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The Photographs Of
​Meryl Meisler


Meryl Meisler
Is Represented By 
Clamp Art Gallery

​
Purchase SASSY '70s from Brooklyn Museum or Amazon 256 pages, Hardcover- $45
​

Amazon

Clamp Art


Brooklyn Museum

​http://www.merylmeisler.com/



​Purgatory & Paradise: SASSY ’70s Suburbia & The City

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Self-Portrait The Girl Scout Oath North Massapequa, NY January 1975

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The Meisler, Forkash & Cash Clan, Massapequa, NY Rosh Hashanah 1974

Paradise & Purgatory: SASSY ’70s Suburbia & The City juxtaposes intimate images of home life on Long Island alongside NYC street and night life – the likes of which have never been seen. Quirky, nostalgic and a bit naughty, it’s a genuine cultural capsule of a decade that captivates today’s generation. The photos and stories illustrate Meryl’s coming of age:

The South Bronx, suburbia, The Mystery Club, dance lessons, Girl Scouts, the Rockette's, the circus, school, mitzvahs, proms, weddings, gay Fire Island, the Hamptons, feminists, happy hookers, CBGB, Punks, Disco, After Hours and Go-Go Bars, Jewish and LGBT Pride, street life, home theatrics, holidays, friendship, family and love. She had to photograph it to make sense of it all, to hold onto the time, to release and now finally share it. The ’70s were sassy, but also sweet, and so was Meryl.


Meryl’s introduction to purgatory and the importance of being open-minded, not pre-judging people, began with a 1957 childhood incident, being told “You can never go to heaven, the best you can do is purgatory” because she was Jewish. That’s when Meryl learned about purgatory, and the importance of being open minded and not pre-judging people. Meryl moved to NYC in 1975, with her first paycheck she bought an antique edition of Dante’s Purgatory and Paradise illustrated by Gustave Doré. She needed to “own it” and take back the power.
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Carrying her medium format camera everywhere with great delight – Meryl photographed the world she knew on Long Island– donning childhood uniforms and costumes for self-portraits, comedic insider views of family and friends homes, the hilarity of her parents’ Mystery Club circle. “Not in mine eyes alone is Paradise,” declares Dante in Paradiso. Many viewed ‘70s NYC as hell, purgatory at best. With an open mind and heart, Meryl found paradise photographing the streets and nightlife of The City, many so wild she never dared to show them until now.
Paradise & Purgatory: SASSY ’70s Suburbia & The City is available for purchase:
 The Strand (Strand is the Amazon Dealer)

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Jive Guy on Williamsburg Subway Brooklyn, NY March 1978

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Hand to Crotch, Hurrahs Wild Wild West Pary, NY, NY 1978


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Butterfly Bedroom TelephonButterfly Bedroom Telephone East Meadow, NY June 1975e East Meadow, NY June 1975

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Clown Car at the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus NY, NY April 1977

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Father and sons in three-piece suits at the Easter parade, New York City, 1977

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A Flower Outside CBGB OMFUG NY, NY April 1977


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Crucified Pose, Star Wars Party, The Pines, Fire Island, NY 1977

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Self-Portrait, A falling Star, North Massapequa, NY, January 1975

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Granddaughter and Grandfather, The Mystery Club, North Woodmere, NY, January 1975

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A Tale of Two Cities: Disco Era Bushwick

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Rejected From Studio 54 No No Studio 54 – NY, NY, October 1978

NYC in the late 1970s and early 80s could best be described using Charles Dickens’ phrase “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Meryl Meisler’s photographs documented it with compassion and humor.

As the city neared bankruptcy, crime rates rose, epidemics of arson and crack made the Big Apple seem like it was rotting to the core. In the midst of it all, a scintillating groundbreaking disco nightlife culture arose. Crossing the most exclusive clubs’ velvet gates, Meryl danced and photographed with her medium format camera. July 13, 1977, while she was en route to Studio 54, a blackout shuttered NYC. A few days later, the disco beat was back while headlines and radios blasted news about a neighborhood had she never heard of before, Bushwick, where looting and rioting erupted in the darkness and went on and on.


Fast forward to 1981; Meryl arrives at her new teaching position in a Bushwick Public School. On the surface the neighborhood epitomized urban decay. The beauty of natural light and those who loved and thrived in the destruction were captured with a point and shoot camera as Meryl walked to and from the subway and school.

A Tale of Two Cities: Disco Era Bushwick juxtaposes Meryl’s disco and Bushwick photographs with the writing of authors who grew up amongst the rubble. The accounts of Bushwick historians and educators, Disco Divas and Dickens’ narrative contribute to this true-life story and remind us that many of the same issues reverberate today.

Meryl’s images of Bushwick are the largest known documentation of the neighborhood during a desperate decade. Her disco photographs have never been shown before the publication of this book.

A Tale of Two Cities: Disco Era Bushwick
is available for purchase online at The Strand (Strand is the Amazon Dealer)

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Boyz To Men – Bushwick, Brooklyn, NY, October 1982


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 Studio 54, NY, NY, July 25, 1979


​Meryl Meisler was born 1951 in the South Bronx and raised in North Massapequa, Long Island, NY. Inspired by Diane Arbus, Jacques Henri Lartigue as well as her dad Jack and grandfather Murray Meisler, Meryl began photographing herself, family, and friends while enrolled in a photography class taught by Cavalliere Ketchum at The University of Wisconsin, Madison. In 1975, Meryl returned to New York City and studied with Lisette Model, continuing to photograph her hometown and the city around her.

After working as a freelance illustrator by day, Meryl frequented and photographed the infamous New York Discos. As a 1978 CETA Artist grant recipient, Meryl created a portfolio of photographs which explored her Jewish Identity for the American Jewish Congress.

After CETA, Meryl began a 3 decade career as a NYC Public School Art Teacher. Meisler has received fellowships,  grants and residencies  from the New York Foundation for the Arts, Light Work, YADDO, VCCA,  Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, The Leonian Foundation, The Puffin Foundation, Time Warner, Artists Space, C.E.T.A., the China Institute and the Japan Society. Her work has been exhibited at the Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn Historical Society, Dia Art Foundation, MASS MoCA, Islip Art Museum, Annenberg Space for Photography, the New Museum for Contemporary Art, New-York Historical Society, Steven Kasher Gallery, The Whitney Museum of American Art and in public spaces including Grand Central Terminal, South Street Seaport, Photoville and throughout the NYC subway system.

Her work is in the permanent collections of the American Jewish Congress, ARTPPOOL Budapest, AT&T, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, the Brooklyn Historical Society, Book Art Museum- Poland, Columbia University, Emory University, Islip Art Museum, the Library of Congress, Musée de la Poste Paris, New York Transit Museum,  Smithsonian Institute, University of Iowa, The Waskomium and can be found in the artist book collections of Carnegie Melon, the Centre Georges Pompidou, the Chrysler Museum, the Museum of Modern Art NYC, Metronome Library,,  and Whitney Museum of American Art. Upon retiring from the NYC public schools, Meisler began releasing large bodies of previously unseen work. Meryl’s first monograph A Tale of Two Cities: Disco Era Bushwick (Bizarre, 2014), received international acclaim. The book juxtaposes her zenith of disco photos with images of the burned out yet beautiful neighborhood of Bushwick, Brooklyn in the 1980s.

Her second book, Purgatory & Paradise SASSY ‘70s Suburbia & The City (Bizarre, 2015), contrasts intimate images of home life on Long Island alongside NYC street and night life. She is happily back working in the darkroom, making gelatin silver prints of contemporary images and  never seen photos from her enormous archive. Meryl is currently working on two more books in her series about the 1970s & ’80s. New York PARADISE LOST Bushwick Era Disco will be released in Spring 2020. New York PARADISE LOST  will be bigger, badder, bolder and make her first books seem like fairytales. Meryl lives and works in New York City and Woodstock, NY, continuing the photographic memoir she began in 1973 – a uniquely American story, sweet and sassy with a pinch of mystery. Her work is represented by ClampArt.


Above – Test Strip Queen (Self Portrait) 2019 Home Page Banner Portraits of Meryl Meisler
Left- by Meryl Meisler 2020
Middle – by Meryl Meisler 1978
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Right – by Ken Frest 2019 Download Bio CV.pdf



The Photographs Of
​Meryl Meisler


Meryl Meisler
Is Represented By 
Clamp Art Gallery

​
Purchase SASSY '70s from Brooklyn Museum or Amazon 256 pages, Hardcover- $45

Amazon

Clamp Art


Brooklyn Museum

​http://www.merylmeisler.com/

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