Vulnerability R Sto ic ry h a a n r d d P h P ot o os s n by er hissing and creaking ice floes. Spellbound by their resemblance to massive levitating sheets of glass, I stood in transfixed silence. Mesmerized. Until I noticed my gloves had frozen solid to the boat railing. Which is how I left them; in sublime rigor mortis, a gift-to-the-gods for the privilege of witnessing such a luminous sight. . . . But I digress. Yet what is the art and science of j window repair, but a digression? A Stockholm has over a dozen 24-hour removal services; Sicily, on the other hand, has not one. A benign climate alleviates the need to hibernate behind a thermal-paned Maginot Line. It enables a person to live with, rather than in opposition to, the breaks. Mild temperatures coupled with a rural- agrarian economy, create a fertile soil from which eclectic repairs blossom. Anonymous Fixers use a myriad of objects in their repairs: bird cages, place gold leaf in the cracks of vessels; or Jerusalem pilgrims, whose written prayers are painstakingly folded and wedged into chinks of the Wailing Wall. In both cases, the crack becomes alchemically transformed into a sign of reverence and survival. I see the bandaged pane as a phenomenally ephemeral example of twentieth-century street art. The ad- hoc doctored window reflects an attitude toward the glass canvas not unStruck deer hurtled through their car action s Gar army March Window closes, rs the tnclude de sup- opposi- who begged the left and low their Guatema- i t conver- isible. oof of the red when e that be- r Alvarez *4nn000 opens reolacement u o n t be operational un- [« 19S a tthe earliest. This is the same ‘ ear that "he last SUBROC » sup noM-t to be withdrawn from senile- - r e t General Accounting O mipeests that, lik*' WASHINGTON — President Kea ean is trying to close what he calls the 'w indow of vulnerability that would allow- iH eS iv ie ts to pene tra te^ land-based missile defenses. But leaving wide open asmaher _ ake our carrier fleet'submarines virtually de fenseless against attacking Soviet submarines. The problem is not only that a —- “ sumbarine gap is devel- T y caused by unseem On £ J note t o * - Jack Anderson time. 1 su join me ir concernin For st of embol breakthre surrende’ inch fart limb As example, and subi As comp er incur admissio services ness. K meekly our bre; settle fc upon a Wh like t har MJCITUX AND PATTERN Every physical form, every living form, every pattern of feeling or thought has its own unique identity, its boundaries, its extension and its wider context; it contains or is contained by another pattern; it follows or is followed by another pattern. The unique identity, discrete shape, and nature of a spaceoccupying substance are shaped by the boundary that separates it from and connects it to the space outside. An organic form lives and grows only through its intricate transactions with its environment. An optical event becomes a visually perceived figure only when seen against its ground. The quality, feeling, and meaning of a sound is cast in the matrix of the physical processes that generated it; it is not independent of its surrounding silence or the other sounds that frame i t In the same way the physical, biological, or moral individuality of man is the function of his active relationship with the physical and social environment. —Gyorgy Kepes “Art and Ecological Consciousness” Arts of the Environment, 1972 THE VENGEFULVANDALISMOFKRISTALLNACHT % On November 7, 1938, a young Polish Jew named Herschel Grynszpan Onset), an unemployed 17-year-old, shot and k illed the th ird secretary o f the Reich's embassy in Paris. He d id it, Grynszpan declared, to avenge Nazi treatment o f his fe llow Jews. On hearing the news H it ler flew into a rage and prepared to exact vengeance in the form o f the worst pogrom that had ever taken place in modern Germany. On H itler's instructions, all German Jews were to be punished, and German nonJews responded w ith terrible enthusiasm. W ith in 60 hours o f Grynszpan's confession a wave o f lethal vandalism swept through Jewish synagogues, homes and stores. In the course o f the ir thuggish orgy, which came to be called Kristallnacht fo r the shards o f glass that littered German streets, the Nazis by the ir own estimate k illed 35 Jews, arrested many thousands, and levied against all German Jews fines that totaled one b illion marks. They also wrecked 7,500 shops and 119 synagogues, and in a final insult added to injury, they confiscated the money that was later paid to Jews fo r insurance claims— five m illion marks ($1,250,000) fo r the broken glass alone. Curious Germans peer at the gutted interior of a Jewish shop—one of hundreds the Nazis wrecked in retaliation for apolitical murder committed by a Jew. The destruction sped up a process that eliminated Jews from Germany's economic, social and political life. break, as it were, from the habitual desire to glaze our lives with a frost of perfection. Aside from ship christenings and Jewish weddings, where glass is smashed in the name of good fortune, broken glass glistens with associations to violence, rebellion, frustration, release, and surprise. To paraphrase Mr. Wright once again, broken glass literally reflects the degree to which Form follows Fahrenheit. Climate and topography affect people’s ability to cope with the breaks. In northern countries, broken panes are replaced rather than repaired: like the H ippocratic manner in which the medical profession approaches a patient. The Crack Doctor’s Oath, however, reads: “ Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.” When architectural acne requires urban(e) plastic surgery, certain procedures must be observed. First, clean the wound and apply a local anesthetic; soap and water will do. Simple fissures can be sp lin ted w ith tape and wood or nuts and bo lts . Compound fractures, on the other hand, require more extensive window dressing. To heal these rifts, apply stitches and s ilicone injections (to suture fancy). When the pane becomes more than an accident, the operation is a success. While studying the cracks in walls, Leonardo daVinci discovered “ a divine landscape . . . which quickens the spirit of invention.” The calligraphy of repaired w in dows creates an equally divine landscape. Written in cursive R o r s c h a c h s c r ip t , these t r a n s l u c e n t paleographs are as mysterious as Arabic or Chinese curls of alphabet. In Hebrew, the form of each letter itself was once worshipped as a manifestation of the Lord. Will future generations s tudy these “ clear stories" as some form of automatic writing, to be dec iphered fo r origin and meaning? Someday I hope to do a stained glass commission for San Francisco Mill Valley Berlin flower boxes, weather vanes, tide tables, occasionally even the culprit who broke the pane in the first place. Like the Balinese, they "have no art; they just do everything the best they can.” "Shoulds and shouldn’ts,” “ dos and don’ts,” "building codes and Kants," are quietly discarded in the name of economy, brevity and wit. The Crack Patchers of Anytown carry neither high-tech tricks nor aesthetic trompe I'oeil cards camouflaged up their sleeves. Their patch-work simply reflects a direct use of indigenous materials. A situation somewhat akin to Japanese master craftsmen who a Zen meditation center. I would throw copies of the I Ching through every window in the building. The breakage would be mended in a manner harmonious with both the toss of the coins and the trajectory of the books. (After all, in Chinese there is no word for “ problem,” just “ dangerous opportunity.” Let me close this paean to patched panes with a tip-of-the-cap to our former Secretary of State, Mr. Alexander M. Haig Jr. Alex, like the Jabberwock in Alice in Wonderland, has a penchant for using words to mean whatever he chooses. “ Haigese,” unfortunately, lures innocent metaphors down dimly lit State Department corridors, only to browbeat them into crypto-military jargon. In an effort to rescue “windows of vulnerability” from such saber-rattling connotations, and restore its secular ambiguity, I chose it as the monicker for these photographs. Windows of Vulnerability began nearly a decade ago, as resource material for my architectural glass work. While paying attention to how people fix broken windows, I discovered a wealth of information about light, form, color, shadow, and composition. A process which has given me insight into Marcel Duchamp’s response upon being informed his “ Large Glass," ten years in the making, was broken while in transit. “ Finally,” he said. ■ Richard Posner is a Seattle artist Clinton St. Quarterly 31
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