Blooming Under 59th Street

"It's for workers.  I had this vision of people getting up really early, half in a dream state, putting on their clothes, drinking a cup of coffee and getting on the subway to go to work.."     

Elizabeth Murray

   Whether Elizabeth Murray, the creator of this mural entitled "Blooming" (1996) truly had the workers in mind when she designed this artwork in not in question.  What is in question is the effect this space has upon these workers.  She further adds, ''A lot of people don't look. But they hesitate a second before they walk in. I think it's the color. They are hit by the color in some way.''   Hit is an understatement.  Assaulted is more accurate.  Jarred, bludgeoned, accosted,  or assailed are also appropriate adjectives to describe the sensation which strikes one rising from the number 4/5 platform. Perhaps Murray is right about the color, or more precisely the garish use of color, or maybe it is the bulbous, graffiti like shapes which conjure in each person threatening images from the City's collective unconscious of 1970's Manhattan where rampant graffiti and violence in the subways was the accepted norm. 

The natural instinct is for one not to stop and linger in wonderment at the artist's bold use of color but to quickly identify which escalator will take one out of this room as quickly as possible.  It does not give the worker a reprieve on his morning commute, but helps ensure he moves along as quickly as possible. 

 

Borough Hall Faience

The tile work in the Borough Hall station is a  celebration of the subway's arrival into Brooklyn (January 9th, 1908) just 10 years after Brooklyn joined New York City.   Grand, bas relief wreaths set into deep mosiac freize frame the BH monogram.  Above the monogram a green egg and dart moulding caps the wall. The large intricate name panels hang like tapestries and are almost identical to the ones found in Times Square.

The medallions themselves were produced by Grueby Pottery out of South Boston.  Grueby is the most collectible and desirable of American potteries, and for that reason difficult to find, with the exception of the NYC subway stations Astor Place, Bleeker Street, 28th Street, Columbus Circle, and many of the stations along the Lexington Ave Line.  One can also find Grueby tiles on the crossing floor at the Catherdral of St John the Devine on Amsterdam Ave, installed around 1910.

Grueby first introduced his matte green glaze in 1897 which quickly became a symbol of the Arts and Crafts movement and garnered world wide acclaim.  It was sold throughout the United States and Europe by Gustav Stickley, Tiffany & Co., and Marshall Fields.  Today it still remains the most sought after pottery from the Arts and Crafts period.

 

77th Street Downtown 6

 

One of two glass mosaics, entitled "4 Seasons Seasoned," installed in 2004 by Robert Kushner in the 77th Street station of the East Side IRT, it was fabricated by the Miotto Mosaic Art Studios.

"My intention is for people to enter the station, pass through the turnstile, look up and take note, and then go on with their days feeling a little lighter, having glimpsed something beautiful for a passing moment. As people come and go from this stop, either to their job, home, Lenox Hill Hospital, Central Park, or the museums in the neighborhood, recreation, culture, work or healing are often on their minds. Flowers can be associated with all of these activities and become particuarly apt subject matter for this station."
Robert Kushner

Among Kushner's great influences are Uzbek tribal embroideries and Japanese kimonos. Author Justin Spring writes of Kushner’s vision as “work that is sensual and extravagant, but nonetheless has a certain unexpected roughness and drama. In this use of strong contrasts and cross cultural borrowing, these works remind me of other landmarks of western exoticism: the Guerlain perfume Shalimar, for example, with its dense layering of eastern and western scents (musk, flowers, citrus) into a single, heady evocation of Middle-Eastern sensuality; or Borodin’s fusion of Central Asian and Western musical tradition in his Polovetsian dances for the opera Prince Igor; or Bakst’s imaginative reinterpretation of the orient in his designs for the Ballet Russes’ Scheherezade.”

Not only may Kushner's work may be found in the NYC subway, it may also be viewed at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Modern Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The National Gallery of Art, The Corcoran Gallery of Art, The Philadelphia Museum of Art, The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Denver Art Museum, The Contemporary Museum in Honolulu, The J. Paul Getty Trust in Los Angeles, The Tate Gallery in London, Galleria degli Ufizzi in Florence, and Museum Ludwig in St. Petersburg.

9/11, Friday Morning Commute

Friday morning, 14th Street Union Square subway station. Approximately 30 police officers stand at attention in dress uniform outside the underground precinct.  The low ceiling makes their number seem twice as many. At 8:46 AM a bugle begins Taps. Rising from the subway platform when the first note sounds I am immediately frozen. A less aware commuter following a bit too close, bumps into my shoulder.  More people stop. The bugle resonates, the sound reflects off  the hard surfaces, the white subway tiles, the steel I-Beams, the concrete floors. Each note fills the space, penetrates every crevice, every corner. Above ground it can be heard as well. A low murmur. A distant ghost. When the bugle finishes bagpipes begin. Amazing Grace plays. By now a crowd clusters around the officers, silent.

Around the corner from the underground police station, stretching the entire length of the corridor, approximately 50 or so meters, are the names. They are not carved in stone, nor set in bronze. Instead, they are printed on labels. One label to one tile, and one name to each label, 2,752 in all.

In the days after 9/11, 14th Street was the boundary in which people were not allowed to pass. It is fitting that this unofficial memorial should be here, and remain here after eight years.

Boba Fett Live at Union Square

Boba Fett does indeed play the accordion, and can be heard just steps away from the northwest entrance to the 14th Street Union Square subway.

Ahhh, how the sounds of Paris sounded from the work of his deadly hands. Who knew the ruthless bounty hunter had a soft side? Or perhaps the falling crime rate, and growing unemployment in NYC  forced him to this rather undignified station.

It is rather strange that many Americans associate the accordion with France, and France with Paris, and Paris with love (i.e. passionate sex). Why is this? In my Brooklyn neighborhood, I often see a hipster girl in front of a ramshackle bookstore playing the accordion on Saturdays. How do Americans even learn this instrument?