Inspire Your Heart with Public Art Throughout Our Neighborhoods

Our neighborhoods are world-renowned for serving as home to countless transformative artists and artistic movements over the years. But you don’t have to be invited to an artist’s loft to experience the beauty and inspiration of their work. The public art that abounds in Greenwich Village and the East Village lets us take that imaginative journey every day on our streets— and for free! Here are just a few essential spots in our neighborhoods.

“Untitled (Self Portrait),” Keith Haring

Pop artist Keith Haring launched his far-too-short but still-spectacular creative career in the East Village. It’s fitting, then, that one of the largest representations of Haring’s work in the city stands 12 feet high at the intersection of St. Mark’s Place and Third Avenue. The large, green, dancing “Untitled (Self Portrait),” installed at the corner in 2014, is based on a 1989 Haring sculpture that’s just one-third the size. (An even larger, 30-ft.-tall version of the piece has graced AIDS Garden Chicago since 2019.)

“Untitled” is one of several large-scale Haring pieces in our communities. Also dating from 1989 is the mural “Once Upon a Time,” in the Keith Haring Bathroom of the LGBT Community Center (208 West 13th Street). The mural was created for The Center Show, a celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, and is available for public viewing during the Center’s operating hours. Haring’s larger Carmine Street Mural was installed in 1987 next to the pool of the Tony Dapolito Recreation Center at Clarkson and Varick Streets; the center and the pool have unfortunately been closed for the past five years, with the City claiming the landmarked structure is beyond repair and may have to be demolished. (Learn more about our efforts to preserve the Dapolito Center here.)

First Avenue and East 11th Street

The East Village intersection offers a two-fer on building-size public art. The five-story structure on the southeast corner features a mural honoring Michael Jackson by Brazilian street artist Eduardo Kobra, installed in July 2018. The technicolor painting depicts both the younger Jackson 5–era singer and the “king of pop” in the latter 20th century. “The mural itself is not a simple tribute to MJ,” Kobra told TimeOut New York in 2019. “My entire idea was to show the transformations he went through during his entire life: from black to white, kid to adult, from natural to unnatural.”

Then, just two months after the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg in September 2020, a bright three-story-tall mural honoring her legacy by New York–based street artist Elle took its place on the southwest corner of the intersection. The collage of the notable, quotable, Brooklyn-born Supreme Court justice was curated by the public art charity LISA Project NYC. 

“RBG stands as the centerpiece of the mural,” Elle said upon completion of the artwork. “The flowers to the bottom left are black-eyed Susans, which represent justice. Above that, the Brooklyn Bridge [signifies] her childhood borough. Above her head [are] hints of a crown composed of her many collars, as well as a gentle nod to Biggie, the namesake of her nickname Notorious RBG.” The piece also features the interior of the Library of Congress ceiling and “The Contemplation of Justice,” a statue outside the Supreme Court building in the nation’s capital.

Subway mosaics

Subway stations below ground also offer unique opportunities to be inspired by art. In 1994, pioneering artist and clinical social worker Lee Brozgol installed “The Greenwich Village Murals” along the walls of the Christopher Street–Stonewall station under Seventh Avenue South.

The vignettes of community history in the murals showcase children’s composite drawings, inspired and guided by an artist concerned with “identity” and its portrayal. Brozgol had intended to devote each of the four panels to one famous person, “but the Village is so rich in amazing characters who shaped America that picking only 12 was impossible.” With students from Greenwich Village’s P.S. 41, he found space for some 40 people arranged into four groups: Founders, Providers, Bohemians, and Rebels. The entire 1993 artwork honors the many individuals who made the neighborhood a focal point of artistic and political activity. (Read more about the history of Christopher Street transit here.)

A few avenues away, “Broadway Diary” by Canadian-born artist Timothy Snell features 40 “portholes” looking out onto local scenes and historic sites (such as Grace Church, Washington Square Park, Cooper Union, and Astor Place) from the walls of the Eighth Street–New York University station. Installed in 2005, the mosaics of varying sizes are scattered throughout the station, offering “moments of diversion … for people waiting and small surprises for repeat travelers in transit through this station,” the artist said. “The repeat of elements like the cyclist through a series of panels in a loose use of line and color was a device to add motion and allow more abstract considerations to enter into the work with the hook of recognizable subject matter.”

City-as-School Mural

Last but not least is the mural at Hudson Street between West Houston and Clarkson Streets, on the walls of City-as-School, the city’s oldest alternative public high school. The 200,000-sq-ft. artwork from New York–based Argentine muralist Magda Love and the aforementioned Kobra is the largest mural in New York City. 

After working as a mentor with the school’s music and arts department, Love came up with the idea of doing a mural on the school’s enormous west-facing wall, prominently visible as it faced a block-long, empty City-owned lot. She collaborated with students over the course of several months to develop a design. Kobra later approached the school, hoping to contribute to the project by working with students on a mural on the wall just south of Love’s. 

Completed in 2018, the artwork covers the whole facade along the entire block. Love’s side draws from the aesthetic of folkloric Mexican art and features a woman engulfed by brightly hued exotic flora, psychedelic imagery, and celestial forms. Kobra’s section offers multicolored, geometric, painted tiles that depict immigrants who entered the city through Ellis Island. (Read more about the mural’s and school’s history here.)

Unfortunately, about half the mural could be hidden from view depending on the City’s plans for 388 Hudson Street, the structure being proposed for the empty lot next to the school. Read more about our campaign to ensure responsible planning for the site here.