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Occhio contro occhio

Folk Art/Vernacular Architecture/Cultural Landscapes

n/a

May 27, 2008

The Garden of Earthly Delights in Fresno

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Baldassare Forestiere's "Underground Gardens," Fresno, 2008.

A Brief Visit to California’s Subterranean Marvel, Baldassare Forestiere’s “Underground Gardens.”

May 2, 2008

Holy Land USA, a Religious Vision in Ruins

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Holy Land USA, Waterbury, CT, 2005.

During the 1960s and 1970s, 40,000 people visited Waterbury, CT annually to pray at Holy Land USA, a Catholic theme park created by John Greco. Now it lies in ruins.

March 30, 2008

Gino Vitale, Brooklyn developer and shrine builder.

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Gino Vitale, with one of his Red Hook shrine buildings in the background, March 24, 2008.

Brooklyn developer Gino Vitale adapts the centuries old edicole sacre (devotional shrines) to his newly constructed buildings.

March 19, 2008

St. Joseph's Altar, Barese Style

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Antonietta Vitucci's St. Joseph's altar, March 18, 2008.

Celebrating St. Joseph in Brooklyn and some thoughts on lived religion.

August 28, 2008

Lace in the Crystal City

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
The exhibition “Lace, the Spaces Between,” Corning, New York.

An exhibition presents women’s domestic needlework in Corning, New York.

December 23, 2008

An Epic of Mediterranean Culture

Joey Skee
Joe Milone and his Exhibited Shoe Shine Stand, 1942.

Sixty-six years ago, the Museum of Modern Art exhibited a Sicilian-American bootblack’s decorated shoeshine kit, contributing to the museum director’s eventual dismissal.

September 28, 2008

Backyard Figs from Brooklyn

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Figs

In which this blogger says nothing more profound than he really, really likes figs.

February 23, 2010

Ricordando Vincenzo Ancona

Joey Skee
Martha Cooper
Vincenzo Ancona, Castel del Golfo Social Club, Brooklyn, 1987.

Poet, visual artist, raconteur, singer, immigrant laborer, friend.

March 24, 2010

Visiting 15th Century Italy with my 15-Year-Old Son

Joey Skee

Gaming lessons from the Boot.

June 1, 2010

Building Community, the Brooklyn Way

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
KAVES, Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, April 14, 2010.

Meet KAVES, band leader, tattoo artist, community activist.

February 22, 2011

Craftsmanship Documented

Joey Skee
The Metropolitan Musuem of Art
Mandolins (detail), New York, circa 1900, crafted by Angelo Mannello (1858-1922).

Italian Americans at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

May 5, 2011

Talking Folklore

Joey Skee

Over the next several months, I will be presenting the book Italian Folk in venues throughout the New York metropolitan area.

October 20, 2011

A Ph.D. in Basket Weaving

Joey Skee
Folklorist Joseph Sciorra, Ph.D. (University of Pennsylvania, 1996), holding Italian-American immigrant Vincenzo Ancona’s Sicilian-style basket made in Castellammare del Golfo (Trapani), Sicily in 1985.

Italian-American anti-intellectualism rears its ugly little head again.

December 25, 2007

Gramsci’s Presepio

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Underground Nativity, 2007.

The domestic presepio, an example of living folklore.

February 2, 2013

Representing Cowboy Life, Italian/American Style

Joey Skee
Chris Moran/Nevada Commission on Tourism

The exhibition “Italian Buckaroos: Old World & New World”

February 13, 2013

Visiting Italian-American Ranchers in the West

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Tomera Ranch, Elko county, Nevada, 2013.

Italian-American folklife.

October 17, 2012

The Decorated Flowerpots of Brooklyn

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Decorated planter, 1601 81st Street, Dyker Heights, Brooklyn, 2012.

Looking (again) at a little known Italian-American folk art.

May 24, 2013

Flatlands Flowerpot Find

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
1293 and 1297 East 52nd Street, off Avenue J, Flatlands, Brooklyn.

More on the continuing saga of the mysterious planters.

June 14, 2013

Variations on a Theme

Joey Skee
Joseph Sciorra
Decorated planter, 1471 East 31st Street, Flatlands, Brooklyn.

Pattern in the Material Folk Culture of Brooklyn’s Decorated Planters