Freeman alley: the Postman, Sacsix, and pasteups

It’s been nearly a month since the last post, as this year I found myself bogged down between playing catch-up after a short trip to NYC, wrapping up two new university courses, and taking on some extra Cambridge examining. The images from this entry are from just that trip, which has become an annual pre- or post- Memorial day trip to New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania.

These pasteups all come from Freeman alley, a very easy-to-miss hidden gem, just off lower Manhattan’s Bowery.

The pasteups themselves come mostly from well-known artists The Postman (Warhol and Basquiat) and Sacsix (Danny Devito). I’m not sure of the artist of the partially-gone Kurt Cobain, but I’ll be sure to provide an update.

Next time you find yourself in lower Manhattan, I’d recommend you swing by the alley, as it’s always full of some interesting art.

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First street green, an art park in the East Village

For this month’s second entry, I’ve decided to once again cross the pond, and highlight one of my favourite stops when in NYC. These photos are from the First Street Green Art Park, which as the name suggests is on East first street, near Houston (pronounced HOWS-ton), just on the border with the Lower East Side. It’s a community effort, and features new art nearly every time I visit. I enjoy this space, because many of the murals, in addition to being quite beautiful, also convey positive, optimistic messages. Something in short supply these days. There aren’t too many concentrated spots for street art in this part of the city; it is plentiful, but scattered. Here is the space’s twitter account, so you can keep up with any goings-on.

A “Kobra” strikes in NYC

After an absence of six years, from 2005-2011, I now make twice yearly pilgrimages back to the east coast of the US, mostly to visit family and friends, but also to reconnect with NYC. During these visits I generally stay in Airbnb flats in the East Village or Lower East Side. I do this mainly because I enjoy the atmosphere of those two neighborhoods, but also because they are both areas in which I am guaranteed to find a few hidden gems of street art.

Just near my Airbnb, on East 12th street, I found a mural that I had seen a few times on my Instagram feed, a huge portrait of young and older Michael Jackson. Doing a bit of research, I discovered that the artist was Brazilian Eduardo Kobra, and that he had made a trip to NYC and left 18 murals, some of them several stories in height all around the city. Here is a link to an article which also has a map showing the locations of all 18 murals.

I didn’t make it to all 18 sites, and most of the photos here are of murals in lower Manhattan. However the one of the firefighter and Einstein on a bike required me to make a trip (and no, my nose didn’t bleed) all the way up to East 50th St. But it was definitely worth the trek, as these two murals are immense, perhaps the biggest I’ve seen. The firefighter mural seems to attract the most attention from tourists. In fact, I was able to play tour guide to a group of Portuguese travellers, to whom I explained that the number “343” on the firefighter’s helmet was a tribute to the number of firefighters lost on the day of the 9/11 attacks. Of course I also encouraged them to head down to the East Village instead of Times Square, as the former is much more NYC than dirty Elmos and the M&M store will ever be. I wonder if they heeded my advice.

 

June in Manhattan

These shots come from my (now) annual trip to the US just before and after Memorial Day, in which I spend about 7 of those days roaming NYC in search of anything interesting that may have popped up since my last visit during the subzero cold snap at the end of December. New York never disappoints, and I found some fantastic street art. In fact, I’ll have to divide the post into three parts: Manhattan, Jersey City, and Brooklyn.

The photos in this entry come mostly from the Lower East Side and East Village, though there are a few shots from Harlem as well.

Winter in NYC, below freezing on the LES

The photos here come from my twice-yearly pilgrimage to the US, this one just around the Christmas holiday. Almost all of these shots come from the Lower East Side and East Village, and were taken, as the title indicates, during one of the coldest cold snaps in recent history. I found myself having to wear three or four layers just to spend an hour or two walking the streets of lower Manhattan. I wasn’t able to make it out to Brooklyn, as my time in NYC was less than 24 hours, but I certainly wasn’t disappointed. My favorites would be the double vision Mickey mouse, the mailbox Basquiat, and the Debbie Harry mural. I also tried to get various shots of large scale work, mostly on Allen Street on the Lower East Side.

 

NYC, a repurposed mailbox

My visit to NYC was very short and the weather about as nasty as I remember it for the end of December. When I ascended from the depths of Penn Station the city was being attacked by that light fluffy snow that Christmas dreams are made of, a Miracle on 34th Street a day late. By the time I reached my destination in the East Village, the fluff had turned to sleet, making every corner an ankle-deep puddle of slush. The wind decided to pick up also, reducing all but the most expensive umbrellas to piles of discarded aluminum-frame skeletons next to almost every trash bin. Not exactly street art safari weather. The next day the weather cleared up and I was able to make a short trip round the Lower East Side, though I didn’t stray too far south of Houston, as an especially stubborn karaoke and bourbon-induced hangover was just starting to kick in. What I did manage to find was this abandoned mailbox, which was painted over in red and white and sprinkled with some random images. I imagine we’ll be seeing more like this as the email revolution continues to spread. I hope to see the same type of conversion for phone booths as well.