Jeffrey Long shows ‘em how its done.
It is reassuring to know that our future is secure and in the capable hands of a fresh new generation of bloviators.
I see great things ahead for this fine young man.
Avoid modern art. But when modern art finds you, call Buffalo Bloviator.
The Bloviator (pictured above in a rare cameo appearance), counts among his friends a Buffalo personal injury attorney. Yes, even some personal injury attorneys have friends. My friend has asked me not to reveal his identity at this time, because thanks to my advice, he is in fear for his personal safety. Herein, my personal injury attorney friend shall, and for the remainder of this document, be referred to as “the seller”.
The seller has had in his exclusive care, custody, and control a seemingly harmless painting of a house, hanging in his own house from a nail in his living room wall. The painting has been in his family for many years. The painting belonged to the seller’s grandmother who received it from a great aunt who had an art shop in France. The seller’s ancestors left France and Germany during World War II.
The painting is signed “P Cezanne”. The story passed down by his relatives is that the painting’s history is unclear and it is probably not actually an authentic Cezanne. And so the painting hung on a nail in the living room of the seller, in close proximity to where his children enjoy playing animated games with the family pet, often involving acrobatic feats and object-throwing exhibitions.
Exhibit “A”: The Signature.
Having myself personally been swept up in the excitement of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery’s successful multi-tens of millions of dollars masterpiece sale, I suggested to the seller that he should find out, or rule out, once and for all if his painting is a genuine masterpiece. I appealed to his personal injury attorney range of instincts -logic and money. I advocated that he should know now, rather than find out twenty years from now, that he is as wealthy as personal injury attorney John Edwards.
I suggested to the seller that he take the painting to Sotheby’s Auction House in New York City. I based my careful advice on all of the nuanced circumstances surrounding the issue, and the fact that I am fully ignorant about the topic. To my surprise and delight, the seller reported back to me that he had made an appointment at Sotheby’s for the day which has now become last Wednesday.
From this point on, the story takes on a particularly Buffalo character.
As my friend prepared for his trip to Sotheby’s, he became burdened with the responsibility of managing an uninsured piece of art potentially worth tens of millions of dollars. What if information were leaked from Sotheby’s that the valuable painting existed? The painting was removed from its nail and hidden under a pile of laundry. The seller found some cardboard and fashioned a container. He secured it with duct tape and even a shoestring. A sleeve was made out of an unfinished work of art that his wife had once begun and then abandoned in the basement.
The seller set out for Sotheby’s on Tuesday. He drove his car because he was afraid to check the painting through airport baggage. He placed the painting in the back seat in case he was rear-ended. (Being rear-ended is the stock-in-trade of a personal injury attorney.) Tuesday night he checked into a motel. He couldn’t sleep because he was worried about the possible masterpiece locked in his car.
As in every Buffalo story, the lead character called his friend regularly to report on his activities. Wednesday morning the seller phoned me. He had arrived in NYC and found a parking space sixty yards from the entrance to Sotheby’s. He reported to me that he was four hours early for his 2 p.m. appointment but didn’t want to appear too anxious by showing up early. He decided to wait it out in the car with the painting. Every Buffalo story also requires a urination scene. The seller was concerned about leaving the painting in the car, or leaving the car and carrying the painting into a building. He went behind a dumpster.
The seller contacted me again at 1:45 p.m. He reported that he was “going in.” My phone rang a few minutes later but the connection failed. I phoned back and the seller nervously whispered that he was beginning his meeting with the woman. He would call me back. At 2:05 my phone rang. “What happened?” I asked impatiently. “They laughed me out of the place,” the seller reported. He continued, “She could have been a little nicer about telling me that I was losing fifty million dollars.”
The Sotheby’s woman had studied the painting for about twelve seconds. She actually seemed more interested in his packaging, particularly the wife’s unfinished apple painting which he used as a wrapping paper.
Exhibit “B”: The the seller’s wife’s unfinished apple painting.
The painting “lacked the precision of the great masters.” She also said that the “signature did not look like Cezanne’s signature”.
http://www.uen.org/utahlink/tours/tourElement.cgi?element_id=34784&tour_id=17720&category_id=28211
Exhibit “C”: Cezanne signature.
The signatures look pretty darned close to me. The seller thinks so too. If the woman was wrong about the signature, then it calls into question her other argument as well. What does precision have to do with modern art anyway? Didn’t throwing paint from across the room at the canvas create many masterpieces? How precise is the Yellow Square painting that we have all admired at the Albright-Knox?
The seller and I agree that the authenticity of the painting is still an unresolved issue. I suggested placing the painting on eBay to solicit input from the marketplace.
You can see the auction at: http://cgi.ebay.com/Cezanne-Masterpiece-House-in-Provence-Near-Gardanne_W0QQitemZ180112628429QQihZ008QQcategoryZ20129QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
The opening deaccessioning bid starts at $1.00. So far there have been no takers.
(The seller will consider a Buy-It-Now price of $60,000,000.00 for those shopping for Mother’s Day.)
Being in the modern art business, the Buffalo Bloviator now feels as though we are among the misunderstood.
Dear Buffalo Bloviator;
I want to sincerely thank all of you who expressed their support for the RiverWright Ethanol plant in Buffalo. Literally hundreds of letters, emails and phone calls were made to Common Councilmen and, believe me, your voices were heard!
Thanks again for your support!
Kevin Townsell
RiverWright Energy
Buffalo’s entry into the world of ethanol making with an $80 million plant on the Buffalo River received final approval Tuesday. By an 8-1 vote, the Common Council gave the project its final approval and set the stage for an operation that will turn bushels of corn into gallons of alternative fuel.
Developers said the Council’s action allows them to begin construction this summer and start manufacturing ethanol by June of next year. The facility will employ about 67 people.
The plant, located in the city’s Old First Ward, will reuse a cluster of dormant grain elevators left over from Buffalo’s heyday as a flour and grain manufacturing center.
This is the final approval, said Rick Smith III of River- Wright Energy, the firm developing the plant. We wanted to make sure we addressed all the community’s concerns, and I think we have.
The Council gave its approval, required because the Childs Street plant is in a Coastal Review District, after the city Planning Board ruled the project would not have a harmful impact on the community.
The one Council member who voted against the project said he believes the board was hasty in reaching that conclusion.
I think it should have had a full environmental assessment review,†Council President David Franczyk said.
Franczyk said he remains concerned about potential odor, noise and pollution problems and suggested the city is simply rubber-stamping the project.
His colleagues disagreed, and so did the neighborhood’s largest community group, which came out in favor of the project.
Mayor Byron W. Brown told The Buffalo News on Tuesday he supports the ethanol plant and is satisfied the Planning Board and Zoning Board have adequately addressed all issues.
With everything appearing to be in order, I intend to sign it, Brown said, referring to the item the Council approved Tuesday.
Once up and running, the plant is expected to turn 40 million bushels of corn into 110 million gallons of ethanol each year.
News Staff Reporter Brian Meyer contributed to this report.
In response to very much appreciated requests to post a progress report on the 153 Delaware Avenue restoration, I submit the following pictoral essay. A picture is worth a thousand bloviations. (The thousand bloviations shall be forthcoming.)
As the following pictures will attest, the early stages of a restoration are far from glamorous. Most of the early efforts go toward stabilizing the property and correcting structural issues. But hey, it doesn’t get any better than this. I even get to make lots of trips to Home Depot -I have found a state of happiness.
This is “Big Blue” way before it was painted blue. The years would not be easy on the big guy.
One of the things I learned while shopping for downtown property is that every old building is replete with an old safe, and that there are no longer any safe movers willing to take on those big old monsters. The safe in Big Blue was collapsing a room. I also learned that when Ellicott Development (the people who sold me Big Blue) have a “tough job”, they send this man. The “Man In Black” made good on their promise to remove the old 2100 pound safe.
The safe was too heavy for the stairs so they “peeled” it. Happy 4th of July!
Anybody want a slightly used safe?
These old safes are made of fireproof concrete sandwiched in a
thin steel skin. If you ever use a safe to protect valuables,
be sure to use the cast iron inner safe. The small inner safe accounts
for most of the weight and is not easily peeled. The small inner safe
had to be lowered down the fire escape with cables, using their biggest guy as a counter weight.
His men applied their finesse to this ice machine that was too big for the door.
Do you prefer your ice cubed, slivered, or crushed? How’bout your ice machine?
In order to keep the expensive fire sprinkler pipes from freezing, I had to set up emergency heating by patching together the inventory of furnace components in the building. Later I will relocate them. Luckily our winter was late this year. The basement had no heater, but I found an orphaned furnace in the back of the kitchen and set it up in the basement. That kept the basement at a nice safe 50 degrees. The mice were happy. This was the first time that I have ever actually used duct tape (Swiss Army knife) for its manufacturer’s intended purpose.
 
I tore out the kitchen ceiling and installed insulation. The 22 foot walk-in cooler is for the wife’s beer. It also serves as a handy scaffold so that you can lie down and work on the ceiling like Michael Angelo.
I hired designer Paul LaMorticella and architect David Sutton to help me create a master plan. While the master plan is being developed, I am removing the paint from the exterior brick. The historic brick from 1865 has a very fragile fire skin. I am attempting to preserve the character that the years have provided. Commercial outfits would typically media blast the building. Gentle baking soda is the latest sand blasting material used to remove paint on historic brick because the rain carries away the spent media. This method would leave a clean, light orange color that you see on many restored buildings such as The Mansion on Delaware Avenue. I prefer the distressed, multi-colored effect because it reminds me of the last time I tried growing a beard.
Another new method is to apply caustic putty to the surface of the building and then cover it with a sheet of plastic like a bandage. The plastic sheet keeps the caustic material from drying out or being washed away by rain. Then you peel the bandage off, scrape the residue and repeat. This method is not easy for one person to apply, especially if tall ladders give him nosebleeds.
I formulated my own inexpensive paint-weakening caustic jelly that freezes below 55 degrees and looks like White-Out (which was invented by a family with links to Buffalo). It is environmentally neutral and creates no airborne residue. My custom “paint bloviator” clings to the paint for weeks when the temperature is cool. I applied it to the building during the deep freeze that we had in February. I pretended that I was Sam Wilkeson working in stubborn, frozen solitude. I devised several methods for applying it from the ground. One method involved equipment I purchased at Toys R Us. I got some pretty strange looks from passers by. Standing on Delaware Avenue wearing a Devo suit, a full visor, and shooting a blinking ray gun that turned a haunted looking house into a white frozen glob, I guess I must have appeard to be either a performance artist or a ghost buster.
The final removal method utilizes the 24 foot fiberglass and aluminum pressure washer extension shown leaning up against the wall. I wear a nylon harness that helps me support the weight. Mark Croce was driving by one day and noticed me working. He recommended that I try a special spinning water head for the pressure sprayer. It is somewhat like a shower message head, on steroids, that would remove your skin. It works great.
Today, in an exciting surprise development, I began uncovering a painted sign on the side of the building. So far it says, “OF 25″ in 1920’s era font. You can see it in the second to the last picture.
