James Derek Sapienza (1986-)

• 2012-05-22 8 notes

  

  Cleveland, a ways back (some day before Easter).

• 2012-04-05 9 notes

  

  Baseball is finally here. I trust it will keep me sane and even-keeled, just like its supposed to (though this was a long time ago). Two thousand eight or something.

• 2012-02-08 14 notes

  

  An age of umpires, 2009.

• 2011-11-10 3 notes

  

  The writing is on the wall. The wall is on nothing. The facade is a joke, get it?

• 2011-11-04 11 notes

  

  Billy Wayne’s karaoke at Tina’s lounge. Cleveland, Ohio.

• 2011-08-10 5 notes

  

  A nice way to gauge depth, the Cuyahoga River at Eastertime.

• 2011-05-15 3 notes

  

  Because Cleveland is always there to show how much fun the rust belt really is.

• 2010-10-31 1 note

  

  Two a.m. Cleveland, August 2009 Steve’s lunch. Selling pierogi and hot dogs since 1955, it’s a real king mixer for all on off types in Ohio City. Showing up on a whim on word of a free Mission of Burma show, and a week away from human breakdown, my car had already bit it, it had exploded somewhere on 87 South a few days earlier. In a few more days, I would be thrown out of the house, grinning at another failure in adulthood. But Mission of Burma, and the hot dogs… It wasn’t a dream, because I have the photos to prove it. And the scars.

• 2010-10-12 1 note

  

  Rust Belt rust captured by a twenty-five dollar second hand camera lens. The curb of a Cleveland gheetoe surrounded by cemeteries. The city can’t afford to keep either of the boneyards up. They treat the living inhabitants of the neighborhood worse.

• 2010-10-07 1 note

  

  Another figure of authority, though this one is more out of touch. Frozen in time at the Cleveland Museum, this knight is not “paunchy and addled with gout” like the Met’s Henry VIII. No, this dead man sits strong and patient on his dead horse waiting to be photographed in calendar and family vacation appropriate poses. Cleveland, OH.

• 2010-09-23 0 notes

  

  All that was left was the facade of the garage. The innards had been demolished in favor of a vacant lot.

• 0 notes

  

  Searching in vein for Albert Ayler’s grave, and all I got was this lousy statue. Used to be part of a chapel that was disassembled a century ago then forgotten. Blight had stricken the neighborhood, they had wised up, and no longer had use for a god.

• 2010-09-19 0 notes

  

  Summer storm in Cleveland. 3 PM. Ever seen a sky that dark that early? I hadn’t.

• 2010-09-15 1 note

  

  View from the abandoned Cleveland Coast Guard station 100+ degree heat on Lake Erie July/August ‘10

• 2010-09-14 1 note

  

  West Side Market in Cleveland, OH. Each miming orations to a deaf and indifferent crowd through an ancient public address system on a balcony of avocado tile. Bottled soda pop and shin kicking children in tow, it was a rowdy day, I can tell you.