Pamela Harris

Posts in the Drawing Category

Dogs Never Suck November 8, 2024

Growing up in a barely middle class, puritan New England town, I often saw bullying brutality in and outside my home. Sarcasm ruled. If you had a feeling - any feeling - you made a joke or buried it. You shoveled snow or smoked a butt. You didn’t be a weakling and talk about it.

In high school we’d get high and dream of getting out of our town, of going into the world to leave a mark. I left the instant I could, but this wasn’t the norm. Living there was so embedded in our DNA that it was more fun to talk about leaving than actually do it. Some left for a year or two, but most came back. They wanted familiar. They wanted what they knew. They wanted their kids to go to the schools they went to. Familiar was easy. It felt safe.

What hit me repeatedly during this election is how many people don’t want change. They want what they know. Change is uncertainty. I think part of the reason Kamala Harris lost - next to the reality that America wasn’t going to vote for a female president - was because she represented change. Her opponent didn’t. His old school machismo and beliefs he repeatedly spouted had an effect that somehow - I don’t understand how - created safety. You knew exactly what you were getting.

I’ve never taken for granted what it means to be an American. Go to any country and locals who speak English know that English signifies class. It suggests someone is wealthy enough to be educated. To speak English is aspirational. Our clothes, movies, tv shows, books, art, all our products set a bar of desire. Currencies around the world find their value against the American dollar. It’s the strongest currency because it’s always been the most stable.

Even when we’re hated we’re still envied. Reluctantly admired. Mostly because Americans represent democracy and hope to countries who don’t have either. We were the country the world tethered dependence on as proof that justice prevails. But now we’re in new territory. Now we get to see what comes next.

I grew up in one of those towns that scorned immigrants. If you weren’t third generation you sucked. But the reality was that most of us were first gen. Second at most. My stepfather came to America when a cousin here sponsored him. They got him a job sweeping floors in a factory. My stepfather had an eighth grade education and didn’t speak English. Twenty-five years later he bought that factory. Many of his employees were immigrants. They had benefits, but he made sure they had a life insurance policy. To my stepfather, life insurance was magical. He had come here in steerage after his whole family was wiped out. Life insurance was safety, something you could get in America.

When I came to NYC all the delis in my neighborhood were run by Koreans. The parents stocked shelves and worked the registers all day and night. Their kids sat barely out of eye shot studying. I’ve lived in the same neighborhood for over thirty years and got to see their kids grow up. Many went to charter schools, then on to med school, or became engineers. One kid went to work for NASA.

NYC became the capital of the art world only because immigrants came here fleeing Hitler. Call culture elitist, but in war, early targets are museums. Kill a country by killing their culture. Destroy or steal their history. The value of culture gives a place a sense of place. It gives it meaning. Everyone loves their local museum whether they visit it or not. Through our art, movies, books, tv shows and music - a trillion dollar industry and more - think of the influence we cleave around the world. Ever hear a Russian rock band? Bring earplugs. The irony is, the creative world in America is Jewish, gay, straight, Black, white, trans, undefined and more. A gaggle of groups now under fire.

On a personal level, this last year has been brutal. It's been a micro version of the macro going on in America. For an entire year (and still ongoing), on almost a weekly basis I've had to deal with two bullies who are cruel and vicious. I’ll write more about it later, but they've turned out to be the most poorly wrapped gift. I have had to look at where and how I still give my power away because of fear. And this let me became so f*cking determined to never ever do that again. In turn, a lot of the fear has vanished. Faith over doubt. It always comes back to faith over doubt.

Wednesday night I did a zoom with a group of actor and writer friends and one said, “Do we simply let him take over?” She wasn’t suggesting violence. I think she was expressing what I’m feeling more than anything right now: Defiance. If I add the tone of hope to ‘what do we do now?’ and try to keep my heart from hardening, it’s a good question.


New Show July 12, 2015

It's been going well in the studio. I go through spurts where every drawing works out and I've been in that process.

It actually never goes not well. My attitude is however it's going is how it's going. I've been doing it long enough to get satisfaction from it, no matter what. Writing is much more frustrating. Though also immensely satisfying.

Over the last few months I've had some new people coming through my studio. I'm in a show that opened yesterday at the Amy Simon Gallery and it seems to be going well so far. I like showing and it's nice to be back out there. The show will be up through August.




Time Inc. March 31, 2013

When my second job ended I was still financially at zero and needed to get a job quick. This time I didn't look for entry level and instead looked for anything that hinted at creative. Four days into my search I saw an ad for a scanner operator at Time Inc. Fuck, man. Time Inc. Imagine working there. Maybe I could work there. Why couldn't I work there. I was going to work there.

The scanner operator at my old job talked a lot about what he did and I started thinking about the language he used. I realized I knew enough to bullshit my way in to an interview. I tweaked my resume, sent it over to Rockefeller Center and two weeks later got a call. I put my one suit on with shoes and purse that matched and I went to the interview.

The person I was meeting with was in the Ad Center, a branch of Time Inc. that was in the basement. When I got there he put his hand out and I shook it and started talking. "I don't know much about scanning," I said, then my eyes started rolling around crazy. "I really want to work here. My last job was at an imaging house and I know how to do everything else it says on my resume. I read 'What Color Is My Parachute' and I'm willing to work hard and do whatever it takes and the two companies I've worked for so far have gone out of business -- Oh! Scitex backed the second one and even though the owner took off with their money they liked him!" He wrote something down, then smiled. We stared at each other and I saw he wasn't annoyed that I lied. I asked, "Do my skills fit anywhere?" He nodded and made a phone call. What I heard sounded like the parents from Peanuts: "Whah wah, wah wah wah." A minute later he led me down a hall to a cubicle. "Good luck," he said. "I hope you get the job."

It took five interviews: Peggy thought I'd be great but Alan didn't think I was the 'right stuff.' Everyone at Time Inc. was Ivy or had something stellar going for them, and my family's only claim to notoriety was when my uncle stood in the middle of Chinatown in Boston, shit his pants and yelled "I am NOT a homosexual!" Peggy prevailed and I got a job as a production assistant working at People Magazine.

The job was pure grunt: I was to check in advertising materials, log them into a computer and send the 4-color film to production to make sure it matched the color chrome the advertiser sent along. Each weekly magazine - People, Sports Illustrated and Time - had a team of four that worked side by side in an open plan office, across from cubicles filled with Team Leaders.

All of us, leaders and peons, were the misfit toy section of Time Inc. We were a posse relegated to the basement, made up of a compulsive masturbator (Brown); an he's-not-out-of-the-closet compulsive shopper (Yale); a 6' 5" female college basketball star (U of Texas) who wore skirts and tube socks; a Harvard grad who got lost every time he left the building; the son of a very famous Talmud scholar (Brown); a relative of Jimi Hendrix (Middlebury); a U of Penn PHD who's left breast was bigger than her right and asked me every day if I could tell (I couldn't); a pothead who loved heavy metal (his dad ran a printing plant Time Inc. used); and my boss, Mario, a 90-pound impeccably dressed weakling who was a virtuoso pianist.

A retarded monkey could do our jobs and we pissed the day away telling stories. "In college I worked in a custom shirt shop," Mario would begin. He grew up in blue collar CT and had put himself through Juilliard. "One day a Sheik came in with an entourage of 20. I closed the store for him and then presented our dress shirts as well as cuff and collar options. The Sheik chose 30 of every style I suggested." Mario chuckled. "Which were all our styles. I then went high into drawers, low into drawers pulling out all of our very best ties. He bought 7 of every tie." Mario wrung his hands, excited. "My boss watched from the doorway and I could tell he was pleased. When I rang up the sale, the total was over $35,000. It was the biggest sale we had ever had." Mario pulled a glucose monitor out of his shirt pocket and stuck his finger in it. He was a severe diabetic and had to test his blood frequently. "I carefully wrapped a tie for the Sheik - everything else would be shipped. I helped him and his entourage into a line of Rolls Royces outside, and when I went back into the store my boss came over and put his hand on my shoulder. I was ready for the accolades." Mario looked at his glucose number. "My boss looked into my eyes and said 'Mario.' I look at him, feeling nothing but love. I said, 'Was that spectacular?' My boss put his other hand on my shoulder. 'Mario,' he said. 'You didn't sell him the pin dot tie.' " Mario nodded his head to drive home the point then jerked up his shirt. He pulled a syringe out of his other pocket and stabbed himself in the stomach. "Who wants to go smoke," he said.

(Years later, long after I left, Time Warner purchased the above drawing on the left in 2004.)