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December 15, 2006
Spring is sprung. So what I wanna know is: did anyone tag 11 Spring last night? That would cause all manner of hue and cry, I expect. And be funny. That’s because there are very complex rules that I can never get my head around regarding that worst of misnomers: ‘street art’. Something about the primacy of marking previously unmarked spaces, and then defending them from further defacement as vociferously as a golf community owner’s association (oh, an aside -- did anyone notice that whomever is defacing the Swoon pieces have hit the site on Rivington Street that she recently redid?). If I understand this right, it is sort of like pissing on your neighbor’s door and then getting mad if someone tries to piss there after you. We have a lot to learn from dogs, it seems.
11 Spring is -- well, used to be -- one of ‘those buildings’. Dotting the Manhattan landscape in fewer numbers every passing year (well, month, it seems now), everyone has a personal favorite, be it 421 6th Street, the Windermere, or the nearby 190 Bowery. They sit, hulking and mysterious, targets of our naïve wish of ‘authentic’ redevelopment, or just ghosts resonant with misheard or half understood stories of glories past, a life we thought would be even marginally accessible when we got here, but in point of fact was as rare and inaccessible as these relics.
A year or two ago, it was on the verge of crossing over, purchased by the scion of a publishing magnate. Not much happened in the way of renovation as we all looked on in disgust and envy as some rich asshole was about to make an 30,000 sq ft private house in the heart of NoLIta.
The building then took a far more pedestrian turn, being sold off to a developer who lowered the sights, planning a couple apartments, stainless steel yadda yadda eruo whatever. All the details will be published on Triple Mint, for those of you who can’t get enough of ‘high end residential’ development.
But in a bid to seem arty, or neighborhood friendly, or, most likely, cagey about future maintenance bills, the developers were apparently swayed by Marc and Sara Schiller of the Wooster Collective, a group dedicated to the chronicling and cooptation of street art worldwide, to allow one last gasp, handing over the building for what looks to be a lovely caged bird of, um, free expression.
For the next three days, you are free to live out your Julius Knipl fantasy, tromping around three stories of proof that New York hasn’t provided much in the way of innovative street art in a long goddamn time. Of course, our regular jailing strategy might have something to do with it, along with a lack of publicly funded art schools.
After this brief window it will be papered over, and the hidden imagery will be used to add to the marketing chic, while hopefully dissuading future generations from returning to what was the preeminent site for street artists in the New York for the past generation.
See, that’s smart. The building will be tagged, inside and out, even though for all the world it will look like nothing more than a Joseph Pell Lombardi hedge fund job. I assume the developers were savvy enough to not attempt to extract promises from anyone, but surely there are tacit understandings that it’s hands-off from here out, and the Wooster Collective will do their best to decry those do disrespect the memory of this show by, ironically, keeping the spirit of the building alive.
It makes me think of Gordon Matta-Clark, a man who never passed on a chance to remind institutional wankers that you shouldn’t challenge an artist known for being rebellious. I can’t find cite on line (so this is all going from memory of an Sorkin article somewhere), but back in the seventies, Peter Eisenman, the ur-Williamsburg trustafarian bad boy, flush with Nazi cash and legitimacy from thankfully dead PJ, started an alternative something or other art space, the IAUS. He invited Matta-Clark to participate in a show. Matta-Clark, best known for a project that involve splitting a house in half with a chainsaw, showed up and promptly shot out the windows with a shotgun. That was a apparently a bit too bad boy, and Matta-Clark was banished and the windows re-glazed before the opening.
Some of the artists I am sure rankled at the implied prohibition that starts Monday and extends indefinitely, or at least to the notion that a movement that is known best when its work is executed without oversight or extant restriction was working within at least some parameters (at least one chronicled it). Others, such as marketing-friendly Shepard Fairey, didn't need any urging, overt or otherwise. And that is what usually bothers me when bandying about the whole art meme.
Granted, ‘fine artists’ are another big bunch of wankers who play this game with far more sophistication (since the sums involved are much larger). But so much of what one sees in this alterna-friendly, anti-establishment work just seems to be a training grounds for Mountain Dew ads. There are notable exceptions, like Bansky (and ESPO, a distinction I make that I acknowledge is completely arbitrary. I just like his stuff), but the prevailing attitude and aesthetic just reeks of what every illustration student in art school was like -- they could draw really well (and, honestly, better than us), but could never be bothered to think.
So there is plenty of bullshit to be called on this project, but since the narrative that surrounds it is so devoid of critical inquiry, I’m sure there are plenty of petulant street art fans who will hear none of this. And it shouldn’t stop you from going. Given how bland and polished the rest of this area is, you will no doubt see some really incredible stuff. But don’t forget what a snow job a big part of this is.
And since you will be right across the street, stop in and see something perhaps even more radical, though far more subtle. Jen Bekman (disclosure: who is a friend, though probably not happy with the association after this post) is hosting the latest edition of the Hot Shots !, which is the most democratic and subversive emerging artist opportunity I know of downtown: rather than depend on mostly inaccessible school programs, insiders, friends, or people who expect favors, she finds art in a manner that must be truly frightening to Art Basel hangers-on -- she invites strangers to submit. The results are shockingly contemporaneous in quality that what you would find across town. And she’s not going to hide it when it comes down Sunday.
Found always via this Permanent Link.
December 6, 2006
Don't even think of progress here. The mayor really is an all kinds of smoke out of doors kind of guy. The man who has sold the idea that the Republican model of ‘smaller government’ is best expressed by telling you not to eat at Dunkin’ Donuts. Of course, everyone one loves to tout the sheep in wolf’s clothing argument. If that is the case, then kudos to Mike’s clever interpretation of the liberal model of progressive taxation is renters subsidize homeowners.
But I digress. Why mention Mike when we should really be talking about Uncle Joe Bruno? Just because it’s congestion week, and Ken Livingston has the biggest cojones in congestion pricing these days, don’t expect diminutive Mike Bloomberg to throw down. This is, after all, a man who won’t fly commercial to his Caribbean hideway. But before you get all exercised thinking our mayor wouldn’t take on a limey, remember, he’s not afraid of the serious opponents. Like the Chinese. Particularly those selling Chow Fun.
Since Streetsblog has written all you need to know about congestion pricing, and I don’t care how expensive they make it to drive into Manhattan -- except to note, whatever it is, it ain’t enough, since all of New Jersey parks on my block on the weekend -- I decided take a skeptic’s position, but not because I enjoy being a jerk (a pleasure I pursue for its own rewards), but to try to establish some possible remedies that we can do without resorting to the sort of utopian bitterness that pervades so many car-free tracts.
First, a very provocative observation: Manhattan isn’t that congested. It’s true. For all the complaints about subsidized on street parking, and productivity lost, you can still travel a large percentage (if not majority) of the streets of Manhattan most of the day with about the same ease of any large metropolitan area, and find about as much parking.
"You obviously never take a cab up 6th Avenue at 5PM," you shout over the blare of honking horns. True, I do not. "And you never try to park downtown," you also counter. Also true: I don’t work for the city, so parking on sidewalks all over downtown is a perk unknown to me.
But the salient point here is that destination based driving (I want to go shop in SoHo! I need to drive to work so I can pick my kids from soccer on the way home!) is the source of most of our car-based congestion. It mirrors a set of behaviors learned in the suburbs: that cars are the best way to get somewhere, and, once there, parking must be absurdly proximate to the final destination. How many people think they can actually park within a block of the Apple Store in SoHo? I don’t want to know.
New Yorkers don’t drive much for a couple reasons: we live here, we know driving isn’t typically the fastest way to get somewhere, and we don’t own cars. Oh, and driving is fucking expensive. So charging people 10 bucks to drive to SoHo on a Saturday (even the most expensive congestion pricing in London tops out at $15) isn’t much of a deterrent, particularly when it costs $6 for the tunnel and $20 to park for an hour.
True deterrence would require managing all Manhattan entries south of the GWB, and treating everything south of 185th Street as a congestion zone, because there are strange race/class components to this -- though much of northern Manhattan is more easily traversed by car, there are plenty of bottleneck points up there. Do you want to explain why time and money is invested in making Houston Street passable on a Saturday night, but not 125th Street on a Saturday afternoon (and more practically, to deal with the overflow of people going up perimeter avenues to avoid the FDR). To say nothing of outer borough boulevards.
And that isn’t possible. Not because it isn’t a good idea, but because of Uncle Joe. Even with Spitzer looking to be a somewhat rational -- sorry, we're comparing him to Pataki: make that sentient -- human being, the two-headed devil of Silver/Bruno, coupled with the yokel upstate attitude evidenced by the state DOT (which controls most our street/traffic management) create the pitch perfect ode to shitty governing.
So we aren’t going to get congestion based tolls, or fares for entering zones (and I don’t know that such an idea even can be worked out). And we still have the prospect of nodal congestion issues (commuting, tunnel approaches, and some destination based driving -- Times Square, the EV weekend, etc.). So what can we do with the tools we have? My skeptic’s approach sees three options: cops, cops and parking meters:
First, cops: stop them from parking all over downtown. Well, not just them. Everyone. No more parking exemptions for city employees. No more lax enforcement of the above (mini-congestion management, since it would reduce a large number of river crossings daily).
Second, cops: let’s enforce the laws we have. Getting in and out of Manhattan at rush hour sucks. We can always make it worse by aggressively enforcing the laws we already have. Double parking, intersection blocking, multiple turning cars, speeding. All these things add to congestion and danger. If we can’t make it more expensive in money to get into the city, we can make it more time consumptive. It might not be so pleasant for those living on Hudson Street in the short term, but eventually it might improve. And if it doesn’t, DeNiro can buy them all dinner, since he probably suckered them into moving there in the first place. And, most crucially, start ticketing assholes who use the horn. It’s on the books, it’s a healthy fine, and it would make such a quality of life difference for residents.
Third, parking meters: Get rid of them. There’s no way you can make it practical to have meters reflect the value of parking. Are you going to put 24 quarters in a meter for 30 minutes? Who uses those meters anyway? Um, people driving into Manhattan, right? Anyone living here certainly won’t be giving up a street spot to drive across town.
Sure, there will be some fools who think they can commute to Manhattan with free all day parking available, but it will only take about a month for everyone with a car in a garage to get rid of it, take up residency on a curb and never move. Then, after a morning or two of circling for two hours for a spot, they will get the message. Get rid of all curbside parking on avenues and main cross streets (save delivery vehicles), and any meters on side streets (most of them are meter-free anyway).
Will this make Manhattan a pedestrian paradise? Probably not, but I hate most pedestrians too, so whatever. But put up breathalyzer checkpoints at the main exit routes of Manhattan for several consecutive weekends, and you would radically change the driving patterns in Manhattan. What would all this congestion improvement get us anyway? I don’t really care if everyone going home to Jersey suffers every night. And if they actually tore up some streets once we were so deliriously car free, they would only fill them with condos from Scarano and Kondylis.