Tuesday, December 2, 2014

Does this 'Alphabet City' mural on Avenue C represent the community?


[Photo by Bobby Williams]

If you've been over on the southwest corner of Avenue C and East Sixth Street in the last week or so, then you've likely seen the new mural in progress on the (rather mysterious) RCN Cable building.

The mural, called "Alphabet City," is the work of Brooklyn-based artists The Yok and Sheryo who work for the Jersey City-based arts group Green Villain.


[Photo last week by Magic Brian]

All this has arrived with controversy, according to The Villager:

Is RCN whitewashing Loisaida culture and history? Celebrated street artist Antonio "Chico" Garcia and the community group Loisaida Inc. are crying foul after the company nixed their plan to create a mural celebrating L.E.S. “heroes” on the RCN cable building on Avenue C.

Apparently RCN officials are still pissed at Chico for his unauthorized Obama-McCain murals back in 2008. (RCN finally had them painted over in 2010.)


[EVG photo from 2008]

Elizabeth Colon, a founder of Loisaida Inc., told The Villager, "Is that what they think the community is, ‘A, B, C, D’? When we were talking about representing 50 or 60 years of Lower East Side history?"

You can read the rest of The Villager piece here.

And here was how the RCN wall was looking back in the summer…



Previously on EV Grieve:
RCN Cable discovers 'illegal graffiti' two years later

23 comments:

VH McKenzie said...

Frankly, I think we've got more than enough Chico murals in the neighborhood already. All those portraits that are just slightly off-kilter and not in an intentional way, giving you the side eye by accident - meh, enough of that.

I like this mural and I hope to get a look at it in person before the locals tag the hell out of it. Putting on my coat…..

Anonymous said...

What, we're not allowed to have art from anyone but Chico???? I for one and pretty tired of the dude's sloppy ubiquity in the hood and welcome some fresh work from outside the "community"

nygrump said...

I just hope it won't be disrespectful to law enforcement while being accpeting of luxury values.

Anonymous said...

Chico sucks. It's enough already.

Anonymous said...

It's better than those craptastic plastic awning things they have on the fence around the future essex crossing - with cute ethnic community people - all of whom will not be allowed to live on the NEW IMPROVED LES/EV.

Anonymous said...

It looks good to me. Chico's stuff looks flat and boring IMO, and his protractors never loom anything like the people they're meant to portray. TIme for some new artistic blood in the hood.

Anonymous said...

sorry for typos above. His portraits don't look anything like the people they're supposed to portray...

Giovanni said...

That's why Picasso sucks too, none of those paintings looks anything like his subjects. Too bad he didn't just take up photography.

moe said...

Picasso could paint realistically very well when he chose to. Same with the great majority of fine artists that eventually chose a less directly representational style.
Chico on the other hand, not so much.
Hey God bless him he is old school and part of the fabric but let's not kid ourselves here.

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

The comparison to Picasso is ridiculous and who made Chico the EV's official artist in residence anyway? -- this wall looks like a pretty welcome change to me.

Anonymous said...

love chico's stuff; also like this mural. can't we have both?!

Giovanni said...

You know who sucked too? Walt Disney. None of his drawings look like the real thing. Does anyone think Donald Duck really looks like a real duck? And then there's Goofy.

Mickey's a mouse, Donald's a duck, Pluto's a dog... What the hell is Goofy?


PS: Ken, sorry dude, you've been trolled!

Anonymous said...

Believe it or not the history of the Lower East Side goes back even before the 1960s. Screw the race baiting by Chico and Rosie Mendez the history of the Lower East Side is not exclusively hispanic-Germans, Jews, Irish, Italian, Poles, Ukranians have made enormous contributions to the Lower East Side. Personally haven't cared for Chico since he put up that ugly mural honoring the British monarchy across from Stuy Town.

moe said...

Wrong again. Walt Disney almost certainly drew nothing you have ever seen. Everything you are calling Disney came from his amazing roster of studio artists. Disney was in most ways the force and genius behind the enterprise, but only in the earliest days did he draw any characters, and even then they were studies, prototypes, not the production images and animation the public is familiar with.

I once read somewhere that he was a pretty decent draftsman and had done some advertising art as a very young man, but I don't know what or where that is, if in fact it exists.

Anonymous said...

Giovanni, I don't understand why you are repeatedly comparing Chico to artists who obviously were not trying to depict their subjects naturalistically, which Chico clearly is. Are you seriously suggesting Chico is on par with Picasso? Laughable.

Anonymous said...

My favorite incredibly bizarre Chico pairing: Mother Theresa and Princess Di on the same mural. "In memory of royalty and holiness." You couldn't make this stuff up in a parody.

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

Like Moe said.

Walt Disney was an amazing producer, but he did not design or animate the first Mickey Mouse. By around 1930 he mostly stopped drawing altogether and was acting his cartoons out for his animators.

Anonymous said...

I like Chico a lot, but I also think it's great to see some fresh art in the neighborhood.

Anonymous said...

A few weeks ago people were complaining about the tags on the side of some building, today they are complaining about Keith Haring and Chico? Is this EV Grieve or Art 101? It's art, either you like it or you don't, but it's still art and at least it's part of the real EV unlike Taylor Swift. If you don't like it that's your problem.

Anonymous said...

That was supposed to be Mother Theresa and Princess Di? I thought it was E.T. and Wayne Gretzky!

Scuba Diva said...

Anonymous said:

My favorite incredibly bizarre Chico pairing: Mother Theresa and Princess Di on the same mural. "In memory of royalty and holiness." You couldn't make this stuff up in a parody.

Oh, I loved the "In Memory of Royalty and Holiness" mural. Hey, I don't make this stuff up, folks.

Hey, and kids: Chico is home-grown, unlike certain 3-month wonders who call themselves "New Yorkers."

Anonymous said...

Not the biggest fan of Chico, but not in love with this either, Meh either way

Anonymous said...

Sorry guys...Chico is fine. He was here doing murals when nobody would come anywhere near alphabet city and always tapped into the pulse of the community, it's history and the people that saved it from the wrecking ball.....and he's from the neighborhood. A neighborhood mural done by people from outside the 'hood? Are you all crazy?