A personal visual diary
on
The Art of Disease
by
Mauro Fiorese

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Chapter 9
New York/New York

Verona , Italy. March 15, 2015.
1.59 AM
I just came back from my last trip to New York where, as usual, I tried to combine something good for both my Art and my Health. But this time my wife, Pamela, came with me for a week and I also wanted to do something good for her. This was her first time in NY so I wanted this trip to be special for her, also in order to leave her some good memories of one of the places that I always called my “second home”.
Life has been hard with us in the past two years and things were really hard to manage between us: an accident that stopped me for 8 months living her basically alone with our newborn daughter Leda. And when I (we) were almost recovered and about to see the Light again, here he comes: the Guy.
Devastating. So my goal on this week was to try to balance or partially try to compensate the huge Gap that Life created between us with something unique and special.
We all should always try to do that for us and those we love. Not everyday, of course, but once in a while.
Such things are very important: big or small, no matter the size of the surprise, what matter is the idea behind it.
That idea, that thought, can create
an undeletable memory in
somebody’s Life.

New York was as cold as the North Pole but also amazingly covered by a white coat of snow that gave it a surreal touch. Just what we needed but also something that New York can rarely offer: the possibility to slow down, relax and enjoy this precious Time.
So we started outdoor: we first went for a long walk on Central Park.

Then we visited some funny places, from a toy store to a sexy shop: things you basically can do only in New York in one day.

Than we went for Art: The M.o.M.A. first, of course. Than the gallery district around W 20s, just across the high line. We saw something really cool and something really pathetic, as usual, in Art. We were not that surprised, but we enjoyed the art scene. We also visited a very, touching photography exhibition by an I.C.P. student about her parents’ battle with cancer. And that was particularly touching for me.
I also wanted to show Pamels the house of my two favorite “Robert” in the history of Photography: Robert Frank and Robert Mapplethorpe. And they were leaving basically few blocks away…

I wanted to do something special so I bought two online tickets for the Maroon 5 concert at the Madison Square Garden. That was awesome!
In the next, few days we went shopping, we visited a friend’s new house, we experienced ice, we tried any kind of international Cusine, we went for a Palm reading and we saw somebody both LOOKING FOR and OFFERING Love through outdoor street announcements.
As well as a 10.000 dollars reward for a lost Pitbull.
Nevertheless on the last day we
ended up at
the “Top of the World”.
Pamela, then, left me a gift on the bed before she left to go back to Italy.
A notebook for me where to start writing my wish list.
We all should have one in Life.
That’s a suggestion I give you.
That was a gift we both did
to myself.

Chapter 10
Statistics/Success

What I always learned for New York in the past, when I used to live there, is that we basically are all
“living numbers”.
In such a complex, intense, pulsing, provoking, chaotic, controversial, “Boom-Boom City” it’s easy to experience that feeling.
But as more as you live this Place you find out something more positive and always less cinical about it, as well as you can find something new
about you.
New York recently thought me that numbers can be “warm”.
How?
The answer is: Statistics.
I fell so much in love with statistics that I now want to found a
“STATISTIC Fan Club”.
Because here numbers can be discussed.
Here they are not scientifically and definitively supporting anything that can be proved as 100% true.
And that was so liberating for a man like me who has always been miserable with Math in School!

As I said, after I was diagnosed with Cancer, I always tried to combine good possibilities for my Art and for my Health on all my trips to NY.
So this time I went to two more “Temples” that I never visited before: Saatchi & Saatchi, the “Temple of Visibility” and Memorial Sloan Kettering, the “Temple of Cancer”.

They both have something in common now: me.
Now statistic became an issue because, as an ill person and patient, I AM a living statistic. But I’m still warm. ????
Doctors say that 90% of people in my situation have a Life expectation of less than five years.
But chemos are working well in Italy and the expert doctor I met at MSKCC discussed with me some new possibilities about medical trials and new drugs that could be ready when the Guy will start his expansion.
So… that helped my right side of the brain. But for my left part, being invited to Saatchi in New York (thanks to my friend Valeria at Saatchi Milan) was something really cool. People like Carolyn and David, Sharon and Kathy were listening to my Story ” Libra in Cancer”.
The one you are reading right now.
They discussed it, took notes, and came up with new brilliant ideas.
In a global way.
I loved it!
And I want to thank both doctors and creative people. Because with me and for me, first of all, the were human.
Thank you again, NY!

   

Mauro Fiorese all rights reserved
March 2015

To be continued…