The downstairs neighbor

A few years ago, I had a downstairs neighbor in Midtown who frequently would object to the free-jazz saxophone squalls, atonal guitar-band gibberish and Prophet Omega airchecks that would emanate from my stereo late at night. He’d stamp upstairs to complain. Once I got riled up by some crappy blues record he was playing, so I stamped downstairs to give him a hard time, too. His apartment was filled with mountains of oil paintings—of Midtown street scenes, blues musicians and people he knew. His name was, and still is, Anthony Montanino. Now he lives in Pacifica, but he still maintains connections here, and a bunch of his paintings are showing at Art Foundry Gallery, 1021 R Street, through January 31. There are a number of other artists’ works also on display, including ones by Tim White, who usually writes about art in this space, and Gregory Kondos.