Art & Culture

What do we miss when we’re not looking for stories? How are little-known stories preserved by chance? Are we participating in history simply by existing in public space?  Gulielma Elmore Sands and Levi Weeks were both boarders at 208 Greenwich Street in 1799. On the night of December 22, they planned to elope. Gulielma bundled up in a shawl and a hat to brave the cold night and find her soon-to-be husband. They were going out to meet somewhere private, she told another boarder. This was the last time Gulielma was seen alive. The next week, neighborhood residents claimed they saw an article of women’s clothing floating in Manhattan Well. Gulielma was missing. Her body was found eleven years later on January 2, 1800, with strangulation marks on her neck, in a well in Lispenard’s Meadow. Today, Lispenard’s Meadow is…

What does public art look like in New York City? What happens when the City changes, but the art remains the same? How does art in public space appeal to modern audiences if you can’t find it on social media? Walter De Maria is not a household name. Though he made large-scale, location-specific art pieces that have captured public attention in cities throughout the world, he kept a low profile in his life and career. He was a mystery to the press, seldom making public appearances or speaking out about his life or work. De Maria preferred to make art for outdoor spaces; wide accessibility to the public was essential to him, but he offered very little explanation for his art. Communicating what his pieces mean, it seems, was never De Maria’s priority. After his death in 2013, today’s audiences…

 What is the ownership of a work of art? Who has the rights to build–and/or destroy–art that is deemed disruptive? Who decides what story gets told? If you were alive in the 1930s, you knew Diego Rivera’s work. Known for his communism, his short temper, and his extremely detailed depictions of social and cultural life, he is regarded as one of the best visual artists of all time, and a shaper of the Mexican mural movement. In 1932, Nelson D. Rockefeller commissioned Diego Rivera to make a giant mural for the lobby of 30 Rockefeller Center. Although Rockefeller didn’t agree with Rivera’s politics, he was an acclaimed art collector and wanted to have work from the best artists of the day. River was undeniably on that list. Rockefeller paid Rivera $21,000 (or $361,362 in 2019!) to paint a 63-foot-long mural…

Who invented Tap dancing? How is self-expression shaped and developed? When does the geographical proximity of different cultures influence art? Williams Henry Lane was born free in Rhode Island in 1825. As a child, he moved to New York’s Five Points district–today, a section of the Financial District–where a lot of Irish and African Americans lived. The Five Points bustled with performance, drinking, gambling, and dance. It was a poor area, quickly becoming a “melting pot” as immigrant groups found their way to Lower Manhattan to live and work. Lane was initially a performer in minstrel shows, a popular form of American entertainment between 1830 and 1890. In minstrel shows, white performers (usually Irish men) appeared in blackface, imitating hideous stereotypes of African-American speech, music, and dance. Usually the skits and jokes made fun of slaves, and only white people…