Central Park East: III.  Parks are for fun, of course. But wherever there are lots of people -- and the parks were littered with people on Easter Sunday afternoon -- there's money to be made. And the concessionaires with their colorful quasi-mobile carts were making money feeding the hordes of parkgoers. Although there's nothing really special about these carts, they are colorful, all in the same bright green and white scheme, and they seem to lend the park a welcoming gay Parisian air. (For a better look at the cart -- or at any photo on this page -- click on the picture).

Parks Department-sanctioned concessionaires weren't the only people making money in the park. Performance artists were having a pretty good money day too. The extraordinarily energetic dancers in the photo at left were rehearsing in front of a large audience in the old "bandshell". You can't believe the flying routines these two executed. She was courageous; he was outrageous. I got the impression he was the mentor, she the student, but the performance from both bespoke professionalism. These two must have lost fifteen pounds between them Sunday afternoon!

I saved my favorite image for last. You must click on this one! Although this performance artist wasn't the best contortionist I've ever seen -- there was a superb one in Paris outside of the Museum of Art at the Centre George Pompidou -- and was by no means the best dancer, his dancing, his twisting, and his turning coupled with his colorful and strange costume won me over. My gut, which at times like this I trust without understanding why, told me this was a gentle and playful creature who was at once creative but very lonely. Part of my reaction was conditioned on his "bicycle," not shown here, which was decked out to resemble a Hells Angels' motorcycle. A most interesting and unique person!

Interesting and unique in an entirely different way is the phenomenon of preemptive graffiti which is the subject of the next page.