West Side Canvas: Fresh From the Farm on the Upper West Side

Painting and essay by Robert Beck

The coming and going of businesses is an integral part of Upper West Side life, to the extent that it fills a substantial column in the Rag once every week. I’m glad for the resource, as otherwise I might find myself spinning around, wondering what block I’m on more than I already do. 

Creature of habit that I am, I usually wait to go to a new restaurant until someone tells me it’s good or invites me to join them there for dinner. It was an invitation that first brought me to Friend of a Farmer at 68 West 71st. My wife and I went to that location when it was Pasha, but evidently not often enough.

This is the second Friend of a Farmer, the first being off of Gramercy Park. Both the restaurant design and the menu lean into the idea of country. As one who once shoved a hay hook under his kneecap when the baling wire broke, I know that country means different things to people, but as a restaurant goer, I give Friend of a Farmer high marks for comfort, delicious food, and attentive, friendly service. My ice cream came in a small flower pot.  

We are early eaters and had time for a pleasant chat with the server about the restaurant. I felt it would be an interesting place to paint. The manager liked the idea, and I returned later to meet the owner and discuss what was involved. That was good, because the day I showed up to paint was Juneteenth. Reservations started coming in the previous evening, and when I arrived at 8 a.m., they already had more than 100 on the books.

I set up my easel in the hall outside the kitchen, in front of a pass-through window that they use only when things get really busy. Not a lot of space there, but the manager, Brandon, said we would make it work. The “we” were: Brandon, Camille, and Mitchell, who all had to do a slight sideways twist to get past, often with trays of food, customers threading their way to and from tables, and the artist, who had to keep his elbows tight and brushes out of the narrow traffic lane. The deal was that I would be done and gone before the lunch crowd arrived. I had the option of looking toward the front of the restaurant or into the kitchen through the opening, but I’d have to bend over a little to see the action at the stove, and this was not the day for that.  Straight and narrow was required. I painted toward the bar and porch door.

My position allowed the guys in the kitchen to look out the pass-through and see how the painting was progressing. We smiled and nodded. As the pace ramped up, everybody worked around me like I was part of the architecture. Customers passed without comment. I don’t think anybody noticed me pack up and leave except the hungry group forming at the entrance, who had to part to let me through.  Back inside, where everything moved in accelerated concert, there was a little more room to navigate in front of the kitchen.

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See more of Robert Beck’s work and visit his UWS studio at www.robertbeck.net. Let him know if you have a connection to an archetypical UWS place or event that would make a good West Side Canvas subject. Thank you!

Note: Before Robert Beck started West Side Canvas, his essays and paintings were featured in Weekend Column. See Robert Beck’s earlier columns here and here.

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