Like most everything these days, we have to wait for what we want.
So it is with the rains.
They are only now showing up, in late January, three separate storms, arriving as they do in Los Angeles from the north, with a slow, steady buildup of gray clouds in the sky, perhaps the only event in our region that telegraphs its arrival with deliberate and reserved politeness.
After the first storm, we went up to Mulholland Drive where the winds were blowing and the sky was clear and the ground saturated.
From there you could see across the San Fernando Valley and into the distant San Gabriels shrouded under clouds of her own.
There is only time of year I truly adore in Southern California, and it is right now. Soon the miserly precipitation will end and the months of heat and smog will rear up again.
But right now there is glory in the sky and the views.
The New Yorker has a photo essay about Mike Mandel, who was born in 1950, studied at CSUN, and made a large body of photography here in the 1970s.
His work reminds me of the people who grew up here during that time, kids who were lucky to live a good life in houses with swimming pools, competent neighborhood schools, low cost college, and the ability to just do nothing, or everything, on foot, on bike, in car. Some are alive today, living in Encino or Woodland Hills or Studio City, inheritors of $2 million houses with $780 a year property taxes. These photos are their youth.
They had a rollicking good time in the past 70 years: getting high, going to concerts, having lots of sex, traveling everywhere and coming back to a freeway and shopping center universe in a city where only making yourself happy was considered the most profound errand in life.
The late 60s and early 70s was a subversive time with the Vietnam War, racial protests, and the Generation Gap. Anyone under 30 was thought angelic and gifted with great insights into human nature. Anyone over 30 was held responsible for all the hypocrisies and injustices of society. The Baby Boomers blamed their parents for conformity, environmental ruin, war and segregation. Yet these pissed off kids truly enjoyed a lucky period in the world, partaking of all the freedoms and leaving the bill for future generations.
The late 60s and early 70s imitated the time we live in now with cooler temperatures, unfiltered cigarettes and the insulted assurance that this country and state worked well for white people, and if everyone just got down, baby, and spoke their, like, mind, why, hey man, there was nothing that couldn’t be achieved, like even landing on the moon or dating Jane Fonda.
In the arts it was a time of blunt honesty, just showing things as they were, in music, movies and photography. There was group therapy, of just saying what was on your mind, no matter how embarrassing or crude or cruel. “Bob, Carol, Ted & Alice” captured that quintessential Southern California moment with its wry satire and takedown of the sexual revolution within married couples.
But there is nothing malicious or mean in Mandel’s work. It’s childlike in its openness, sweetness and curiosity.
If you had a camera, and practiced photography professionally, you went out and shot photos of suburbia, of people driving in cars, or you were goofy and put yourself, like Mike Mandel, in the middle of the photo with strangers. You saw the humor in ridiculous juxtapositions of people and environment: the shirtless slab of guy in the butcher shop, the suede coated beauty next to the space laser game, the old lady on her driveway with her boat and garbage can, the double cowboy hatted dude with a box of popcorn next to the bumper cars.
Now these images are a historical record of a lost time. And we value their freedoms, dearly, as we endure temporary incarceration and social isolation during this pandemic.
I went to look at just a part of it, May 1975 (3,724 images).
There are black and white photographs of entire stretches of streets in our city, for example every structure along Melrose Avenue for miles.
Many who possess far greater insights than I will concoct profundities about these pictures, connecting them to politics or music or the decline of the West.
They will project onto the photos whatever template of modern ideology they wish.
But I think these photos just are. They are the exact thing they show. And that is what makes them brilliant. For they are the essence of Los Angeles, a homely and free place of ambition and anomie.
There is 3910 Melrose Avenue with a circa 1964 Pontiac parked in front of a 1920s Spanish Style house with arched windows, topiary and a cement walled lawn.
At 7168 Melrose there is a commercial building, with a 1960s decorative screen covering over a 1920s red tiled roof and stucco façade.
Most of the photographs juxtapose car and architecture. That is the recipe. It makes us long for youth, ache for what has passed, and imagine what it might be like to drive a ’74 Camaro down spotless Melrose, listening to a Doobie Brothers 8-Track, and stopping off to pick up a bag of gourmet Brazilian nuts at Iliffili.
Sex was open and advertised in 1975. Cock of the Walk had live sexy males in private rooms. It was next door to Madam’s Cat House with sexy girls in private rooms. If you messed up your clothes you could slip in quickly next door and change into a new pair of old jeans at Hollywood Used Clothing.
Bundi’s at 8525 Melrose had stylish looking clothes. Just outside, a bus bench advertises the Jewish funeral services of Malinow Silverman.
Along 8650 Melrose, a 1969 Cadillac convertible, and a 1964 Chevy Impala coupe, are parked on the curb in front of several young, hip stores offering haircutting, needlework, a rock gallery, and Ruthe Lee Richman’s Art in Flowers.
A few doors down, Irving’s Coffee Shop served Pepsi-Cola. What kind of menu did they have ? Imagine your dining choices in 1975 Los Angeles, a 90% white city prior to the mass immigration and cuisines of Vietnamese, Filipino, Burmese, Persian, Haitian, Korean, Guatemalan, Honduran, Brazilian, Malaysian, and Sri Lankan peoples.
Imagine a city where so much was tolerated but where nobody lived under bridges or slept alongside freeways, and bus benches were used by bus riders.
Having trouble sleeping? Stop by International Water Beds. Writing letters to friends? Pick up some custom letterhead at Melrose Stationers. Is your cane chair falling apart? Frank Lew at 706 N. Orange Grove will repair it.
There are a lot of photos to look at. Like everything else these days we compare it to 2020. Even 2019 seems more like 1975 in the take-for-granted-liberties we had before the pandemic.
And now we close with these lyrics:
Freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose
Nothin’, don’t mean nothin’ hon’ if it ain’t free, no no
And, feelin’ good was easy, Lord, when he sang the blues
Last year, in early 2019, before all hell swept over the Earth, I was working as a photographer.
Seeking to refresh my portfolio, I contacted a model on Instagram who was a striking looking Black male. He had close to 20,000 followers. He agreed to a “trade for print” (TFP) which is just a term for a barter arrangement where a model and photographer work for free in a mutually beneficial arrangement.
I thought about how I might shoot this person, and I found a start-up clothing company that was just gearing up. The designer founder, a middle-aged white, who had 20 years of experience in fashion, had just moved from New York. He made rugby shirts, well-tailored trousers and other prep clothes that were locally manufactured in downtown Los Angeles to high quality standards.
I contacted the designer and drove down to his perfectly decorated art deco apartment in Hancock Park where he had selected and neatly folded jackets, pants, and shirts to photograph. Again, the arrangement was just to “tag” his products on Instagram and he would get credit and some free advertising and I would have loaner clothes for my model.
The model came over to my house. I shot him in the clothes as he stood in my backyard, and in a chair in my living room. And then he left. And all was fine. The Black guy with the green eyes in the colorful shirts looked wonderful. (I have erased his face to protect his identity.)
I felt some compassion for the model, who was, of course, also pursuing acting. I gave him a couple of leads of directors or producers I knew and said he should follow them online. He sent me texts of thanks. And that was the end.
Then the designer saw the gratis, no charge, promo photos.
And for whatever reason, he hated, despised, and was completely revolted by the good-looking young Black male. He gave no reasons, but it seemed that he preferred a “preppy, All-American” (WASPY) male. He was aghast at the free photographs and not at all appreciative of the pro-bono work. He told me he wished that I never put this Black man in his clothes.
A day later the model contacted me and asked why the designer had (unknown to me) blocked him on Instagram. I had no answer. My heart broke because I could not understand why. I could only guess racial animosity. But could not prove it. Why the hostility directed against this dark-skinned man? He had done nothing wrong other than wear the designer’s clothes!
I had, in my initiative, promoted a new clothing line, and an upcoming model, and all I had were some very fine photos. It had cost me nothing, except for the gasoline driving 30 miles roundtrip to Hancock Park.
Then a few months ago, about a year after the shoot, the model, whom I hadn’t communicated with, sent me a DM on Instagram. It read something like this:
“You do not have the right to TFP my name to promote your friend’s clothing company! You are OLD! Why don’t you go fuck your Chinese boyfriend!”
I didn’t answer. The attack was completely unprovoked. It did not matter to the model that he got free, edited, professional photographs that he could use to promote himself. And that my “friend” was not a friend at all, just a brand I found on Instagram. I guessed that the pandemic had made him just a bit more crazy as it had all of us.
Today, out of curiosity, I went to see whatever happened to that promising start-up company that made the very colorful rugby shirts and high-quality khakis.
I couldn’t see it. The clothing company designer had blocked me on Instagram.
I’m recounting this story because I had the best of intentions all around in producing this small shoot. Everyone was treated fairly, courteously, respectfully. Nobody was mistreated in any way.
I found an alternative way to look at the website of the designer’s IG page. He has one Black model in every single photo. And dozens of boxes of “Black Lives Matter” and all sort of salutes to racial justice and racial equality.
Of course, it’s past May 25, 2020. George Floyd is dead. Black Lives Matter. Everyone must show social media empathy for the cause. The company that sells the $200 khakis makes sure that its’ images are on the appropriate side of compassion.
I see the kind posts this year. I remember the mean actions of last year.
He was born in Egypt and came here when he was five. Ash lives with his mother and his 5-year-old son in Reseda. He is divorced and hurt his shoulder playing pool. Slight, medium height, shaved head, he has a kind, soft, shy demeanor.
Like most these days he has work and no work. I didn’t ask more. Nearly a quarter of the people in Los Angeles have no jobs. But Ash is sadly cheerful. He is devoted to his son and his scents. I asked my subject to wear a mask except when I photographed him.
We walked around my neighborhood, after 6, when the light was dimming and people were walking dogs and children. Some had masks, others did not.
You would never know something malign was afoot in the land.
There is a mid-century calm on the blocks that radiate off Kittridge west of Kester: Saloma, Lemona, Norwich, Noble, Haynes. The houses are nearly 70 years old. Not rich enough to be torn down, not quite poor enough for decay, they are like their residents: solid, homely, neat, clean, enduring without drama.
Except for the walkers, there are hardly any people outside. Nobody gardening, nobody socializing, nobody doing anything social.
This area has been dead at night since “I Love Lucy” went off the air.
There are a couple of houses for sale. I saw one, a not pretty ranch house with an asphalt driveway and crummy design. It’s for sale at $1.2 million. Another fancy one with a vinyl fence in front is just under a million.
Who is buying these houses? Not the unemployed or the homeless.
One just sold across the street from me, a fancy Z Gallerie style redesigned Spanish home, $1.3 million. It had been remodeled, non-stop, for four years, the owner lavishing last minute changes on the property while vacationing in Turkey and Mykonos. Just when you thought the remodeling was over, a new element was added, like a chandelier in the carport, or double oversized Buddha heads overlooking the hot tub.
Earlier this week, the new owners moved in. Yesterday, roofers came to pull down all the clay tiles and re-roof it.
Some have discretionary income, others line up in their cars to get bags of donated food.
Last evening, on the streets around here, the little ranch houses from the 1950s were going into another night. A man was testing paint colors on his garage. Along the sidewalk, beside the house with the American flag and the backyard basketball hoop, an old man with a red bandana mask walked with two little girls and their dog.
And Ash from Scent Trails was leaning against a tree, perhaps dreaming of his next lilac infused adventure.
A housing and planning blog I read, Granola Shotgun, recently had a post about how the author is hassled for taking photos in public for such elements as parking lots, buildings, encampments or anything structural connected to a human.
In the past 15 years, since I started this blog, I have had similar experiences of being confronted when diligently just recording any exterior anywhere because it captured my imagination.
As recently as March 2020, on the last night I went out to drink at MacLeod Ale, I left the brewery. I was with a friend, who also had a camera. The sun was setting. The light was golden and glorious. I had my Fuji XE3. While walking on Calvert towards Cedros, I started photographing many things that the light was hitting, including the exterior of an auto body shop.
Several tough, menacing looking men were conversing across from the shop. One yelled at me, “Hey! Why you taking picture?” he said.
I had a few beers so I answered, “Because I want to. I’m not on private property and the sun looks beautiful on that building.”
“What building? What sun? What you talking about?” he answered.
We walked over to Bessemer St. through the trash of a block long homeless encampment, (which I wouldn’t dare shoot) which once would have been illegal and immoral, but is now normal. People living, shitting, drinking, sleeping on the street. By the tens of thousands. OK in Garbageciti.
On Bessemer, as we got into the car, a tinted window Mercedes SUV drove by slowly, eyeing us, letting us know we were under his surveillance. Nothing happened, but we drove away chilled at the implicit threat.
I write and photograph about the urban condition of my neighborhood. I do it with the intent of telling the truth, not to promote my product or sell a political dogma. A billboard on Kester at the golden hour is just a billboard.
In 2006, I was photographing the exterior of the historic Valley Municipal Building on a Monday morning. An older woman came out, not a security guard, just an older woman, and she screamed, “What are you doing! Why are you shooting this building!” She had a car, and she drove up to me as I walked along Sylvan St. asking again what I was doing.
“There are people who want to harm this country!” she said through her window.
Like her. Opponents of constitutionally protected free speech.
Photography is politicized now, like everything else. A public photo in Los Angeles is assumed to be:
ICE finding undocumented people.
TMZ trailing a celebrity.
Location scouting for a porn.
A developer intent on building something.
A Karen uncovering a violation.
Will a photograph ever just be a photograph again? Could Robert Doisneau or Henri-Cartier Bresson shoot children on the street today? Or would they be confronted by parents or teachers or strangers asking what the hell they were doing?
How did it come to be that a joyful, celebratory, observant act, public photography, become so reviled and feared? We live in a time when every person has a camera on their phone, so anyone can really take a photo anywhere at any time, yet the deliberate, artistic, considered flaneur, strolling through the city after a few glasses of wine, can be confronted if he carries a traditional camera and aims it at strangers.
Then there is the aspect of shame. We have no public shame anymore. People dress, eat and behave in ways that would largely be considered shameful by 1945 or 1970 standards. So shame is employed as a tool by the weak, sometimes used against others who are weak, but often to gather like minded bullies together to defeat free-thinkers.
These examples of 21st C. public dress and obscene signs would have probably been against law or custom 60 years ago. Just as today it would be unthinkable for grown man with a camera going up to a children crossing the street and photographing them, as Henri Cartier Bresson did in Paris 80 years ago.
The public no longer knows what is properly public and what is not.
When private people prohibit public photography, they often think they are exercising the rule of law. Security guards fall into this category. Yet they stand on weak ground. No building, other than a military installation, has the right to not be photographed.
And we live in time of political intention. Every act is political. One can identify with a political party by wearing or not wearing a virus guarding mask, or drinking soda with a plastic straw, living in a gated McMansion, expressing sympathy for the police, or wearing a red baseball cap. All can get you harmed or doxxed.
At the 2017 Woman’s Rights March, I went out with several older neighbors and of course I had my camera. It was a historic moment. And I photographed a crowd near Universal City. Which provoked a young guy, masked in bandana, to walk up and demand to know why I was photographing.
There is nothing illegal about photographing people in public. Or buildings. Even outside a schoolyard, even families picnicking in the park, even photographing a parking lot in a poor area of Van Nuys. These are all legal and protected by law.
But no law protects against widespread public fear of freedom of speech. When enough mobs band together to ban something you can be sure it will be. Photography by photographer is on the list of once free rights that face censoring, cancelling and expulsion.
Here in Van Nuys 
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