Photos © 2015 Marilyn Stern
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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Bob Marley
pomeranian avocado shrimp sushi
"Lobster Bake"
empress & elf
king for a day
patient pirates
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Greetings from Jersey City
Jersey City is right across the Hudson from Manhattan. But most of my Manhattan friends have never or rarely been there. My friend Alan used to go there to buy acid, but not anymore. There are still plenty of head shops, but he can't get the acid he needs -- for his etching. Not just art supplies but plenty of artists have been forced out of J-City by the rapid development. Sleek towers of glass and steel line the waterfront where funky brick factories and warehouses used to be. Like the old Lorillard tobacco building on 1st Street, where some of my friends had art and printing studios.
Today more art is apt to be seen on the outside of buildings than inside. J-City could well be called the City of Murals. I thought I discovered a secret charm, some spontaneous outburst of anarchy and creativity. But no. It was a government program, specifically an intitiative by Mayor .... in (date). You can read about it: (URL).
Mayor ... claims to be helping to support artists. Yet a good portion of the muralists come from overseas, with glowing international reputations. Ie. their work adds status to J-City which helps real estate brokers sell their pricey properties. In fact, spontanteous street art -- graffitti -- is being driven out of town by these very murals.
Don't get me wrong. I love the murals, and celebrate them here. It's just an old story of the urban frontier in these parts: Artists settle, make the place attractive, then get forced out.
Still J-City has charm. Especially around the Grove Street PATH station where these pix were made. Enjoy. And go visit!
Chicken man CLOSE-UP
Today more art is apt to be seen on the outside of buildings than inside. J-City could well be called the City of Murals. I thought I discovered a secret charm, some spontaneous outburst of anarchy and creativity. But no. It was a government program, specifically an intitiative by Mayor .... in (date). You can read about it: (URL).
Mayor ... claims to be helping to support artists. Yet a good portion of the muralists come from overseas, with glowing international reputations. Ie. their work adds status to J-City which helps real estate brokers sell their pricey properties. In fact, spontanteous street art -- graffitti -- is being driven out of town by these very murals.
Don't get me wrong. I love the murals, and celebrate them here. It's just an old story of the urban frontier in these parts: Artists settle, make the place attractive, then get forced out.
Still J-City has charm. Especially around the Grove Street PATH station where these pix were made. Enjoy. And go visit!
JERSEY CITY MURALS
At Marin Blvd near 1st Street
Miss Liberty, the J-City view. DETAIL. On Bay Street about 1 block from Grove Street PATH
Miss Liberty and harbor views, stretching across several buildings on Bay St.
The work of multiple artists on walls around parking lot on Bay St.
DETAIL. Signed LNY/ Savage Habbit
Parking lot on Bay St.
Full mural by LNY/ Savage Habbit
(montaged together, as parked cars blocked my view from a single vantage point --
one of the drawbacks of parking-lot-as-gallery)
Chicken man surprise in cement window, Bay St.
Photo or painting? Grove St.
All photos are © 2014 Marilyn Stern
M Stern does not own © to the mural art.
They appear here as noncommercial documentary usage.
Any commercial use of these images is only by written permission
from M Stern AND the mural artists.
Thursday, August 27, 2015
Ocean Grove, NJ
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