Little Model Town
Little Model Town
Standing on my favorite bluff along Library Avenue in Carnegie, the one generations of others stood upon to see into distant areas and distant futures. From here, the neighborhood known as Irishtown, built on a very flat flood plain, looks like a little scale model of a small town.
Below is the view standing back a little to give you an idea of the height. The bluff drops off to a set of railroad tracks that trail along the bottom, then below that is Chartiers Creek.
A distance view of the bluff.
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Sunny Main Street
Main Street Carnegie
Well, it was sunny, but instead of leaving it in its natural colors, I desaturated it to approximate a black and white shot because I liked the close-set details of all the buildings and light poles and bollards and bricks. I then added a yellow filter because it seemed to help define things better.
View of Main Street
View of West Carnegie
Walking around affords all sorts of interesting views you don’t see from the car. Walking a little out of the way affords views you haven’t seen before. Putting this together and planning for the right time of day pays of in an interesting shot. The leaves have fallen off the trees, an overcast day opened up just before sunset, and I finally got one of the shots of an area of Carnegie I’ve been planning for a while.
At this time of day, at this time of year, the trees are bare and otherwise large pools of shadow are open, and the sun, angled down after the autumnal equinox instead of shining from overhead, flows down the east-west leading streets and alights the details on the houses.
And here is this view in sepia, similar to my last view of West Main Street.
West Main Street from above, in sepia.
Autumn Blue and Gold
Autumn Blue and Gold
The sun polished the remaining yellow leaves those humble street trees to pure gold, set against the patina blue domes of Holy Virgin Russian Orthodox Church in Carnegie, and all set before a perfect blue autumn sky.
Wish I’d had my better camera with me, and I might have captured more detail, but this is very nice.
All Roads Lead to Carnegie, 2011
Main Street Banners
Our everyday banners in Carnegie line up neatly along Main Street and add color with a few awnings. In a few weeks these ornamental pear trees will turn to bronze.
I designed these banners for the Carnegie Community Development Corporation and Carnegie Borough to replace the set of turquoise banners we’d had for at least six years.
The phrase came from a stop I made at a convenience store out in the middle of nowhere while actually only about 15 miles from Carnegie—rural southwestern Pennsylvania is like that, wooded hills and open fields and numbered state roads. Remembering another visit out that way I knew one of the roads I was on led right back into Carnegie from out there, windy and hilly, but no turns.
I asked the clerk, “Which one of these roads leads to Carnegie?”
She paused and considered for just a few seconds. “All roads lead to Carnegie,” she said, as if it was a fact that everyone knew.
It’s true too. Carnegie, even though only six miles outside Pittsburgh, was once a hub for all the small towns to the south and west, and looking at a map, especially before the interstate, all those state and county roads do lead to Carnegie.
This is also one of the images in my photo exhibit, Carnegie Photographed.
Passageway
Passageway
Houses are tightly packed here; the parking lot was at one point a home as well. The weathered concrete sidewalk sprouts autumn wildflowers.
Summer Morning, Main Street
Summer Morning, Main Street
It’s not a special day or special event or anything out of the ordinary, in fact it’s quite ordinary all around, just a quiet summer morning on Main Street in Carnegie, like so many I remember through the years. I wish I’d had my DSLR instead of the little point and shoot, but this captured the details and colors pretty well.
I’ve got quite a few photos of Main Street in Carnegie, many posted on this blog, since I’m there nearly every day sometimes visiting the Post Office and the bank as well as other businesses, and even after so many years—I bean visiting Main Street with my parents just a little over 50 years ago—I can always find something new about it.
I also have a photo exhibit of images of Carnegie, including Main Street and a few other galleries, and an exhibit of paintings of Carnegie as well. I don’t get much of a chance to get away, so I work with what I see around me.
Main Street, July 4
Main Street, Carnegie, July 4, 2012
Just another in my series of sun-and-heat-drenched photos of my town done in a sort of vintage look.
The Penny Post Card, not certain of the year.
I always associate Independence Day with small towns and parks and such. Carnegie’s Main Street looks much as it did when I was growing up, and that much like it did when my parents were growing up.
Below is a “penny post card” of Main Street from an unknown year and a slightly different angle, but you’ll recognize the image. See other photos of Main Street, Carnegie.
Evening Lights: Painting
Evening Lights, acrylic on canvas © B.E. Kazmarski
As I walked home from an errand this evening, this is what it looked like.
I didn’t paint this today or tonight but on a similar in April 2006; the warm temperatures make it feel as if it’s a month later than it is. But in that year for some reason the perfect turquoise twilight of spring and the clear fresh air was suddenly inspiring to me to paint the tiny lights reflected on Chartiers Creek, the wash of streetlights on the fronts of buildings and deep shadows behind and between, and that big sky above it all.
I also decided to paint all this in paints, not pastels or watercolors or anything else I was accustomed to using. I had been studying painting techniques and wanted that tactile, dimensional quality of paint, the wet that dried, applying daubs of pure color in one place and then letting two or more colors mix on my brush in another place.
Beginning with three 8″ x 10″ stretched canvases, brushes and paints I’d gotten for nothing from a friend whose painter aunt had passed away, I thought this was the best way to capture the deep colors of the night scenes.
Steep
Steep
Just a typical street running down a hill to cross the railroad tracks, then back up and over the other side, and many other narrow streets running parallel up and down and over the hills, and more narrow streets crossing those with their grids of power lines above, and houses and businesses crowding close to sidewalks and to each other, one hundred years and more after they were built in a European style by and for immigrants to carry on their lives in a new country.
This is Glendale, PA, next door to Carnegie.
All Roads Lead to Carnegie
Main Street Banners
Our everyday banners in Carnegie line up neatly along Main Street and add color with a few awnings. In a few weeks these ornamental pear trees will turn to bronze.
I designed these banners for the Carnegie Community Development Corporation and Carnegie Borough to replace the set of turquoise banners we’d had for at least six years.
The phrase came from a stop I made at a convenience store out in the middle of nowhere while actually only about 15 miles from Carnegie—rural southwestern Pennsylvania is like that, wooded hills and open fields and numbered state roads. Remembering another visit out that way I knew one of the roads I was on led right back into Carnegie from out there, windy and hilly, but no turns.
I asked the clerk, “Which one of these roads leads to Carnegie?”
She paused and considered for just a few seconds. “All roads lead to Carnegie,” she said, as if it was a fact that everyone knew.
It’s true too. Carnegie, even though only six miles outside Pittsburgh, was once a hub for all the small towns to the south and west, and looking at a map, especially before the interstate, all those state and county roads do lead to Carnegie.
Veterans
Veterans
I took this photo in Carnegie’s Memorial Day Parade, but it could be anywhere in the United States on Memorial Day or Veteran’s Day, veterans proud to march and carry their colors.
This photo is one of the images in my recent exhibit, “Carnegie Photographed”. I’ll be posting a slideshow of this exhibit soon.
Today 