The Flamboyant Fund-Raiser

Elena Kess is wearing 6-inch lizard-skin stilettos the color of a moonless midnight. She’s so high off the ground that she’s tiptoeing rather than walking across 30th Avenue. Even if you don’t notice the heels, you can’t miss Elena, who’s as bold as a chorus of exclamation points. Skin-tight black jeans lead to a flowing green blouse. She has a voluminous scarf tied voluptuously around her neck, and her ears are decorated with giant golden circles that peek through her…

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The Out-There Artist

Chris Bogia opens the door and cranks up ’60s rock on the radio. He likes to listen to music when he works in his studio. The art he does — gluing bits of yarn onto his paintings — requires a steady hand and a mindless head. The space is small, but the walls stand tall. They are gallery white. The floors are gunmetal-grey cement, and the skeins of yarn are stored in clear plastic containers neatly stacked on top of each other in a loft-like partition that he reaches with a ladder. A…

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The Groomer Who’s Throwing in the Bone

For Camille Pisciotta, this is just like any other day, except that it isn’t. By the time she’s unlocked the gate at her Pampered Poodle Palace, her big blue eyes are tearing up. “I was never a wimp my entire life,” she says in apology. “You couldn’t get me to cry unless it was at my mother’s wake, but this has torn me up.” “This” refers to the fact that after 47 years, the Pampered Poodle Palace, which Camille raised from a puppy, is being…

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The Soup-to-Nuts Storyteller

Espresso. Giuseppe Viterale never starts or ends the day without a cup of it. He fires up a little gas burner, spoons in the ground coffee and puts the aluminum one-cup pot atop the steady blue flame. “This is like a religious ritual for me,” he says. As the dark-chocolate drink begins leaking out like crude oil, Giuseppe pours a little into his glass teacup and mixes it with sugar until it has the fluffy froth of mocha mousse. “This is better than any fancy coffee machine,”…

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