'Buried Treasure', by Richard Friswell, is part of a larger story about the '07 opening of the Philip Johnson Glass House in New Canaan, CT. It won the Folio: Magazine National Gold Medal for Editiorial Excellence in 2007. This sidebar story describes the extraordinary art collection and the buildings housing it on the estate grounds, now a site of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Article pdf (3.5mb)

Wild Thing is the complete text of a story written by Mr.Friswell on 2008, which won the National Silver Medal for Editiorial Excellence from Folio: Magazine. It describes the photography of Roberto Dutesco and the wild horses of Sable Island; a remote, mid-Atlantic sand spit that he explored photographically for nearly 13 years. Article pdf (2.5mb)

Excerpt from magazine article: Write of Passage, a review of an artist’s current exhibition

Emerging from the subway into the blinding light of Canal Street on New York City’s lower east side, I quickly get my bearings and navigate my way past the throngs of shopkeepers and tourists, walking briskly toward my destination.  As I enter Chinatown, the sidewalks are a jumble of baskets and crates, displaying vegetables and glistening sea life in every imaginable form and color. Some of these unwitting captives squirm helplessly, but most lie stacked and motionless, staring in stunned disbelief at the hazy summer sun high above. A vast array of shoppers in all shapes and sizes can be seen poking and prodding these hapless creatures, mentally sizing them up as a meal for tonight’s table.  Here, in this market, there is an unblinking connection between death and dinner.

Excerpt- Sidebar to museum catalogue article exploring the link between Impressionist painting, past and present

Author’s note: Is light really different from place to place?
The short answer is, yes…and from time-to-time within a day.  The unique feature of Connecticut shoreline light is the moisture-saturated nature of its proximity to the sea.  The humidity and air-borne particles of water prevalent near bodies of water make for denser air, thereby softening detail in the viewer’s eye. It also makes for richer colors in everything we see there, especially warm whites, reds and yellows.  This same effect can be found in the south of France, where the prevailing North African winds (seasonal mistrals) blow Mediterranean Sea air far inland.  As a painter, I have seen similar color saturation in Italy’s Tuscan Region and the Cote d’Azure in France, also close to the sea and similarly affected by prevailing breezes. By contrast, the light in mountainous regions is crisp and dry, heightening the effects of cool blues, purples and greens and preserving detail, even over great distances.

Claude Monet studied these light effects and produced a well-know series of haystack paintings where the impact of time-of-day was a key factor in his use of color and shadow.  Identical subject matter seems to shift and change shape from morning, to mid-day, to evening in these works.  A similar examination of light’s impact on a subject can be seen in his 1892-4 series of paintings of Rouen Cathedral.  Monet set up his easel in a rooming house window, overlooking the church.  There, he worked on multiple canvases, over the course of many months, to painstakingly record the changing effects of light on the façade of his now-famous subject.

Excerpt from promotional piece: “Twentieth Century Silver”- Art Deco and the modern design revolution

But few truly informed collectors are aware that silver design flourished well into the 20th Century, reflecting the new sensibility of an industrial age, where streamlined utilitarianism became the guiding principle of the newly-defined modern lifestyle.  In the first quarter of the 1900s, many were ready to throw off the mantle of Victorian sensibilities and embrace the spirit of “The New”. Advances in science, manufacturing and inventions such as the airplane, the automobile and wireless communication were shrinking the world. Speed and radical reform became the watchwords of a new and outspoken group of intellectuals called, The Futurists.

Excerpt from magazine story: “Passion for Collecting”, a review of a private art collection in New York City

For Schwartz, the edgy blend of outsider art, tribal carvings, historic artifacts, and decorative pieces to be found in virtually every room becomes a perfect reflection of who he is. Together with a seamless mix of paintings by such notable early 20th-century icons as Léger, Dubuffet, Picasso, and Schiele, as well as contemporary artists like Donald Baechler, Donald Wilson, Elvira Bach, and sculptor Julio Aguilera, the living space projects a visual buzz that hangs together—creating a kind of a pleasant chaos. But, like a slender thread weaving its way from room to room, walls and tabletops are also filled with numerous sepia-toned photographs depicting family portraits and intimate individual studies, reminding the visitor that “a family lives here.”

Excerpt from a retail promotional piece:
A Gift from the Stars-
The incredible journey of the diamond from the depth of the earth to the
center of our hearts

Two-and-one-half billion years after the planets’ creation in the crucible of “The Big Bang”, these random, spinning chemical spheres had taken on identities of their own. While the odds are very good that this same process of material conflagration and assimilation had been repeated thousands or millions of times around the universe, the extraordinary confluence of raw chemical building blocks, set in a gentle, liquid-filled gravitational field and at precisely the right distance from the warming energy of a nearby star to sustain the fragile beginnings of life, makes the newly-created earth a rare and unique event in celestial accounting.

For earth and most of its solar neighbors, the original fires of universal creation remain locked at their core.  Like the fading glow of a raging inferno, the lingering evidence of our tempestuous birth resides just beneath our feet.  The thin cool mantle layer that lies over the surface of our planet masks the story of our beginnings just a few hundred meters down…a white hot metallic core that spins at a different speed than our continents and oceans, creates our magnetic fields and occasionally delivers its roiling contents to the surface in the form of violent, cataclysmic volcanic eruptions. 

Excerpt from magazine article: The Birth of Modern- Exploring the beginnings of an architectural revolution

Frank Lloyd Wright was not the only one responding to the changing social climate around him. Europe, too, in the early years of the 20th century was in flux. A call for modernization could be heard in industrialized countries on both sides of the Atlantic. In response to this call for ‘the new’, the first two decades of the 20th century saw a profound and dramatic increase in creative output by the architectural, artistic, literary and musical communities. An extraordinarily concentrated burst of creative energy occurred during this time, unlike anything seen since the Renaissance. The culture of change had reached a tipping point—perhaps because of the steady and irrevocable march of industrialization, or the rise of nationalist fervor among certain European nations, or maybe because the reality of the new flying machine and the speed and excitement of the automobile had managed to grip the human imagination-- It could now be said that the Modern Era was officially underway!

Excerpt from proposed article of a newly-opened architectural destination, “Philip Johnson and the Glass House Collection”

Visitors to the Philip Johnson Glass House National Historic Land Trust may find their attention riveted to the lush and verdant landscape or the flesh and bones of the various building on the grounds, as they appear to morph into living creatures, each with its own personality and unique design characteristics.  For the astute observer, the 47-acre setting may even provide a glimpse of a sculptural work or two, often seeming more natural than man made; but always sited with an eye toward blending seamlessly with their surroundings. Ultimately though, the focus shifts to the man and his very personal statement about this place and how it reflected his vision of the relationship between art, nature and design.

While much emphasis is placed on the life and career of Philip Johnson as an architect, his home in New Canaan, Connecticut, newly opened to the public as part of the National Historic Trust, provides a setting to consider his lifestyle, aesthetic choices and wide-ranging interests outside the pressured world of large-scale building design. 

At the most personal level, spending time on the grounds and exploring the various buildings that were constructed over a 35-year period serves as an invitation to the visitor to become acquainted with the very important, but seldom seen relationship between Johnson and his life-long companion, David Whitney.  Together, they pursued interests in the world of fine art which, over the years, allowed them to amass a vast collection of contemporary art.  This collection, a significant portion of which is in the possession of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where Johnson was a founder of the department of architecture and design for many years, represents a cross-section of some of the greatest names in late 20th century art and ideas.

But much remains here on the grounds of the estate.  In this article we will explore that portion of the art collection that was accumulated by Johnson and Whitney over their many years together and has become a permanent part of the Trust.  We will also investigate how the growing collection influenced new building construction on the grounds.  We will also explore the close relationship between art, nature and architecture that served as a visual and aesthetic guidepost for Philip Johnson throughout his career as a designer and builder of some of the most important edifices, both large and small, of the last century.

Excerpt from magazine piece: Discovering the Africa of Your Dreams

A night in the Nairobi bush is not like any night you have ever experienced, even at a luxury destination like the renowned Karen Blixen Camp (writing as Isak Dinesen, it was once a favored site for the famous, Out of Africa author) in the heart of the Masai Mara Reserve.  Darkness drapes us like a thick velvet blanket, closing off the immediate world and reminding even the most seasoned traveler that the vast tracks of the African wild do not belong to us.  An unimaginable profusion of stars dusts the silhouetted landscape beyond our balcony with a dull blue-gray light.  The river and tree line beyond, once replete with exotic animal and bird life during the day, is now filled with the haunting sounds of the un-named creatures of the night.  Remembering the famous words of Joseph Conrad, in his classic book, “Heart of Darkness”, we consider, “this old river…in its broad reach…leading to the uttermost ends of the earth”, as we seek comfort in our camp lights in much the same way that our primordial  forebears must have done, eons ago.

Transcript of brief biographical short story called, Transformation

All day long I dreamed of what I would do when I got home. School, recess, lunch and homework were small obstacles on my way to the adventure that awaited me each day, just a few backyards away from my own.  I would not allow for any distractions- the Brooklyn Dodgers-Yankees game droning on Mr. Hill’s radio just inside his open kitchen window on the walk home from school; the household chores that always awaited me there; my heavily-perfumed Aunt Ethel, sitting at our kitchen table drinking pale tea out of a too-fancy cup and eating Lemon Coolers, dusted with white confectionary sugar that stuck to my face when she kissed me. 

I was on a mission!  I ran to my room where I strapped on my guns (matching 6-shooters with white pearl handles), pulled on my boots, cocked my cowboy hat jauntily to one side of my head and, hopping on my red Schwinn Hornet complete with handlebar streamers, I galloped off to… THE WOODS.

Entering the woods held all the transformative power of a magic spell for me. I left the boy behind and became the western hero of my Saturday morning, grainy, black and white television world.  This place was filled with all the props a hero needed: rocky outcroppings; low-slung tree limbs for spying over the ridge; bad guys just around the bend; the forbidden railroad tracks bordering the woods that rumbled with the clattery sounds of late-night freight trains. But as dusk settled in, even busy cowboys keep an ear tuned for the dinner bell and a brisk gallop home to the chuck wagon on ‘Charger’.  

I remember lying in my bed late each night, listening wide-eyed to the mournful whistle of the Boston and Maine locomotive as it crept along the moonlit rails, ever imagining the dangers my cowboy hero would have to confront tomorrow…

Life is an adventure.
Do you have a story you want told? 
If you’re at a loss for words, I may have them here.