WHERE THE PAINT ’ S ALWAYS WET
SAM REINDERS TAKES A STROLL AROUND BUSHWICK , NEW YORK ’ S LIVING ART GALLERY
I ’ m surrounded by a motley crew : a middle-aged South Korean lady with a sensible hat , a Spanish couple who are backpacking through the US and a sweet family of four from midwestern Ohio on school holiday to the Big Apple . Our intrepid tattoo-bedecked tour leader is guiding us through “ the largest art gallery ” in the world . Canvases stretch kilometres .
Instead of hushed silences and well-timed oohs and aahs , a lady excuses herself as she squeezes through the group with her weekly shopping and a hipster traipses past , kombucha in hand , rolling her eyes as she negotiates past us to what looks like a large industrial factory , but is probably her home .
I ’ m doing a tour of Bushwick ’ s street art . The canvases here are small factories , lampposts , garage doors , post boxes , poles , doors , ATMs , walls , benches , subways ... well , every possible nook and cranny of space .
Bushwick is a suburb of New York ’ s Brooklyn . You have to cross the river from Manhattan , but it ’ s an easy hop , skip and jump to get here ( take the L-train from Union Square , jump off at Morgan Avenue and head from Bogart Street towards Troutman ). And as there are no overheads for security or climate control for Mona ’ s smile or dusting Monet ’ s lilies , the tour is free . Just because it isn ’ t the Met or
Bushwick is just a hop , skip and L-train from Manhattan .
© VILCHEZ / SHUTTERSTOCK
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CANVASES HERE ARE SMALL FACTORIES , LAMPPOSTS , GARAGE DOORS , POST BOXES , DOORS , ATMS , WALLS , BENCHES , SUBWAYS ... EVERY POSSIBLE NOOK AND CRANNY
© REINDERS
Above : Small hands and big heads . Right : Bushwick street art tour .
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MoMA , though , doesn ’ t mean it isn ’ t art at its finest ( although Van Gogh might cut off more than an ear at the thought of it all ). I struggle to keep up with the jargon and the who ’ s who in this quirky zoo : there ’ s tagging , stencilling , throwies , rollers and stickering , by the likes of Icy & Sot , Nychos (“ like the chip ?” asks the 13-year old from Ohio ), BuffMonster and Jerkface . South Africa ’ s Faith47 represents too . They ’ re artists – many of them respected and well paid – from around the globe who ’ ve come to mark their territory in a spot where it ’ s legal . Well , mostly ...
The gentrification game in Bushwick is strong . Every time I visit the hipsters seem to have mutated , doubled . For every great mural there ’ s an artisanal bagel shop or vegan cookie vendor . As we pass the notorious Roberta ’ s pizzeria ( it holds a Michelin star and counts Beyoncé and Hillary Clinton as regulars ), chef Anthony pops out with the trash . Accustomed to groups of people staring up at the graffiti-marked façade of his restaurant , he stands and smiles proudly . Roberta ’ s is one of the longest-standing establishments in the area and Anthony has witnessed the changes in this ‘ hood , from dodgy industrial zone to hipster haven and everything in between . Even his trashcans are sprinkled with stickers and tags . “ Nothing is safe here ,” he chuckles . “ Except the pizza , that is .”
The beauty of all this ? On your next trip to New York you can do it all again , and it ’ ll be different . There ’ s no permanent collection here . Yesterday ’ s artwork is simply a blank canvas for someone else . The paint here is always wet .
52 // MAKE MEMORIES FOR LIFE