2018 Favorites, and Looking to 2019….
Last week we looked at readers’ top five choices of 2018. Today, check out some of our favorites :
Who Doesn’t Love Carole Teller?
A resident of the East Village for over fifty years, Carole Teller so beautifully and thoroughly documented her neighborhood’s architecture, daily life, and many quirks, that we had to dole it out in multiple parts (see Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, and Carole’s collection of photos of the Godfather Part II being filmed on the streets of the East Village). In 2018 we explored several mysteries from Carole’s collection, trying and (sometimes) succeeding in identifying their location. In this post, we look at her mid-1990s documentation of Jenny Holzer’s Times Square art installation, Truisms.
Truisms spoke to the passersby down below in huge flashing lights, raising questions about consumerism, politics, and our collective conscience in this most appropriate location. It’s especially nice to read about these “truths” before reading our next post…
That Time We (Easily) Caught Donald Trump in a Big Fat Money-Grubbing Lie
Unfortunately, this headline doesn’t shock anyone. It was much of the same back in 2006, when the Trump SoHo Condo-Hotel began marketing units. The advertising clearly showed what we and so many others had been contending all along – that a condo-hotel inherently violated the zoning for this district AND the building was being marketed not only as a hotel but as a primary or secondary residence. In this case, the truth is the truth. Read the story here.
100 Year Anniversary of WWI Armistice
The “War To End All Wars” ended on November 11, 1918. Spoiler alert: it didn’t end all wars. In this post, we explore some of the connections between WWI and the Village.
GVSHP Oral History Collection
This post highlights GVSHP’s extensive Oral History collection. Through 2018, we have conducted almost fifty oral histories. In 2019, we have four more planned for release including affordable housing icon Val Orselli, B&H owners Fawzy and Ola Abdelwahed, GVSHP’s current president and decades-long Villager Art Levin, and former Strand owner Fred Bass, who unfortunately passed away right after we finished recording. Stay tuned for their release!