Summer in Buffalo 1973

In July and August of 1973, I spent time in Clarence Center, NY, a suburb of Buffalo, at a summer job, working for Moog Synthesizers as quality control. I tested transistors and finished MiniMoog synthesizers, and created "sound charts" to instruct new users on how to set the machine to get good sounds out of it. In the course of my work I met the inventor Bob Moog as well as various pop musicians including Keith Emerson of "Emerson, Lake, and Palmer." I lived with the family of an engineer who was a friend of my family, and I sometimes took care of his three young children.

I must have had plenty of leisure time, too, since my sketchbook journal is filled with lots of elaborate drawings and paintings. This is one of them, dated with my date stamp. This gnarly tree sat between my residence and the neighbors' on a leafy suburban street. I had a good view of it through a window and so was able to draw it from life, every sunlit leaf of it. After all these years this is still one of my favorite artworks of mine.

Old Tree in Clarence Center is Pelikan Graphos sepia ink colored with watercolor on sketchbook page, about 8" x 9", July 18, 1973. Click for a larger view.