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 ; 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 unlike the Hippocratic manner action s Gar army March Window closes, rs the include de sup- opposi- who begged the left and low their i Guatema-1 it conver-1 >sible. ’ oof of the red when e that be- * Alvarez *4^.000 opens ~ WASHINGTON - President Hea l gan is trying to close what he calls the ■window of vulnerability'1 that would J allow the SovirtHo penetrate oug land-based missile defenses. ButhOS leaving wide open a smalleCjd inor«tni < ake our Tarrierrleet submarines virtually de tenseless against attacking Soviet submarines. The problem is not only that a "sumbarine gap' is develreplacement won't be operational until 1989 at the earliest. This is the same ear that the last SVBROC is sup- ? .d to ub.e, withdrawn ffrrnom sserrviice.. -ret General Accounting 0 siipyests that. likA time. I su join me ir concernin For st of embol break! hn surrende' inch fart limb: As example, and subi As comp er incur: admissio services ness. tc meekly our bre; settle ft upon a Wh. like t har Y r -oused by unseem l ^ l e a Z ^ handle^’ * ^b ^' near Was K a te r i MATRIX 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 it. 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 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 splinted with tape and wood or nuts and bolts. Compound fractures, San Francisco THE VENGEFUL VANDALISM OF KRISTALLNACHT On November 7,1938, a young Polish Jew named Herschel Grynszpan (inset), an unemployed 17-year-old, shot and killed the third secretary of the Reich's embassy in Paris. He did it, Grynszpan declared, to avenge Nazi treatment of his fellow Jews. On hearing the news Hitler flew into a rage and prepared to exact vengeance in the form of the worst pogrom that had ever taken place in modern Germany. On Hitler's instructions, all German Jews were to be punished, and German nonJews responded with terrible enthusiasm. Within 60 hours of Grynszpan's confession a wave of lethal vandalism swept through Jewish synagogues, homes and stores. In the course of their thuggish orgy, which came to be called Kristallnacht for the shards of glass that littered German streets, the Nazis by their own estimate killed 35 Jews, arrested many thousands, and levied against all German Jews fines that totaled one billion 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 for insurance claims—five million marks ($1,250,000) for the broken glass alone. Curious Germans peer at the gutted interior of a Jewish shop—one of hundreds the Nazis wrecked in retaliation for a political murder committed by a Jew. The destruction sped up a process that eliminated Jews from Germany's economic, social and political life. on the other hand, require more extensive window drossing. To heal these rifts, apply stitches and silicone 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 windows creates an equally divine landscape. Written in cursive Rorschach script, these translucent 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 study these “clear stories" as some form of automatic writing, to be deciphered for origin and meaning? Someday I Mill Valley hope to do a Berlin stained glass 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: 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 commission for 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. ■ Clinton St. Quarterly 19
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