Eastern State Peniteniary, PA

Whenever Dave Cohen & I get together to photograph with our friend Alan Simmons it’s a can’t-miss goodtime, and this trip to the Eastern State Penitentiary was surely on the mark.  Much like our trip to Philly last December the plan was to meet in the parking lot just as they opened, storm the castle with our tripods, and enjoy the results and memories forever after.  

Just entering this incredible piece of history you instantly get the sense of confinement, which is certainly the proper feeling a prison architect would interject into her design.  After walking down a long, lonely hallway with a few rooms on both sides, carefully ducking to protect our gear through the low doorway, we entered the official starting gate.  Here we paid the tripod fee and “suggested donation,” but we passed on the headphones and recordings describing what we were about to see.  This blog won’t give you all of the wonderful descriptions, details and history of the place or characters and events that occurred within its walls.  The Reader is encouraged to investigate these interests and/or visit the prison for further, more personal knowledge. 

We then climbed some steps to the outside where we were directed to enter the main prison spokes where the tour begins.  Here we were greeted by the first of many very helpful guides.  Noticing our tripods and lack of headphones he quickly deduced our mission.  He spent some time saving us time in our effort by suggesting a better “photographer’s path” through the maze.  This helpful guide can be seen in photo #3. 
Photographers visiting this structure will appreciate the lighting set up to insure interesting photos.  The original design seemed to bring in outside light to illuminate the dark cells, dingy hallways and guard post hubs with their security morrors.  Some of the corridors are closed, some are reserved for special guests willing to pay extra, some may be temporarily closed for maintenance, but there is always plenty of space to indulge your creative impulses.  Most of the individual cells are blocked with a single iron crossbar that still allows photographers the ability to shoot passed for an exposure of the interiors.  A few cells are left open and contain exhibits, some of which change periodically and others that are intended to be more permanent.  You would think that the cells would be uniformly designed like most prisons, but at Eastern State there seems to be some uniqueness to many. 

The most unique cell is Al Capone’s sweet suite.  The interior of his cell is seen in photos 23, 24 & 25.  He was arrested for a concealed weapons charge May, 1929, in Philly and served 8 months of his year sentence in this cell.  Here is an excerpt from the sign you can see in photo 21:

"...the officials at Eastern State Penitentiary were nothing if not generous.

"They allowed Capone comforts not typically granted to inmates, including fine furniture, oriental rugs, oil paintings and a fancy radio."  You can read between the lines, right?  It's likely we can substitute the word "bought" for "generous." No offense, guys. It was part of the desing then. 

One spot where I was disappointed was the Catholic Chaplain's Office.  Inmate Lester Smith painted 23 murals covering the entire walls.  They are trying to restore the murals, but I thought we'd be allowed in to photograph what remains on the walls.  It was closed to the public until the public comes up with enough money to secure it's ransom.  Photo 29 was my favorite of the day.  It was shot through glass but I really enjoy the felling.  Another disappointment came through my own fault.  Once, when I went outside I noticed The Hospital.  That was another place I wanted to photograph.  It was currently closed and I never came back to it.  After a quick snapshot of the door and hours sign I noticed The Yard.  To me it was a baseball field, one that was used even in the game's infancy.  I stood and imagined the lines, the plays, the fights --the fun.  When I saw this I was sure it was the pitching coach walking back to the dugout, leaving the infield players to sooth the pitcher while the third base coach talked to his runner, the potential winning run.  I'm still not sure I was wrong.

The most photographed barber chair in the world is in cell block 10.  It used to be in a barber shop closer to Scarface's Suite, but was moved here when the shop's walls started crumbling beyond cheap repair.  There are also many cells converted into interesting displays with a great deal of info about the history of ESP.  Here is a 5-second exposure of a movie displayed on the dark back wall of a cell.  On the ESP site you can find a shot where the photographer was able to pause the video and light the bed.  Very cool. 

There are many eerie looking faces in the peeling paint both inside and outside many cells, like the Casper found in photos 65 & 66.  Although they may be relatively new faces, I'm sure the inmates had no trouble seeing similar spectres that lengthened many a night.   Perhaps they also saw less menacing creatures like this goose found on the back wall in photos 67 & 68. 

Our trip-planning legend, Lewis DeJoseph, for the Northeast Photography Club has sited this place as a must-go feature for the entire club.  I can't wait to see what some of those folks get down here, and I'd like to get down here when they do. 

Dave was able to hold a 10-second shot in photo 14, but this shot had to be discarded because I failed to tell Alan to hold still for 1-half second.  After an amazing tour we finally emerged from the fantastic darkness, and, unlike the stereotypical release from prison, we didn't vow to not come back.  To the contrary.  We'll be back.  Once on the outside we didn't stop shooting.  Sounds like real ganstas, huh?  Yeah, we'll be back. 

Ricketts Glen, PA

...Coming soon...'though prolly not

The Cloisters, NY

Our trip to The Cloisters was organized by Lewis De Joseph and the Trip Planning Committee of the Northeast Photo Club.  Lew's car left from Dunmore with Ray Listanski, Alan Peslak & Jim Cook .  I rode with Dave Cohen and we met them there.  It was a pleasant early morning drive, even though there was a 40+ minute delay at the George Washington Bridge.

We found a parking spot and walked in not knowing if the rest of the group even made it yet.  Dave figured Lew was ignoring my calls and provided several reasons why, then tried the number himself and got the same voice mail.  Well, we knew we'd have a good time and hoped for the best.  At the check-in counter we learned we would have to carry our backpacks in our hands.  When I called about that sort of thing I was informed we'd have to get there before noon to get a tripod pass and that backpacks would be no problem.  If they would have mentioned the handholding policy, I certainly would have packed lighter because the weight of the bag is best distributed to the bottom for carrying comfort when on the back.  The woman behind the counter was gracious enough to tag my bag and allow me to periodically return to change lenses --a procedure I quickly abandoned and henceforth carried on in the elbow-dislodging tradition.

At first Dave and I walked aimlessly as if not knowing what to shoot. I was thinking of our recent times at the historical society where it was almost like a job photographing pieces in their museum.  The Cloisters is owned and operated by MoMA.  All of the pieces within its walls, including many walls, are from European abbeys from the 9th thru 16th centuries.  We certainly knew that each piece was adequately photographed when catalogued so we went in search of our own ways of seeing things.   At this point I felt a release, and quickly relaxed into the usual comfort of the Creative Overself.  We were off.

After about a half hour we looked up and wondered "Where are those guys?" when there they were in the cloister in front of us.  Well, three of them at least --Jim was in another room making his magic.  The rest were scattered about in the garden obviously capturing the close-up world.  It gave me another opportunity to regret missing the recent 2-part macro class given by fellow member Jakub Jasinski.  Other regrets were not paying enough attention to the historical information signs describing each piece, and not getting a shot of the back of the bishop in photo 24.  It's a 600-year-old wooden piece and the whole back and his left side are missing.  The background of that shot is intended to illustrate the deficiency in a subtle way, but a shot from behind might have been more telling.  Here is a shot of a room of sarcophagi taken from the steps behind the bishop.  My unopened tripod was merely leaning on the metal handrail and I steadied it with a hand unable to remain motionless for the requisite 15 seconds, so you know I didn't expect much.  My lack of enthusiasm was because of the large number of people that were always gathered in that room.  Many other photos throughout the gallery have people in them, but moving people tend to disappear in 30-second exposures.  That brings up another regret.  I could have used a 9-stop neutral density filter to drastically lengthen the exposure and maybe could have made a photo with tack sharp sarcophagi surrounded by swirling colors of motion. 

After passing through the room of the dead we went for lunch at The Trie Café which is conveniently nestled within the confines of The Cloisters.   The afternoon sunlight was beginning to break through the clouds and haze by the time we were fed, and we decided to capture some of its brilliance just outside the eatery.   Sensing the harshness of light and increase in attendance we gradually filtered back inside to find the morning magic that now was gone.  The crowds were becoming too thick to blur through the long exposures, and the morning mood seemed to be slumping into a pleasant memory.  It seemed to me we were all experiencing that "I'll shoot this until you're done with that" type of photography which rarely would result in a fine print.  Almost magically one-by-one we found our way to another part of the outside and ended with the six of us alone to enjoy each other's stories.  We all probably got similar hazy shots of the Hudson with a tall ship and the GWB in the background.  It reminds me of how Lew used to ride his bike passed this building on his trips to and from New Jersey when he was a kid.  

We called it a day and a good one it was. It wasn't until we walked to our cars that we realized we had parked right next to each other. Dave said it best when talking with Melba on our way home when he said he would have got more out of it if he DIDN'T have his camera.  It also would have been better to somehow miss the traffic tie-ups that stretched our return trip by about two hours, Sometimes that's the price of admission to a wonderful shoot with such fine company. Let's do another.