Street seafood shop, packed with a shoulder-to-shoulder crowd that spilled out onto the sidewalk all vying for their sample of half a shrimp roll. Salacious-sounding moans encircled the restaurant as people chomped down on their rolls – some in as little as two bites.

“Picking restaurants can be hit or miss,” said Crystal Simpkin, 25, finishing up her shrimp on the congested sidewalk. “But so far, this is definitely my favorite, and I’ll be back.”

Courtesy the Allen Ginsberg After the Tuesday release of a collaboration between the poet Allen Ginsberg and the musician Arthur Russell (above), a record company now plans to issue more previously unreleased music by Mr. Russell.

As previously reported on The Local, a new 12-inch single featuring a rare Allen Ginsberg-Arthur Russell collaboration was released Tuesday from Audika Records and Press Pop Music. But fans of Mr. Russell will be excited to hear that there’s more unearthed material on the way.

“There are a few things people haven’t heard that I want to get out,” said Audika Records founder Steve Knutson in a recent interview with The Local.

Mr. Russell, an East Village resident who died in 1992, collaborated with the Talking Heads, Studio 54 resident DJ Nicky Siano, and minimalist composer Philip Glass, among others. His diverse discography — ranging from avant-disco and experimental pop, to ethereal cello compositions and folk-tinged love songs — touched on many facets of the New York downtown scene in the ’70s and ’80s, and has been widely acclaimed.

Over the next six months, Mr. Knutson plans to “go full circle” with two additional never-before-heard releases, focusing primarily on smaller releases of Mr. Russell’s avant-disco work. One of those avant-disco tracks, “Let’s Go Swimming,” is currently being mastered. Mr. Knutson plans to release the remastered original 12-inch version (which he says “sounds better than the original”) backed with previously unreleased material.

Mr. Russell recorded “Let’s Go Swimming” several times. A reverb-laden, cello-based rendition of “Let’s Go Swimming” previously appeared on the 1986 album “World of Echo,” and an Arthur Gibbons mix of the “mutant disco” version appeared on 2004 compilation “The World of Arthur Russell” from Soul Jazz Records. But the original has yet to be released.

Mr. Knutson, who also manages Rough Trade Records in North America, founded Audika in 2003 for the sole purpose of releasing material from Russell’s archives. Focusing primarily on the musician’s experimental pop output, previous Audika releases have included the posthumous collections “Calling Out of Context” (2004) and “Love is Overtaking Me” (2008).

Though Mr. Knutson never met Mr. Russell, he has been an avid fan since the mid-‘80s, when he first heard the Walter Gibbons mix of Russell’s “Schoolbell Treehouse.” Knutson said it changed his life. “It was like what I’d been waiting to hear all my life,” he said. “I thought it was one of the most incredible things I’d ever heard.”

Nearly a year after the completion of their $1.2 million renovation, the 14th Street Y is putting the southwest corner of 14th and First even more firmly on the East Village cultural map. The Jewish community center (open to “all backgrounds”) is nearing completion of their brand new theater and positioning themselves to provide a community space for “puppetry, filmmaking, experimental theater, aligning Jewish texts with the arts,” according to Reva Gaur who works for the Educational Alliance, a network of social and cultural centers of which the Y is a part. Ms. Gaur says that the “new theater will serve as the only professional theater in a community space in the East Village” when completed.

There are three key players that have made such a theater possible. Stephen Hazan Arnoff, Executive Director of the 14th Street Y, David Tirosh, LABA (the Y’s community arts program) artist-in-residence and Becky Skoff, who manages the theater and the arts program for the Y.

Securing funds for the arts in a time of economic uncertainty is no easy feat. Impressively, the center’s renovation funds have now exceeded the original $1.2 million to nearly $1.5 million with the help of New York City Council Members Rosie Mendez and Dan Garodnick. According to Mr. Arnoff, Councilman Garodnick grew up in the neighborhood and even “attended pre-school at the Y”.

Said Ms. Gaur, “We reached out to City Council members Dan Garodnick and Rosie Mendez to think about how we could obtain the first funds needed for the project. They embraced our vision and supported our application for funds from the City Council Capital Budget. This resulted in a $250,000 from the city which we combined with other funds to make our vision a reality for the community.”

Ms. Gaur explained that “laba” is Hebrew for “lava,” signifying an ambition to delve beneath the surface of the cultural landscape to find ancient wisdom. It’s also wordplay on the English “laboratory.” The next major arts program event is “What Kind of Love Is This: Bob Dylan and the Band” a combined gallery exhibition, symposium, and concert. The theater has already announced collaboration with AMAS Musical Theater, Red Fern Theater Company and Variations Theater Group.

Hannah Thonet Founded in 1973, the Nuyorican Poets Cafe regularly features spoken word events and open mic nights

The East Village has long been considered a Mecca for poets and writers. From bars to old tenement buildings, the historic neighborhood is brimming with former haunts of longtime residents like Allen Ginsberg and W.H. Auden. The crisp weather and changing leaves makes fall the perfect season to wander through the area on a romantic tour. So here’s a roundup of iconic East Village literary landmarks – why should the West Village get all the glory?

Ginsberg Residences

206 East Seventh Street (between Avenues B and C)
170 East Second Street (between Avenues A and B)

Arguably the neighborhood’s most well-known scribe, poet Allen Ginsberg called several apartments home throughout the East Village, including one we recently told you was on the market. In addition to the 12th Street apartment, he lived at 206 East Seventh Street from 1952 to 1953 where fellow Beat poet, William S. Burroughs, was a frequent visitor. Another one of his apartments was at 170 East Second Street. Ginsberg and his longtime partner, Peter Orlovsky, also a poet, lived there from 1958 to 1961.
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Robyn Baitcher A passerby gazes into a diorama on the gate of the Ninth Street Community Garden (top) and is treated to one of J. Kathleen White’s boxed drawings inside.

Since 2005, a set of dioramas has appeared each fall on the gate of the Ninth Street Community Garden. Residents and visitors peer inside for a glimpse of another world – a praying couple kneels before a tree inside this year’s green “Tree” diorama; in the blue “Knots,” skeletons hold knotted rope underwater as a sunken ship looms in the background. A Wells Fargo truck makes an appearance in a red diorama called “Treasure,” and a pink forest blooms behind a pudgy child in one called “Rocket SuperBaby.”

“I don’t know what they’re going to be like until I start making them,” J. Kathleen White said of the whimsical boxed scenes she creates. “Sometimes I think up a theme afterward. It’s a neighborhood thing. There’s no publicity.”

Ms. White said the dioramas are a way to show her drawings fitted against a background of lush greenery, a rare experience for a Manhattan resident looking at art.

“It’s these little scenes in completely obscure places,” she said. “It makes a miniature world within that world of the garden.”

Each year, Ms. White installs about a half dozen boxes on the garden fence along Avenue C. She has worked as a teacher and writer, in addition to drawing and creating art pieces all over New York City and nationally. This month, Ms. White is painting a mural in the basement of the East Village Theater for the New City.

Ms. White said she enjoys watching residents’ surprise each year that the Ninth Street boxes have returned. Though a sign by the installation bears her name, Ms. White gives only small clues as to the meaning behind the funky, vibrantly lit images.

“The continuum in these boxes is that in general, there’s a sense of narrative to the boxes,” she said. “There’s a story here – but what is it? It’s up to people to decide what that is.”

“Findings,” Ms. White’s current set of dioramas on the Ninth Street Community Garden fence, will run until Oct. 25.

Samantha Ku Dario D’Ambrosi supervises preparations for his new show at La MaMa Experimental Theater. His work explores the experience of the mentally ill.

Life-size puppets were perched on stacked chairs at the La MaMa Experimental Theater as Dario D’Ambrosi, the Italian avant-garde actor and director, attended to last-minute details for the opening of his new play tonight.

“Bong Bong Bong against the Walls, Ting Ting Ting in our Heads” opens the fourth annual La MaMa Puppet Series. Mr. D’Ambrosi first worked with mentally ill patients more than 30 years ago, doing research in a mental institution in Milan. Since then, his main avenue of creative exploration has been portraying the experience of mentally ill people through acting and playwriting.

This passion led him to create the Pathological Theater drama school in Rome, which teaches stagecraft to students with a range of conditions such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, autism and Down syndrome.

We caught up with Mr. D’Ambrosi earlier this week as he supervised the hectic construction of the set at the theater.

What was the inspiration for this piece?

This piece came from my work with the mentally ill. You see the set and the puppets, they designed it. We developed the play together. Yes, it’s my play, but it’s also from Teatro Patologico [Pathological Theater].
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Jamie Newfield An illustration by Terry Galmitz from his exhibit, “My East Village.”

When Terry Galmitz went to Avenue D looking for a candy store half-remembered from his youth, he found it was no longer there. In its place stood Sergio Deli Superette, a Spanish bodega, but, Mr. Galmitz reasoned, since he was already there, he would stay a while and draw. The result is one of the most striking images in “My East Village,” his portfolio of neighborhood sketches, on display at SB D Gallery on East 4th Street through Dec. 4.

In black-inked illustrations, a group of children jump gleefully in the water of an open street hydrant, the bodega behind them, its windows postered with lunch and lottery ticket advertisements. This quintessential image of urban summer, and its resonant sense of community, lie at the very heart of Mr. Galmitz’s show, a snap shot of the East Village caught between ethnic and bohemian roots and an ever-developing future.
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Chris Whitehead Rabbi Greg Wall, one of the founders of the Ayn Sof Arkestra and Bigger Band.

The saxophone of a Carnegie Hall veteran and trumpet of a Grammy winner nimbly croon and sway to the drum-brush beat, punctuated by sharp brass notes and bass thumps so close that the front row sees players’ tendons twitch.

That might sound like $150 seats at Lincoln Center, but catching this performance actually requires a padded pew at Sixth Street Synagogue, between First and Second Avenues, home of the Ayn Sof Arkestra and Bigger Band, a Jewish ensemble founded by Greg Wall, the well-known sax-playing rabbi there, and Frank London, his friend and an accomplished trumpeter.

Believed to be one of only a handful of Jewish big bands in the country, the 15-piece group rehearses and plays shows in the Modern Orthodox shul. Lately, its music has added the Talmudic verse of Jake Marmer, poetry columnist for The Forward, the weekly Jewish newspaper.
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It’s the time of year when some of New York City’s most intriguing architectural sites are offered up to the public complete with guided tours. To prepare you for the eighth annual Open House New York weekend this Saturday and Sunday, The Local got the insider scoop on where to head in the East Village.

New York Marble Cemetery
41 1/2 Second Avenue (at Second Street)

www.marblecemetery.org
Hours: Saturday and Sunday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Tania Barnes New York Marble Cemetery.

New York City’s oldest non-sectarian burial ground dates back to 1830 and sits on a half-acre of land, tucked behind a row of townhouses on Second Avenue. More garden than cemetery, the 156 underground vaults are indicated not by markers in the grass but by plaques on the walls.

Hellenophiles, rejoice: at 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, the Natasa Trifan group will perform a 20-minute dance based on the Greek myth of the minotaur. “We’re Greek revival,” Caroline DuBois, president of the cemetery, says by way of explanation. Be sure to also check out the placards on how to bury someone and the main causes of death — from the ubiquitous consumption and still birth to the rarefied, such as scrofula (“King’s Evil” – number 137), Winneplegia (number 142), and Womb Complaint (number 143.)
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Courtesy of The Allen Ginsberg Trust Arthur Russell began collaborating with Allen Ginsberg in the 1970s with Mr. Ginsberg often reading his poetry over Mr. Russell’s instrumentals. The new track was recorded in 1977.

In 2003, Audika Records founder Steve Knutson was digging through a Long Island City storage-facility when he struck tarnished, cassette-tape gold. The space held the archives of late East Village avant-garde composer Arthur Russell, and Knutson had found, albeit in horrible condition, “Ballad of the Lights,” a five-minute 1977 collaboration between Russell and the poet Allen Ginsberg.

Now, an individual record release will highlight the work of the two East Village cultural icons for the first time. The track, which will be released Oct. 19 was recorded in New York with Mr. Russell’s band The Flying Hearts, and Mr. Ginsberg on vocals. The track will be available on 10-inch vinyl via Japanese label Press Pop as well as digitally on iTunes via Audika Records.
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Beth Stebner A young spectator flies the Polish flag on Pulaski Day at St. Stanislaus Church.

Beth Stebner From top: Miss Polonia Manhattan 2010 poses with the marshal of St. Stanislaus. Father and daughter wait for the celebration to begin.

Though old churches punctuate several East Village streets, few are so consistently busy or cause as much sidewalk spillover from residents deviating their walking paths as St. Stanislaus on East Seventh Street near First Avenue.

Sunday marked the 73rd annual Pulaski Day Parade, a celebration of New York’s Polish-American community.

St. Stanislaus hosted one float – a red and white vehicle accommodating a four-piece band. Children wore traditional Krakowiaki garments – dresses and vests in vibrant, saturated colors. Many of the youngest spectators grew impatient waiting for the departure of the float, which this year brought up the tail end of the parade.

“I think the float is great,” said 2010 Miss Polonia Manhattan, Bernadette Deron. “It really represents Polonia.”

This post has been changed to correct an error. The original version misidentified the current holder of the Miss Polonia Manhattan crown.

Beth Stebner A brilliant, blue October sky formed the backdrop for the parade. This year’s theme was “Poland and America: Perfect Together.”