Backdrop for a Town Hall Meeting

So honored to be represented by Congressman Jerry Nadler, an upholder and scholar of the Constitution, a man of integrity, intellect, and commitment, and an unabashed progressive, who hopefully will be our next Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Nadler hosted a town hall meeting tonight. He picked the “largest venue” for his constituents, the auditorium of the High School of Fashion Industries on West 24th Street.

The place turned out to be a hidden gem (of many in the greatest city in the world.) There, flanking both walls of the auditorium were two monumental, detailed murals (a WPA project most probably,) completed in 1940 by Ernest Fiene, who depicted the birth of the union movement in the needle trades, emanating from the catastrophic Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire.

Arthur Fellig in Color

Among the many gems in this trove (332 pieces) of artistic (Sudeks, Shores, Camerons, Hujars, Muybridges, snowflake microphotographs by Bentley, Blumenfeld’s “Blonde,” Capa’s “Bolshoi,”) industrial, scientific, commercial and legal photographic imagery in the intimate photo auction preview of The Knowing Eye: Photographs & Photobooks at Swann Galleries this week (auction today), I found myself returning to examine this ernest calling card, the tiniest item in the show.